New Holland Foudre Project

For the last several months I've been researching Foudre's ( The French method of spelling - while the Dutch way is "foeder"). The opportunity arose when I took over the barrel aging program for New Holland. The sour program had already trippled its barrel count, but that came with the hard realization that the work of tasting and blending each barrel is, in fact, an arduous task. With the post-blending reflection of Blue Sunday, I knew there had to be a better, more efficient way of blending bulk sour beer. The answer was Foudre's.

I asked Brett if I could begin researching and constructing a proposal. His reply - "Yeah, let's get some!" So I began searching. By talking to brewmaster Tim Hawn of Dogfish Head, Lauren Salazar of New Belgium, they were able to point me in a direction. Still, contacting numerous cooperages, barrel brokers, brewers, and tonnellerie was the bulk of the work. Months of digging and numerous dead ends later, I started to find some options. But, they were either far to expensive, too small, old, lacking structural insurance, or just crap. Finally I found Seguin Moreau, a barrel broker/cooperage that seemed to have the perfect option - 9 x 45hl horizontal French oak Foudre's that had just been emptied of white wine. Upon receiving this notification, a proposal was sent to everyone that could have influence on the financial decision of their purchase. This took more time than expected.  I had let the team know the urgency of this deal, particularly because within a week 3 had already been called for. This got things moving. 

My arguments for getting our Foudre's:

 - Increased sour volume, decreased needed barrel space

 - Ease of blending one tank versus tasting and blending 20+ barrels

 - Consistency across vintages

 - Stability of vessel and potentially indefinite use

 - Decreased oxidation
 - Decreased potential of infecting "non-soured" beers

 - Opportunity to expand variety of NHBC's sours

A successful proposal, a fast reaction and several meetings later, our Foudre's we stuffed into a 40' flatbed and on their way from France to Holland, Michigan!

So what's a foudre?
Foudre's are large oak vats, that can range from a couple hundred gallons, up to several thousand (think of Dogfish Head's Palo Santo Vats). Prior to the universal adoption of stainless steel, ALL beer was fermented and matured on wood. By the early 20th century, using oak was nearly phased out except for traditional brewing cultures around Europe. Today, they are primarily utilized in the wine industry to impart the tannic qualities of the wood. However, sometimes these vats become spent - wherein the time it takes to extract those lignan characteristics from the wood becomes longer and longer to reach that acceptable level for that particular wine. Similarly, occasionally a batch of wine will become infected with a known variant of Brettanomyces. Once in there, it is near impossible to get rid of thus rendering the vessel a festering tub of uselessness and a point of further contamination for the rest of the winery.
Brewers love when that happens....

I should note that distilleries rarely use anything larger than the common 53 gallon barrel due to the SA to volume ratio of wood to spirit. Extraction is minimal, and time is exhaustingly long to get the same desired oak/vanillin elements.

So these barrels are put on the market by brokers and cooperages and the brewers these days are snatching them up like no other!

The Plan?

Our Foudre's that arrived April 23rd, are 45 hl (38 barrels or 1188 gallons) Horizontal oak tanks roughly 6 feet wide and 7+ feet long. They came with large oak floor craddles, and all the stainless accessories - Drain valve, beer valve, sample port, sight glass, and manway door - as well as a large rubber bung at the top.
The plan currently is to use two of them for Blue Sunday. The rest will be used for a few new brands we are testing the waters with, that have yet to be publicly announced.

Stay tuned as the barrel program flourishes!


Tim Faith

Brewing Kvass at New Holland Brewing Co.

I first heard of Kvass during my Junior year in college whereupon I was researching different possibilities  of making beer. This went along with my interests of other fermentates such as Kefir, Kombucha, Saurkraut etc...

Conveniently, my brother at the time worked at a Hyvee Bakery in Iowa City. Almost daily they threw away their stale bread, without even giving it to any soup kitchen or anything. My senior year, I asked Luke if he could save me a couple boxes worth of the bread. Weeks later, he had accumulated three larges containers worth of predominantly stale white and wheat loaves. I knew that traditionally Kvass was formulated on rye and other dark breads, but I had to use what was available.

First kvass Homebrew (Feb. 2011)

My first attempt was a bit of a crap shoot. I sliced all the bread into smaller pieces, threw a couple pounds of malted wheat along with clove, cinnamon sticks and bay leaves, all into the mash. I don't particularly remember the rest of my procedures, but do recall that it was fermented with a wild (house cultured) yeast and blended with Lemon and Kombucha. This sat for nearly six months to fully reach its potential. The finished product tasted extremely similar to a pilsner and was just as bright!
I brought a bottle to my interview at New Holland.

Brew Day inventory (300+ Loaves)

Fast forward a couple years later from my first kvass brewday and I got the opportunity to brew a version on a commercial 10 bbl system at New Holland's brewpub. I had been collecting bread from various festivals for nearly 4 months prior. Similarly, De'Boer's bakery would drop off the occasional box of hardly stale, sliced bread; and I would frequent Crust 54 on most weekends to pick up what was left of the stale bread. By February I had accumulated nearly 300 loaves, all that was left was tank space and a brew day to fit into the schedule.
Brew Day

Every type of bread

April 2 rolled around and I had my opening. The night before I took all the bread out of the pub freezer and let it defrost in the brewhouse area. I had planned my recipe around some traditional aspects, but with the intention of balance and complexity.



To the mash:
 - 200 Ibs Pilsner Malt
 - 50 Ibs various malted grain (Abbey, Special B, Ruby, Pale, Crystal 45)
 - 300 Loaves of bread (Wheat, White, Rye, Raisin, Spiced, Multigrain, even some cheddar bread!)
 - 20 x Cinnamon Sticks
 - 1 Ib crushed Coriander

The decision behind this recipe was to use the malt to be more of a fermentable sugar and biscuit backbone to fuel the bready flavor profile. Using just the bread would not get my intended gravity of 2-3.5% ABV (though the traditional Kvass stands only between .5% and 1.5% ABV). Similarly, Kvass utilized whatever ingredients could offer a source of sugar, therefore to comply with that tradition, I used whatever stale grains that were left in partial bags around the brewery. The cinnamon sticks and coriander further encouraged some bready, spiced complexity.
I preheated the mash and began mixing in the grain. Once all the grain was added, I continued to maintain temperature around 160 to ensure enough body and residual sugar in the finished product. My next step was to add the bread. This took quite sometime, as half the loaves were whole and unsliced. I did my best to slice all the bread. The mashing process took a little over an hour. One recommendation here is to use as much water as possible so as you work on adding the bread, the grain bed settles and the makes its own floating mash and doesn't make a sticky aggregate of soup, thus potentially clogging the mash when it comes to sparging.

Filled the entire Mash-Tun with bread!

The run-off went well and the boil lasted 90 min, during which 1 Ib of cascade was added and 2.5 gallons of molassas. I used our normal house yeast for fermentation of which will take an undecided extent of time. Gravity came out to be around 9.5 Plato, and it's finishing around 4.5-5.0 Plato. This ultimately will get us an alcohol of 2.5% ABV...Perfectly sessionable. The wort smelled of ginger snap cookies and toasted rye bread.

I will post tasting notes upon its packaging.

Cheers!

Tim

Sticky mashout

2013 Barrel Aged Night Tripper

Night Tripper is a really special beer for us, in that it is one of the few large beers we make that isn't barrel aged. It still ages, however - on stainless steel for at least 4 months - developing, mellowing and improving in complexity the longer it sits.

Nevertheless, we couldn't resist putting it in barrels.

5 of them to be exact.

The best thing about barrel aging small batches is you can stow them away and forget about them, only to return every so often upon remembering they're still there, and taste them.

With the most recent batch, I had several varieties of barrels each filled with this sweet dark nectar. Some rum, some bourbon and some whiskey. 

Aging ranged from 8 months to over a year! While a few barrels were finished off in our very own Zeppelin Whiskey barrels.

Blending was easy, working with 5 barrels, compared to the 130 + it takes for blue sunday.

I took the three best barrels at that point and trial blended them (just in tasting glasses). It was magnificent.

Finalized it that day and pulled those three barrels together in our small batch specialty tank.

The kicker? 

It was 16.6 % ABV!!!

Cheers.

Weekend/Day Beer Adventures: Sour Beer tasting in the Quad Cities

Man, has it been a while since I last posted. After such a long hiatus, I'm going to get to posting again, and limit other external distractions that have prevented my time for posting (i.e. facebook).
Here is a tasting I attended at Against The Grain Brewery & Alehouse a while ago. Rich is trying to host one at least every quarter. Everyone brought a bottle or two as an entry into the event. It was limited, which was nice - as everyone had an opportunity to try everything in an adequate amount.
One of the show cases of the night was a 50+ year old Belgian Sour that had made its way from a deceased mans basement collection in the 1950's through several Ebay driven beer geeks hands into the Quad Cities. Anyway here is what we tried:

Lindemans Cuvee Rene

White wine complexity and grapes skins. Balanced along with fruit and apricots

50 yr old Belgian Lambic

Musty kombucha and slightly acidic

The Bruery's Mother Funker

Lemon sour warhead and warm pineapple undertones

Crooked Stave L'Brett D'or

Malty, fresh fruit finish and peach pith notes. Grapefruit and muscat grape

Mikkeller Sour Bitch

 Definitely more faint. A dry tannic lycée fruit element

Brouwerij Fonteinen - Schaerbeeske Kriek

 Barnyard smell and scratch and sniff aging cherries. Smells and tastes medicinal. Acidic finish

Crooked Stave Nightmare on Brett

Blended plum fruitiness complexity. A little hot dry empty/hollow. Still green

Cuvee De Ranke

Balanced tart plum. Encourages a swollen tongue

Brouwerij Fonteinen Oude Geuze

Nectarines. Lots of hops bite in back of throat. Dandelion notes in the finish

The Bruery's Sour in the Rye

Rye malt is heavy in character with some caramel. Really sour bite at finish and grapefruit aftertaste

Note: this was my first actual sour beer tasting! Thanks to all the QC folk who invited me.

Not pictured: New Holland Blue Sunday and New Holland MI Nightmare

New Holland Ginger Kombucha

We tapped this on Friday (Jan 4th) alongside Night Tripper. I'm realizing that it takes about a month to complete a batch of Kombucha, and I'm going to try to stick to that, give or take. I had influence for this one from Unity Vibration, and the fact that we had extra ginger laying around our spice cabinet. Tasted Sunday afternoon at the pub!
Pint Served
4.5% ABV

Appearance: Pale blonde in color with a hint of opacity. Upon the pour, it retains a nice white foam head of about a 1/4" but after several minutes it is reduced to a white ring around the glass. Clarity is impressive for lack of filtration and crashing. The intermittent bubble can be seen rising to the surface.
Aroma: As the pint was put in front of me, I got an immediate whiff of funk acidity. The scent is interesting, faintly reminiscent of under-ripe "Red Delicious" Apples. To compliment, undertones of orange peel and coriander are present. Phenols run high.
Taste: The carbonation hits the palate quick, and lasts through the rest of the tasting experience. Interestingly I get a lot of lemon rind flavors, of which I DID add to this. This flavor is prolonged on into the finish. I get a lot of interesting esters from the preliminary fermentation of the yeast, which faintly give off a character of artificiality but also clove and obvious ginger. As the kombucha beer warms, more of an ester/cidery flavor develops, which is quite pleasant.
Mouthfeel: Carbonation is extremely fine, but nevertheless in high concentration as it foams up on the sides of the mouth and down the throat. Quite a light body in comparison to the Unity Vibrations Triple Goddess Ginger Kombucha, and finishes extremely dry and quenching.
Overall Impression: I'm pretty happy with this one, especially for the balance of spice, kombucha, sweetness and alcohol. For now, I'd like to focus on getting those esters down, which may mean making bigger batches and crashing the yeast out. In case you get to try this, I also added bitter orange peel, lemon peel and coriander, alongside a generous portion of ginger. Enjoy!

Unity Vibrations Ginger Kombucha

Tasted at the plant with Jeff Dyke on Saturday afternoon as I was homebrewing a Nugget IPA. I purchased this beer from Kings Cove in Holland. Thanks to Dennis Kotecki for bringing Unity Vibrations out here!

Appearance: A pale straw color and a lot more clear then I was expecting. Still some haze is present. At first there looks to be very little carbonation, but as it sits, quite a few bubbles begin to grow along the sides.
Aroma: Initially I get a note of somewhat of a solvent/artificial scent in conjunction with an orange/lemon juice concentrate characteristic. Strong perfume.
Taste: Similar to the aroma, I get a boastful note of orange and lemon in the foretaste. To follow is a rich sweetness that gives depth and quaffability to the beers flavor. Ultimately the reidual sweetness balances the otherwise dominant emon, solvent, ginger and orange flavors that would otherwise overpower. The aftertaste is reminiscent of cider.
Mouthfeel: Thicker than many kombuchas I've had. Carbonation is minimal, but enough to add a nice texture, though it may over enhance the solventy orange flavor. Finish is semi-dry, with a cloy at the roof of the mouth.
Overall Impression: This kombucha has more of a residual sweetness than many I've had. In fact, it's the sweetest, thickest one yet. I don't know if a lot of that sugar was intentionally left unfermented. However, the spices are a unique far between twist on this crafted beverage. For my own learning, I may try to up the ginger on my next batch at New Holland.


Check them out, Michigan's Kombucha Brewery: Unity Vibration

Autumnal Mole Stout

Thanks to the Smith twins for giving me this beer during christmas weekend. We had a dinner party at Brandon Gittelman's where I received this beer. Tasted Saturday at the plant while brewing a Nugget IPA.

Appearance: Upon opening the can, a burst of foam spurted out. The pour erupted in a 2" head, that stood for several seconds before quickly dissipating and falling back into the beer. An adequately dark beer, that thins out around the edges. After several minutes, there is nothing on top of the beer, not a bubble...I'm guessing from the oils derived from using actual mole.
Aroma: Roasted malt and rich notes of acrid coffee compose most of the aroma, followed by undertones of vegetable, chilies and spice(think cinnamon and nutmeg.n the mole
Taste: A bit acidic and acrid in the front, noteably derived from the cocoa and/or coffee in mole. I was looking for more sweetness in this beer, instead I got an acidic, tannic flavor that nevertheless still maintains a lot of the key ingredients in mexican mole. I get the peppers, both toasted and fresh, along with cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice among others. I would have thought, given from the cans description, the lactose would boost the body and sweetness. Instead I got nothing of that.
Mouthfeel: Thin and highly carbonated. Very little body and the carbonation doesn't help this. Drying and leaves a slightly sour aftertaste (the beer is not sour).
Overall Impression: Meh, some easy fixes in this beer, but just didn't have it going for it. The body was very thin, especially for adding lactose. The Cocoa contributed an acrid astringency. Oils from the mole may have reduced the head. It was fun picking it all out, but probably nothing I'd drink again.

Unity Vibrations Raspberry Kombucha Beer

This was my first and only purchase from Sicilianos during my first time checking them out. Tasted Sunday morning while drinking tea and brewing my own batch of kombucha.
Snifter Served
8% ABV

Appearance: Upon pour, the beer takes on almost a fluorescent, radioactive pink/red appearance. In the glass, the beer is partially cloudy with very little carbonation (even the crack of the bottle cap let out only the slightest hiss). No head stands atop the liquid.
Aroma: Fruity, funky and choked full of raspberry aromatics. Some of the esters perfuming from the glass give a faint rubbing alcohol/cleaner scent.
Taste: My first impression was that this tasted extremely similar of mead with a strong phenolic backbone and estery spice beginning in the mid taste an growing thereafter. However, the proceeding samples gradually came off more and more medicinal, especially with the compliment of the raspberries. As it warms, more of the familiar vinegar/acetic flavor emerges.

Mouthfeel: There is still some residual sugar left over from the bottle conditioning and perhaps pre-mature crashing. This helps add a bit of body to the otherwise strongly acidic and light textured mouthfeel. No carbonated feel.
Overall Impression: Certainly an interesting beverage. Something I would buy a pint of again if I saw it at a bar? Sure, to support the brewery, but to buy in the bottle again for $3.59 again? not a chance. Not especially drinkable given the strong phenolic and sugary flavors. With that 8% ABV, I think a second addition of sugar was too much. And the raspberries further added to the medicinal flavor.

Check them out: Unity Vibration Kombucha

Enjoy By 12-21-12

Tasted Friday night hanging at Jen's parent at their new basement bar. Jen found this bottle at Hy-vee by asking for it as it was hidden behind the counter. We broke it out around 10 pm on 12.21.12.

Appearance: Golden and pristinely bright. A nice frothy white head is well sustained. Lacing is cascaded and wet. A gorgeous appearance.
Aroma: Clean, fresh and very aromatic. Reminiscent of pine, and fresh tropical fruit, specifically melon and zesty orange
Taste: Mango and papaya erupt in a strong citrus and tropical citrus. This dominates the majority of the fore flavor. The middle is nicely balanced by a light fruity complexity. To finish is a faint note of ester and alcohol. Finally the aftertaste holds a brief element of pine, but ever so slight.
Mouthfeel: Minimal carbonation, but the way it is incorporated into the beer adds a different sensation. It seems, how ever so slight, the carbonation stands apart. Light body and very refreshing.
Overall Impression: Yup, everything the bottle says is true. I like the change up from the typical expectation from Stone which is the huge west coast citrus. The melon character definitely was noticeable and well balanced. As fresh as it gets.

The Blending of Blue Sunday Sour

We are but a month away from the Blue Sunday release party, so I figured now would be a good time to give a pre-taste of the workings behind this revered sour ale. I will outline some history behind the beer and its name, its general composition, and the systems/techniques I used for blending. Finally I'll explain (in brief) where the New Holland sour program is going.



For those who don't know, I work at New Holland Brewing Company!
I left Great River Brewery in March of 2012 and moved to Holland where I started as a brewer last April. Working full time on the brewhouse and occasionally on the filler for the first 4 months, I had already realized I'd found a pretty great company. Around August, our wood master left and I was then given reign over the Dragon's Milk cellar and the sour beer program. I had little experience working with wood prior, except the few times I filled a Templeton Rye barrel with GRB Farmer Brown, so this was a daunting promotion. Nevertheless, I hit the books and asked questions to anyone I could. Gradually I learned the ins and outs, but still lurking over my head was a Nightmare (I'll get to this later) of a task - Creating 2013's Blue Sunday Sour.

Brewer Jon helping pull beer from barrels

Fast forward to now and it's already in the tank! I sit here reflecting on what a great experience it was and how much I learned. And I'll say, I can't wait for the next one. But right now, and I know you're reading this post to learn how it was done, so let's start at the beginning...

To my knowledge, Blue Sunday is named to commemorate the sale of alcohol in Holland, and to celebrate the access of good beer at home and in pubs and restaurants, seven days a week. To that, this beer represents another year of success for both us and the industry.

We specifically brew a beer called Blue Sunday, but Blue Sunday Sour is a byproduct of not just that beer, but many others that have intentionally been blended to reach a flavor we feel is of adequate quality for our customers. We age it for you, so it's ready to be consumed as soon as you palm it off the shelves.

185 Sour barrels!

In the first couple months prior I was still on the Brewhouse as we trained a new Brewer. Two to three days a week I worked Dragon's Milk. Finally, once our new brewer, Jon, was fully trained I could finally work full time barrels and begin formulating the blend for Blue Sunday.

One of the biggest difficulties I faced was tasting the sours themselves. Sure I had a beer blog, knew what butyric acid was, and could operate most of the equipment needed to make good commercial beer, but sours? That was a different ball game. Fortunately, my co-workers helped me out by bringing in a vast range of stylistic sours to try and gradually I acquainted myself with what constitutes a sour beer.
Great, the next task was tasting all 130 sour wine barrels and deciphering good from "not ready" (we don't use the term bad - when beer ages and sours it goes through a life cycle of flavors ranging from barnyard to delightfully tart and fruity). This went on for about two weeks, (and) whenever I had time.

Figure 1: Barrel Anatomy

Another issue I faced was accessing the barrels for samples. Typically, one can do this by popping the bung and using a "thief" to taste the beverage. But opening a barrel in this manner and sticking a hollow rod into the liquid risks exposing the beer to oxygen. The oxygen becomes a source of metabolic energy for a group of bacteria called the Acetobacter. While present in many of these sour barrels, they are kept at bay by other bacteria such as Pediococcus and Lacotobacillus and several varieties of a yeast in the genus Brettanomyces.
An alternative is to drill a hole in the head of the barrel, a couple inches above the chime. (see Figure 1: Barrel Anatomy) and plug it with a stainless steel nail (acidity of the beer would deteriorate the nail rapidly if it is anything else).
I could finally get to tasting after I had gotten all 130 barrels drilled and nailed and re-arranged for ease of access.
The next thing I needed to do was develop a plan of attacking these barrels. Fortunately, I had just read a helpful article on Lauren Salazar an her methods and techniques for blending sour beer (Embrace the Funk). I ended up utilizing her symbols for describing the status of each barrel. As Lauren describes:

"I have what I call “Users, Blenders or Waiters”. The “Users” are ready to make beer, the “Blenders” are if you need to make more beer and “Waiters” are just that…they need some time so we wait. So my quality thing is I put a Smiley Face, Sideways Face or Frowny Face. So you might see a “User” with a smiley face and a “User” sideways face…the smiley face one gets used first. "  (Embrace the Funk)

This worked perfectly for me.
Method:
I started in September tasting each barrel, some two or three times. My plan here was to weed out the barrels that were not yet ready (not bad, remember?). This was a relatively easy task. I looked for barrels that still tasted like beer, barrels that perhaps still in their Buttery stage of a pediococcus residence, or perhaps just an unbalanced flavor. These barrels are then set aside to continue until perhaps next year, if and when they are ready.

Tasting notes

The next phase was a bit more challenging. This is where tasting other commercial beers and recognizing desirable flavors by style comes in. I knew I wanted something tart, somewhat reminiscent of 2010 and 2012, yet not as sour as The La Folie. I wanted notes of stone fruit, like plums, but a touch of grapes and fig as well. Similarly, I thought it important to let the wood stand out in the finish. So I went about making combinations. I would prowl the field of barrels building a blend that maintained these characteristics. If an addition took me in the wrong direction, I would have to start over.
In the final days I had composed a blend comprised mostly of Blue Sunday, but along with several other varieties of beer.
This near final blend exhibited just about everything noted above, but was missing something. I brought it down to a vote, so, blending three exact pitchers full, I left one untouched for a control, and the two others each had a one barrel addition to reach an acceptable product.
Votes were tallied and our blend was decided. The hard work was over, but my nerves had not yet subsided. I had yet to ACTUALLY blend these beers, which meant there was no going back after they were in the tank.

Work Station

The next week was the week before thanksgiving and I chose Tuesday as the day to blend. It was a cluster-f**k organizing the barrels, as some that were needed were on the same rack while others were paired with ones I would not use. Sorting and organizing them before and after was another Nightmare (remember?). Nevertheless, everything went smoothly. I blended all the barrels that would constitute a base as well as the barrels that offered more complexity. As the final barrel I had planned on blending went into the tank, I took a sample off the Zwickel. My worst dream had become a reality. That last barrel I had added wasn't filtered, therefore some yeast had settled on the bottom and had begun to develop some un-wanted flavors, of which some had gone into the tank. Tasting the beer, Andrew and I had recognized it as Mercaptan, a byproduct of autolysed (dead) yeast. To the customer, it would be hardly recognizable, but we had just done a taste panel on it and learned to diagnose it in beer. I wanted this blend to be perfect, so this was unacceptable.

To solve this problem, I went back to my tasting notes. I knew I had left a few fantastic barrels behind in case something like this happened. I went through my notes and looked for the barrels that were quite tart, but still had a fruity base to reinforce the complexity. I added one barrel, and found the flavor enhanced along with the tartness, almost completely offsetting the faint Mercaptan flavor. Just to be sure, I added one more.

And I couldn't be happier with the result. Blue Sunday now waits in D5 to be bottled December 20th.

The release party is on January 13th. Be there.

In addition, thank you to all our customers for the support. New Holland's sour beer program is only getting bigger. It means more volume and more varieties to reach a wider distribution. We have some fun stuff coming in 2013, I'll say that.

Finally,

Remember my Nightmare? Well this was half of it.

In conjunction with the Blue Sunday release, I also blended a sour stout that represents my journey learning how to blend beer. But this beer also represents all the bugs, bacteria and mold that we are so afraid of introducing into our business', lives and bodies. A brewers (and QC) nightmare, sure. But a shout out to the positive effects they have on us and the delicacies they produce. Look out Michigan your nightmare is "MI Nightmare"

Cheers!

Ranch Double IPA

This is the first beer in a long time I've reviewed from 8th St. Grille in a long time. Served in their new Omni glasses with a slanted rim. Enjoyed Sunday afternoon at their pub while researching Foudres.
9.0% ABV

Appearance: Glimmering and brightly golden. The head is a soft densely bubbled film across the surface. Very little retention and stature. Consistent and uniformed carbonation rises in single file to the surface of the beer.
Aroma: Piney, grapefruit and a tremendous amount of tropical elements that perfume from the glass. It's something you can keep going back to and it doesn't lose its strength and aroma.
Taste: An enormous juicy hop element is central to this beer. The pinnacle of pineapple and melon with a grapefruit rind, bittered finish. The start maintains enough of a sweetness for the hop complexities to ride on and to further encourage a tropical character. As the beer warms, the beer develops somewhat of a sweet honey flavor to constitute the base.
Mouthfeel: Fine carbonation and a formidable body that lightly fizz the tongue as the liquid goes down. The finish is left very resined and piney, leaving the bitterness on the palate long after the beer has left the mouth.
Overall Impression: Ultimately this beer has the fresh character from late addition west coast hops but incorporates a balance of sweetness and bittering early addition to complete a fantastically quaffable, tropical profile. I'd come back to this any day.

Silverback Pale Ale

My mom picked me up an assorted six-pack of beers (all cans) from her trip to CO. I tasted it on a rainy Saturday afternoon while watching Beerfest! This is my first taste of Wynkoop.
Pint served
5.5% ABV

Appearance: Glowing copper with a faint haze. The head sustains for a few minutes, but leaves behind a thin film across the surface of the beer.
Aroma: Woodsy and grassy. I find hints of citrus and lemongrass, though this remains very subtle against an otherwise more heavily malted pale ale scent. Some characteristics of oxidation are present.
Taste: A malty sweetness resembling baked bread and biscuity undertones. There is a bit of a sanitizer astringency about it, encouraging a green, grassy hop flavor. Not really a fan of the aftertaste.
Mouthfeel: Evenly carbonated and smooth. Not as dry in the finish that I expected, but enough to quench my thirst. No cloy. Medium bodied.
Overall Impression: I wasn't really a fan of this beer, though perhaps it tastes better fresh. The stale hop/astringency really stuck out to me and ultimately deterred finishing the beer.