Beer of the Week: Pelican Pub and Brewery Kiwanda Cream Ale

By Iron Chef Leftovers

The Pelican Pub and Brewery is located in beautiful Pacific City, OR, and has been around for 15 years, although there beers are just starting to show up in the Seattle market. We sampled the Kiwanda Cream Ale from a 22 oz. bottle. Kiwanda clocks in at 5.4% ABV and 25 IBU. From the Pelican website:

Inspired by one of America’s traditional 19th century beer styles, Kiwanda Cream Ale is pale gold with a fruity, floral hop aroma. A sweet malty flavor and a smooth snappy finish round out this tasty, refreshing brew!

Kiwanda shows as very pale in color with very little head. There was almost nothing on the nose – a minimal amount of grain, but that was about it, which was very disappointing. The first few sips were drier than I was expecting from a Cream Ale; almost to the point of being tannic. There were hints of cream and barley but it was subtle and you almost had to go searching for it. I kept hoping that the flavor would develop as consumption progressed, but it never really developed beyond subtle hints. We even tried some food to coax flavor out of this beer, to no avail. I kept hoping for a Boddington’s but got something closer to a Bud.

Kiwanda was a real disappointment as I tend to like Pelican’s beers. This beer had absolutely nothing going on and really wasn’t something I have any inclination to go back and try again. Pelican Brewery’s Kiwanda Cream Ale flies out of here with just 1 Pelecanus erythrorhynchos out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Ninkasi Imperiale Stout

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Ninkasi Brewing is located in lovely Eugene, Oregon and makes a wide range of beers, including a couple of pretty stellar IPA’s. The Imperiale Stout is a special release available in 22 oz. bottles and on tap; we consumed the beer in a bottle, and, as I didn’t purchase the bottle, I am not sure what the beer ran price wise. According to Ninkasi’s website, Imperiale is:

Strong, dark and brooding, Imperial Stouts were originally crafted by the British to survive the long journey to Russia through rain, sleet, and snow. Full bodied and surprisingly smooth, Imperiale Stout has a big roast hit up front, and rich, dark malt flavors balanced by ample hop bitterness.

Statistics

First      Brewed: 2011

Starting      Gravity: 1090

Bitterness:      70 IBUs

Alcohol      %: 9.1

Malt:      2 Row Pale Malt, Munich Malt, Crystal Malt, Carapils Malt, Flaked Barley,      Roasted Barley, Black Malt, Carafa Malt

Hops:      Nugget

This is a big beer, perfectly suited for a cold winter’s day. The beer pours jet black with a brown head. As you would expect, there are tons of roasted malt and chocolate on the nose. The initial taste yielded a beer that was more subtle than the nose suggested – very dry with hints of chocolate and roasted malt on the front of the palate, fading quickly into a smooth, milk chocolate like finish, that unfortunately disappeared more quickly than I would have liked. The beer stayed pretty consistent as it warmed, with some notes of toffee starting to show up at around 50 degrees. The beer lacked any real alcohol burn for being over 9% and lacked any real hop personality despite its 70 IBU. I actually had no idea the IBU was that high until I looked up the stats for this review; they are just about completely lost in roasted chocolate depths of this beer.

Impreiale was not an unpleasant experience – if you are looking for something dark and roasted, I would definitely give this one a shot. If you are looking for dark and hoppy, look elsewhere.

Imperiale generates a rating of 3 Sumerians out of 5.

Beer of the Week: Lantern Brewing Dubbel Abbey Style Brown Ale

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Lantern Brewing is a small brewery located in the Greenwood neighborhood of Seattle. They are relatively new to the game and their beers have a somewhat limited availability (check Chuck’s Hop Shop, they usually carry a couple). Lantern doesn’t have a website (I hate that trend), but they do have a Facebook Page. It also means I can’t give you any stats on the beer.

I was in the mood for Belgian style ale recently and this one was sitting in the fridge, so I cracked it open.

The beer pours brown, like a dark brewed tea, with a dark cream head. Malt and yeast are prevalent in this been from the second you open the bottle, even before it hits the glass. The initial sip is also dominated by malt and yeast, giving way to caramel and sugar, with a short finish of bananas; exactly what you would expect from a Belgian style beer. There is a hint of hop bitterness, but it is not present on every sip; sometimes it is there and you can taste it for a few seconds, other times it is not there at all, but this is only when the beer is cold (there were no detectable hops as the beer warmed). As the beer warms, caramel and burnt sugar flavors dominate and a longer, smoother finish appears, with notes of banana and yeast. This beer reminded me of a liquid banana crème caramel – I kept thinking that I needed a burnt sugar wafer while drinking it.

This beer was delicious and a somewhat unusual style for a Seattle brewery, there are a handful making abbey style beers, but very few are doing Belgian browns. If you are in the mood for a Belgian brown, give this one a try instead of your regular one from Belgium. I think you will find that this beer holds its own against the ones made by guys in robes.

Lantern Brewing Dubbel Abbey Style Brown gets 4 beacons out of 5.

When Web Designers Attack

By Iron Chef Leftovers

There are plenty of sites where you can find people’s opinions, good or bad, about restaurants. I have been known to check out sites like Yelp to see the bad reviews of a place just to see the kinds of stuff that people are complaining about when it comes to a restaurant that I am considering going. Any places that have consistently bad reviews and people are complaining about the same things are probably places to avoid.

In many cases, if a restaurant is terrible, the owner probably has cash flow issues and is not paying staff, vendors, taxes, etc. A recent case of this happened in Pennsylvania at a place called the Italian Village Restaurant (which also appeared on an episode of Restaurant: Impossible).

While not paying your restaurant staff can lead to lots of whispers and anonymous angry tweets, not paying your web designer can be a sticky situation for a restaurant owner.

Recently, the webmaster of The Italian Village in Milmont Park (which was on an episode of Restaurant:Impossible) decided to replace the cheesy web presence of the restaurant with detailed lists of shitty Yelp, Yahoo, and Google reviews. The very best one of the batch suggested throwing the live accordion player in the dumpster because he “belittled people” who didn’t request “Irish Eyes” and “Happy Birthday.” Instead of negotiating with the spurned HTML jockey, The Italian Village went ahead and bought a new domain.

I guess that when you fail to pay your webmaster, you probably deserve having all of your bad reviews put in one place.

Beer of the Week: Fort George Spruce Budd Ale

By Iron Chef Leftovers

I like beers that are different. I have a ton of them stocked in the beer cellar right now that will keep me writing beer reviews well into 2013 (assuming the Mayans were not right). Recently, I saw an update to Chuck’s Hop Shop tap list that Fort George Spruce Budd Ale was on tap.

Here is the description of the beer from the Fort George website:

With the help of many Fort George fans we picked over 120 lbs. of Spruce tips, leaving our arms aching from the constant stabbing of the Spruce needles. Through all of that pain of picking over 35 lbs. of Spruce tips for each batch came a beer that cannot be rivaled in deliciousness. With nothing more than organic pilsner malt and Spruce tips for ingredients, this beer might be the best thing you have ever put in your mouth. With Spruce tips being full of vitamin C, this beer is incredibly good for your health* and can lead to a longer life.** With each glorious sip you are able to realize what an adventure into the woods taste like. With hints of Spruce, citrus, and more Spruce, these beer tastes like a Spruce tree. With the summer heat in full swing, grab a growler of Spruce Budd, find a some shade underneath a tree and enjoy life.

*Probably not true
**Definitely not true.

This beer clocks in a 4.9% ABV and is brewed with no hops (the spruce tips essentially replace the hops). I picked up a growler and the beer appears to only be available on tap.

Spruce Budd pours pale yellow in color with lots of carbonation. There are hints of malt on the nose, but not much else – it has the aroma of an American Lager (i.e. Bud) without any hint of adjuncts. The initial taste was slightly fruity and crisp, without much going on. After a few seconds, you get a burst of raspberry and spruce in a short, dramatic finish. It reminded me of a Jolly rancher candy – slightly sweet, slightly tart. The spruce flavor is balanced and it does not overpower a very subtle beer. As the beer warms, it become slightly bitter and tannic, but not hop like, and the bitterness and tannins fade quickly. Mrs. Iron Chef made the comment that she felt the beer was lacking something, and I immediately said “hops” – I had been thinking the exact same thing that she was. A bit of inclusion of hops would make for a more complex beer and probably would have helped the finish to linger just a bit longer.

Spruce Budd goes down extremely easily and would be perfect for sitting on the back deck on a hot day. The beer is light and refreshing and you feel like you can enjoy several without thinking about it when the weather calls for an ice cold beverage, but you want something with more complexity and flavor than a Bud.

Overall, Spruce Budd is interesting if you have never tried a beer made with spruce, and definitely refreshing if you are looking for something light and not hoppy, but still want something with flavor.

Spruce Budd gets 3 Piceae out of 5.