For this style study, I actually skipped forward by one to try American Stouts (currently style number 13E as classified by the 2008 BJCP Guidelines) simply because I had a handful of them ready to go and didn’t have any Foreign Export (13D) styles in my fridge. I have to admit, I wasn’t exactly looking forward to illustrating what I thought would be another pile of coffee beans … Continue reading Style Study: American Stout
This past December during his Christmas break, Matt and I visited California for probably our biggest “beercation” to date. In a bullheaded effort to experience as much west coast beer as humanly possible in 9 days, we flew into San Francisco and drove down beautiful Highway 1 to San Diego. We sampled so many beers that by the end my liver was weeping and begging me for … Continue reading California Love
Oatmeal in beer!? Yes. You can drink beer for breakfast and tell your boss you had some oatmeal and you would not be lying! Woo hoo! Oatmeal Stouts are currently classified as style number 13C, which means I’m halfway through tasting all six types of stouts, as classified by the 2008 BJCP guidelines! You can see my post on Dry Stouts here and the one I did … Continue reading Style Study: Oatmeal Stout
BJCP Overall Summary of Sweet Stout: (full description here) “A very dark, sweet, full-bodied, slightly roasty ale. Often tastes like sweetened espresso.” So, as I mentioned in my previous post, the BJCP, or Beer Judge Certification Program, publishes a list of beer style guidelines that is apparently about to change. As I hit “publish” on my last Style Study, I happened to check some old tweets from the … Continue reading Style Study: Sweet Stout
I’m kicking off November’s posts with a new series I’m dubbing “Style Study.” And, since this past Thursday was International Stout Day, I’ve decided to start with stouts. According to the BJCP, there are six types of stouts (although, this is apparently about to change–see the first draft of the new guidelines here); Dry, Sweet, Oatmeal, American, Foreign Extra, and Russian Imperial. I’ll be starting … Continue reading Style Study: Dry Stout
I think it’s safe to say that I’m mildly obsessed with Perennial Artisan Ales. I’d rate myself about an 8 on a scale from one to ten, one being not-at-all-interested and ten being full-on-cray-cray-for-their-beer. Until I have visited their St. Louis tasting room AND stood in line for a bottle release, I can’t truly deem myself “level 10” obsessed, at least in my mind. Admittedly, it’s just a matter of … Continue reading Beer Tasting: Peach Berliner Weisse from Perennial Artisan Ales
Visiting new breweries is always fun, but this one felt different, in a good way. I first read about Scratch Brewing Company in late 2013, in a complimentary issue of Draft magazine that a local home-brew shop threw in with my rather large order. According to the article, there was a brewer dude down in southern Illinois who rummaged around in the local woods to … Continue reading Scratching the Surface
Back in mid-March, Matt and I took the Cicerone Off-Flavor course at their Chicago-based Certification Program offices. I’d previously only read about the six off-flavors we studied that day (there are more than six–it was a brief course), and I will say that you truly can’t know what they taste like…well…until you taste them! I took the class to further my skills in off-flavor identification as a home … Continue reading Off-Flavor Fun
About two months ago, I was honored to participate in an event at the Brew Camp classroom, put on by Kim Leshinski of Hail to the Ale. And now, a mere 60-ish days later, I am writing about it! 😉 Kim and I met at the 5 Rabbit Iron Brew Challenge, and when my husband and I won the challenge with our mole stout, (<–a post on the subject is … Continue reading Recipe: A Belgian, Wit a Little Too Much Marmalade
This year we took our 2nd annual “Brewcation” to Michigan, and I’ll describe this year’s trip by saying that there were four breweries, three days, and two beer geeks! That was super cheesy…but accurate, so it’s cool. Matt and I decided to once again spend the weekend of his Spring Break (Matt is a teacher) in Michigan bouncing from brewery to brewery, sipping samples and collecting and … Continue reading Brewcation 2014
Worth A Thousand Beers 