Beer of the Week: Russian River Pliny the Elder

By Iron Chef Leftovers

The beer is so legendary that it has taken on a life of its own making it one of the tougher beers to find. It does not help that it is only distributed in 4 states – California, Oregon, Colorado and Pennsylvania, and only available once every six weeks or so, driving demand through the roof. It is probably the number 1 beer that was requested in beer trading that I have done. Luckily, a trip to SF a few month back involved a side trip to the Russian River brewery and the ability to pick up 6 bottles of Pliny. Most were distributed to friends, a couple were for my consumption.

The skinny from Russian River:

Pliny the Elder is brewed with Amarillo, Centennial, CTZ, and Simcoe hops. It is well-balanced with malt, hops, and alcohol, slightly bitter with a fresh hop aroma of floral, citrus, and pine. Best enjoyed FRESH! That is why we make it in such limited supply. Actual bottling date is printed on each bottle!

Where did we come up with this name? Back in the year 2000, our friend, Vic Kralj, who owns the Bistro in Hayward, California, decided to have his first ever Double IPA festival. Vic invited 10 breweries, 6 of whom (including us) had to brew something special for him since we had nothing that would fall under this style category. Vinnie had made a Double IPA at Blind Pig in 1994, but was not brewing one at Russian River Brewing at the time. He had an idea for the recipe, but not a name. After much research in beer books, brainstorming, and deliberation, we came up with “Pliny the Elder”. Pliny, the man, lived in the first century- 23 to 79 A.D. According to our brewing references, he and his contemporaries either created the botanical name or at least wrote about Lupus Salictarius, or hops, currently known as Humulus Lupulus. That was a very early reference to an important part of any Double IPA! Pliny the beer has now become one of our flagship brews!Pliny the Elder was immortalized by his nephew, Pliny the Younger, who wrote about his uncle succumbing to ash and smoke during the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 A.D. while rescuing people. Cheers to the scholar, historian, officer, writer, and Roman Naturalist- Pliny the Elder!

Original Gravity:     1.070

Alcohol by Volume:     8.0%

Color:     Copper

Bitterness:     High

The beer pours hazy orange in color with an off-white head. Extreme amounts of citrus and peel show on the nose and they hit you from a foot away. Upon closer inspection, orange peel, pine, resin and grain dominate the nose. This beer drinks big, a blast of grain starts you out before quickly relenting to the hops and there are a lot of them. Grapefruit and tangerine dominate before slowly bringing just a small amount of bitter orange peel and resin to the party on the finish. Those notes linger for a long time before slowly fading off after a minute. This is definitely a beer to be savored and drunk slowly to truly appreciate the complexity. Pliny is balanced and fruity with no indication of its 8% alcohol and is easy to drink for such a big beer. Pliny is a truly great beer and worth finding someone to trade bottles with if you have never had it before.
Russian River Pliny the Elder lectures the crowd with 5 history lessons out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Reuben’s Roggenbier Dry Hopped with Belma Cask

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Belma hops are fairly obscure around the beer world and a good number of beer drinkers probably have never heard of them. Belma brings strawberry quality to the party, but they aren’t available in huge quantities, which is why you see them more in experimental or one off beers. The guys down at Reuben’s had some Belma hops and happened to have their Roggenbier, which, in case you are unaware is a rye based hefeweisen beer, so it has a good deal of banana qualities to it. Bananas and strawberries in a cask beer? Are we about to have a chocolate and peanut butter moment?

The beer pours the color of cloudy tea with light notes of rye and strawberry on the nose. The beer starts out with a nice yeast component and a mild sweetness before bringing strawberry and rye into the picture. Those flavors linger all the way to the finish with a light breadyness and sweetness joining the party with some banana notes also. The finish is surprisingly long for a cask and the beer is layered and complex with none of the flavors dominating the beer. They all play well together, feeding off each other and making the transition from one flavor to another smooth, producing something very different and delicious. At only 5.3% ABV this one is also very easy to put back a few of.

Reuben’s Roggenbier Dry Hopped with Belma Cask produces a sweet 4 fruit bowls out of 5.

A Shout-Out to bitchbeer.org

By Iron Chef Leftovers

I have met and hung out with some pretty hard core beer lovers from all around the country in my various trips around the Ballard brewery scene. It has led to a pretty extensive network of people who I regualarly swap beer with. Last night I got to meet such a group of ladies who run the beer blog bitchbeer.org as they were doing a tour of the Pacific Northwest (they mostly hail from Austin, Texas). They are pretty hard core, have a great blog and, get this, collectively wrote a book about the history of the Austin Beer scene. It was a pleasure meeting all of you and I hope that you enjoy the rest of you stay and the beer in the Pacific Northwest.

For those who care, I have linked their blog in our links section. It is definitely worth checking out.

Beer of the Week: Port Brewing High Tide Fresh Hop IPA

By Iron Chef Leftovers

It is strange that I had a bottle of fresh hop beer sitting in my fridge for several months without having opened it or even realizing it was there. That is what happened with the my 22 oz. bottle of Port Brewing High Tide Fresh Hop IPA. The beer was fresh hopped with Centennial and Simcoe hops and came in at 6.5% ABV. Because it had been sitting for a while, I figured that I would have pretty low expectations of the beer, and honestly, figured that all of the hop flavor would have been dead by this point. I am happy to report, I was wrong.

The beer pours golden in color with a hint of orange and an off white head. There is significant hop character on the noes with strong notes of citrus and citrus peel with light notes of grain and resin. A major citrus bomb on the palate – the beer starts off with a slightly tannic dryness before quickly switching to hops, and lots of them. There are strong notes of citrus peel and grapefruit before finishing off with more citrus peel and a pleasant lingering bitterness on the front of the tongue that keeps going for quite a while. Well balanced and higher alcohol than most fresh hops, it goes down smooth while displaying nice character.

Port Brewing High Tide Fresh Hop IPA cycles in with 3 ebb tides out of 5.

Beer of the Week: NW Peaks Challenger IPA

By Iron Chef Leftovers

It is almost suicide for a NW brewery to not have an IPA regularly on tap, just because it seems to be the default beer of a number of NW craft brew drinkers. Because of that, there is significant pressure on breweries to not only produce the style, but to do it well so they don’t get lost in the shuffle. For the early part of its existence, NW Peaks did not have an IPA on regularly, but that changed about a year ago when one of their regular commercial customers asked them to brew one, which lead to the Challenger IPA.

From the NW Peaks site:

The name. The mountain. Mt Challenger anchors the NW boundary of the Picket Range, arguably the most remote, inaccessible area of the N Cascades. The main feature of Mt Challenger (maybe besides its jagged, rocky summit and sub-summits) is the Challenger glacier – the largest in the area spanning nearly 2 miles and about 3000 of vertical feet. It’s a great climb, with a long approach (which many might consider a climbing excursion in itself), fun glacier slogs, and a nice rock pitch at the end. A truly great mountain and great back country climbing excursion. A perfect namesake to our traditional NW IPA.

The Beer. We tried to emulate the stunning features of Mt Challenger in the IPA. We started by selecting 7 varieties of hops, each used at 1 specific time during the process to bring out a unique flavor and bouquet that had both the traditional citrus notes as well as other complementary notes, in this case stone fruit. The malts were chosen to support the hop character, add a little complexity, and give Challenger IPA a nice balance, one that would feature, but not owerwhelm with, the hops. The result is a nice drinkable hop forward IPA featuring citrus and stone fruits on a solid, medium bodied backbone.

ABV: ~6.5%

The beer pours hazy golden orange in color with a nice citrus and grain nose. The beer starts out with a pleasant amount of citrus before shifting into a slightly floral sweetness, lingering for a few moments before bringing a mild bitterness of resin and citrus peel. The beer finishes long, bringing all of the flavors together with hints of grain tying everything into one cohesive unit. The beer has plenty of character and a nice balance between bitter and citrus, making this a pretty easy beer to drink with a great lingering finish. The different variety of hops bring a nice layering to the beer and the 6.5% ABV is not at all perceptible.

NW Peaks Challenger IPA rises to the occasion and accomplishes its task with 4 double dares out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Boundary Bay Imperial IPA

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Boundary Bay up in Bellingham, Wa, makes some of the finest IPA’s in the country. So much so that in a blind tasting a couple of years ago, their REGULAR IPA actually beat Pliny the Elder. So needless to say, I was excited when I came across an Imperial IPA by Boundary Bay, which I had no idea they made. I picked up the beer in a 22 oz. bottle for about $9. From what I have been able to gather online, the beer was actually pretty low in alcohol for an imperial, coming in at just 8.5%.

From the BB website:

A full bodied, copper colored India Pale Ale. Strong alcohol content and an agressive fresh hop finish. Only in the great Northwest can you find such a well balanced, over the top, highly hopped draft ale. Original Gravity 1.086

The beer pours orange in color with a light cream colored head. There are significant hop notes on the nose with hints of grain and citrus supporting. The beer starts off with a touch of malt sweetness before quickly transitioning to a pleasantly bitter component with touches of hop resin and citrus before finishing long with pleasant burnt citrus peel and juicy citrus, which linger for quite a long time. The balance is nice and layered with no alcohol perceptible on the finish. The beer is slightly fruitier as it warms with a touch more burn from the resin, but still nicely balanced and very drinkable for an Imperial IPA, but with enough hop character to let you know this is a hop monster.

Boundary Bay Imperial IPA hoists up the mainsail with 3 Sloop John-B’s out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Populuxe Blond IPA

By Iron Chef Leftovers

The concept of a blond IPA is a bit of an American invention, combining a pretty traditional Belgian style of beer with one that has become very uniquely American. The results of the odd union can be great but at the same time I have had a few that were complete disasters. Populuxe through their hat into the ring with their Blond IPA, clocking in at 6.0% ABV.

The beer pours light orange in color with significant amounts of citrus and hints of grain and yeast on the nose. It starts out slightly sweet coupled with a nice crispness before moving into bitter citrus peel with a nice bite. The beer finishes dry with a great combination of mild resin, citrus and citrus peel with just a touch of bitterness and hints of yeast that fade in and out, depending on the sip. The bitter finish is long and lingering in a very pleasant way and the beer shows great IPA character without overwhelming the Belgian notes that subtly appear.

Populuxe Blond IPA shows its natural color with a pretty 3 Marilyn Monroes out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Brooklyn Brewing Sorachi Ace

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Somehow, despite both its size and profile in the craft brew community, Brooklyn Breweries beers are not available in Seattle (You can’t find their beers in Oregon, Washington or California, but you can find them in BC, go figure). That is disappointing since they make some pretty special beers. Because of that, I made it a point when I was back in NJ over Christmas to seek out a few of their beers for transport back to the Pacific Northwest. One of the ones I was able to come by is their Sorachi Ace – a saison hopped with, wait for it…Sorachi Ace hops. I had it once a while back and I really liked it (this was really before I was familiar with Sorachi) so I thought it was time to try it again. The beer came in a 750 ml bottle and ran about $10.

A rather long read from the Brooklyn website:

Most Brooklyn beers are made with a blend of hop varietals. As a chef does with spices, we look to get the best qualities of each hop and create a harmony of flavors and aromas. However, a few years ago, our brewmaster ran into a hop unique enough to deserve its own moment in the sun. A large Japanese brewery first developed the hop variety “Sorachi Ace” in 1988. A cross between the British “Brewer’s Gold” and the Czech “Saaz” varieties, it exhibited a quality that was unexpected – it smelled really lemony.

The unique flavor of Sorachi Ace was bypassed by the big brewers, but we thought it was pretty cool. So we made a special beer with it, and added the beer to our Brewmaster’s Reserve special draft beer program last year. Most Brewmaster’s Reserve beers are only available for a short time, and then they’re gone. But we liked this one so much, we decided to bring it back and give it the star treatment. Brooklyn Sorachi Ace is a classic saison, a cracklingly dry, hoppy unfiltered golden farmhouse ale, but made entirely with now-rare Sorachi Ace hops grown by a single farm in Washington. We ferment it with our special Belgian ale strain, and then add more Sorachi Ace hops post-fermentation. After the dry-hopping, the beer emerges with a bright spicy lemongrass / lemon zest aroma backed by a wonderfully clean malt flavor
It tastes like sunshine in a glass, and that suits us just fine, especially with seafood dishes and fresh cheeses. It’s just the thing on nice summer days and beyond.

Style: Single-hop Farmhouse Saison
Malts: German two-row Pilsner Malt
Additions: Brewer’s white sugar
Hops: Washington-grown Sorachi Ace
Yeast: Our special Belgian strain (primary); Champagne yeast (secondary)
Alcohol by Volume: 7.6%
IBUs: 34
Original Gravity: 15.7° Plato
Calories: 208 (per 12oz)
Food Pairings: Pork buns, fish tacos, shrimp, smoked salmon, sushi, prosciutto, curries, salads, grilled meats and fresh goat cheese (such as Westfield Bulk Chevre.)

The beer pours hazy pale yellow in color with a foamy white head and shows significant notes of yeast and passion fruit coupled with some grassy/dill funk and hints of lemon peel on the nose. The beer starts out dry with a mild grain component and just a touch of hop character before moving on to notes of sugar and Belgian yeast and finally finishing long with hints of grass, lemon, yeast and dill and just a tinge of bitterness before lingering with a pleasant, tannic dryness. The hops and Belgian notes become a bit more pronounced as the beer warms but the grass and dill and the farmhouse notes also become significantly more pronounced, making this beer a pretty deep and complex item. Despite all of the interesting flavors, the beer is well balanced and you really don’t notice the alcohol until you try to stand up after putting back the entire bottle. A great beer showcasing Sorachi Ace with the added benefit of Belgian flavors,

Brooklyn Brewing’s Sorachi Ace shows its hand with 4 of a kind out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Reuben’s American Rye Grapefruit and Amarillo Randall

By Iron Chef Leftovers

I have mentioned it before in this space; grapefruit in beer is a dicey proposition. If you are too heavy handed, the beer tastes like grapefruit and nothing else. If you are too light handed, the beer just completely overwhelms any grapefruit character. Generally you will find the grapefruit infused in a pale or an IPA. Reuben’s decided to take a different approach and infuse their American Rye with grapefruit and Amarillo hops. Will it work? We shall see.

The beer pours hazy yellow in color with notes of sweet grapefruit and hints of rind and rye on the nose. The beer starts off with a distinctive grapefruit note with touches of sweetness from the malt before moving into light pine and grapefruit peel with a pleasant dry mouth feel and just a slight bit of tartness. The finish is a nice combination of rye and mildly tart grapefruit with just a hint of bitterness that lingers on the tongue. The grapefruit is there without being overpowering and balances nicely with the stronger flavors of the rye.

Reuben’s American Rye Grapefruit and Amarillo Randall squeezes in with 4 juicers out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Smuttynose Old Brown Dog

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Way back in my college days, we were in the early years of the craft beer revolution. I was living in Boston and that generally meant that craft beer was either Sam Adams, Harpoon, Rogue or Red Hook, all beers that were generally from sizeable enough breweries they had at least regional distribution. I remember going into the package store in the mid ’90’s (what is a package store? That is for another post) and seeing a beer from some new brewery in New Hampshire (a whopping 40 miles from Boston) with a harbor seal as its logo. I remember looking in the case and seeing they had 2 beers – Shoals Pale Ale and Old Brown Dog. Since I was on a limited budget, I went with the 6 pack of Old Brown Dog (hey, what can I say, I am a sucker for a good dog picture), thus beginning my long love affair with the beers of Smuttynose Brewing. They have since expanded their brewery and are regionally distributing to most states east of the Mississippi (sadly, not out on the West Coast). When I was back in NJ over the winter, it afforded me an opportunity to pick up a 6 pack of this old friend and bring it back to Seattle with me.

From the Smuttynose website:

Old Brown Dog has been cited as a classic example of the “American Brown Ale” style of beer. Compared to a typical English Brown Ale, Old Brown Dog is fuller-bodied and more strongly hopped.

Old Brown Dog has been around for many years. It was first brewed in 1988 at the Northampton Brewery. In 1989 it won a silver medal in its category (American Brown Ale) at the Great American Beer Festival in Denver.

Color: deep reddish brown

Malt Bill
North American 2-Row, Munich 10L, C-120, Chocolate

Hops
Bittering: Cascade and Galena
Flavoring: Willamette

Starting Extract 15° Plato
Terminal Extract 3.26° Plato

ABV 6.7%

IBU 18

Recommended Food Pairings
Griiled meats, especially sausages, ribs and steak

Silver Medal 1989 Great American Beer Festival

The beer pours medium amber in color with a cream colored head. It shows significant notes of grain and yeast with hints of toffee and caramel supporting. The beer starts out with a light sweetness coupled with hints of toffee followed by pleasant grain middle with just a hint of roast flavor and malt before finishing dry with an ever so slight pleasant bitterness that lingers happily in a semi-long finish. As the beer warms, the deeper roasted and toffee flavors become more prevalent, particularly on the finish where it lingers pleasantly with the light bitterness. Deep and complex, I had no idea this beer was as high on the alcohol content as it is, since it is well balanced without any hints of the alcohol. If you ever get a chance, give Smuttynose Old Brown Dog a shot.

Smuttynose Old Brown Dog comes in from the yard and gnaws on 3 bones out of 5.

On a side note, a few years back, Smuttynose did a one-off, imperial version of this beer called Older Brown Dog. I wanted to try it and I was able to find a single bottle of it on a trip back to Boston. I shipped it back to Seattle, but it, alas, did not survive the trip, and I never got a chance to try the beer.