Allagash Dubbel Ale

Allagash Brewing Company has appeared on this site several times, and I’ve been quite pleased with these Belgian-style beers. Tonight, the Allagash Dubbel called my name and gave me an excuse to use my chalice again.

Its website describes Allagash Dubbel as an ale that:

. . . boasts a dark mahogany color with ruby hues and a complex malty taste. The finish is dry with subtle hints of chocolate and nuts. With time, Allagash Dubbel will mature in the bottle and acquire distinctive port and sherry characteristics.

The ale will mature because it has a hefty 7% ABV rating, but the alcohol is hardly noticeable in the smell or the taste.

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Phin & Matt’s Extraordinary Ale

After the wallop I took from Wednesday’s dark Dogfish Head, I decided to retreat to the calmer qualities of a pale ale.

Southern Tier’s Phin & Matt’s Extraordinary Ale is an American Pale Ale with a label elaborately decorated with red, white, blue, and plenty of six-pointed stars. I originally grabbed the bottle thinking it would make a good back-deck beer for the Fourth of July — but I couldn’t wait that long to try it out.

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Dogfish Head World Wide Stout

Let this be a lesson for anyone exploring beers by Dogfish Head — if the ABV rating is nowhere to be seen, but the word “ridiculous” appears on the label, assume you are in for a heckuva strong beer.

The bottle describes Dogfish Head’s World Wide Stout as, “A very dark beer brewed with a ridiculous amount of barley.” In fact, so much barley is used that I should have treated the beer as a barley wine; Dogfish Head’s World Wide Stout has an 18% ABV rating!

I know this now, but I didn’t do my research before imbibing. I merely grabbed a big beer glass and dumped the entire 12 oz bottle in with such force that it created the big, tan head you see in the picture — usually, such a high alcohol-by-volume beer wouldn’t produce much of a foamy topper. Such was my carelessness that the beer gods, now offended, began plotting my imminent comeuppance.

World Wide Stout certainly was dark, pitch black with mere dark brown highlights, and it smelled delicious. Though alcohol dominated the aroma, the astringency was infused with rich vanilla, licorice, and roasted chestnuts — creating a perfume that sped deliberately to the nose and delivered its aromatic right punch. This stout smelled like the inside of a bourbon barrel; one that’s empty but still redolent of hooch.

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Bohemia Obscura

Happy Cinco de Mayo everyone! As I’m writing this, I’m celebrating by enjoying a few sips of the wonderful Clase Azul Reposado Tequila which I carried home from my trip to Mexico earlier this year. It has a rich caramel and vanilla flavor with only a hint of smokiness, oily on the tongue and wonderful all around — and this is coming from someone who has always thought he hated tequila.

But this post isn’t about tequila; it’s about another bottle I stuffed into my luggage before flying home from Cabo — a bottle of beer.

Bohemia was the best beer I had while I was in Mexico. I described it as having a “sweet citrus nose . . . complimented by lightly bitter hops” but acknowledged it still tasted “like a Corona, but better.” That bottle was of Bohemia Clasica. Two days later, the staff delivered to my room a special bottle of Bohemia Obscura — a darker version of Bohemia. I resolved to save the bottle because I had already consumed my beer for the day, so Bohemia Obscura wound up in my suitcase and ultimately made its way to my basement.

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Two Brothers Hop Juice DIPA

After a week of travel and last night’s hoppy Bigfoot, I felt I needed something extra strong for this IPA Monday session — so went to my basement and came up carrying a bottle of Hop Juice.

Hop Juice is a self-styled Double India Pale Ale bottled by Two Brothers Brewing Co. in Warrenville, IL. It initially drew my attention with the label image of a hop getting its “juice” squeezed out by a pair of pliers; but the brewery location — Warrenville, IL — was why I actually bought the bottle. During my years living in Chicago, I worked near the tiny suburb of Warrenville and I had no idea there was a brewery in that town. Heck, I didn’t even think they had a stoplight!

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Last Consumed:

My wife and I usually select a Christmas Tree during the weekend after Thanksgiving, and we were thrilled to discover the farm down the road from us is selling trees this year. She and I stopped by the farm while walking our Boston Terrier, Caesar, who helped us sniff out a good one. After my wife and I dithered over the best tree for several minutes, Caesar weighed in with his selection by lifting his leg on a plump Fraser Fir.

I hope that means he liked it.

The tree went up on my shoulder, I carried it home (drawing chuckles from several people driving by), and our Christmas season officially began. We’ve been listening to Christmas music, drinking hot chocolate, and generally sickening all humbugs spying through our windows.

So it should come as no surprise that I’ve selected the “Hoppy Christmas Ale” from Belgium’s Brewery De Ranke. The beer — Père Noël (imported by Shelton Brothers) — intimates the reason for Father Christmas’ jolly cheeks and rosy nose; the label depicts Santa embracing the frothy, 7% ABV Strong Pale Ale.

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