On India Pale Ales - Central Waters Glacial Trail IPA

To follow up on Matt Lange's entry on Monday, I wanted to talk today about India Pale Ales. It always seems that the worst offenders of the unbalanced beer syndrome are IPAs. It is a style that is easy brew, it is a style that readily covers mistakes, and it is a style that is very easy to overdo. It is also one of my favorite styles because of the sheer diversity and flavor capabilities - from English bitters to the noise-rock inspired hop-bombs to the newer variations like Stone's XI - a dark IPA with a roasted, stout-ish notes.

At some point in the not-too-distant past there was one style: India Pale Ale and it meant, basically, one thing: a strongly bittered bite in the finish. In most other respects it was sort of a cross between a pale ale and an amber - with some caramel or biscuit malts for color and complexity, but otherwise a fairly simple, if not slightly stronger malt bill. Typically with a strong ABV around 7-8%. Today, we call this a sub-category of the India Pale Ale - the English IPA.

Central Waters' Lac Du Bay IPA was in this English tradition. Paul Graham, head brewer at Central Waters, agrees: "The Lac Du Bay IPA was an English IPA. Very malty, higher in alcohol (7.5%), and hopped with English hops (more earthy and flowery)." Unforutnately, "the retirement of Lac Du Bay was not by choice. The hop shortage (or what the some of the players in the industry made to appear as a shortage - that's a whole other story) caused the retirement. We had access to American hops still, so the change [to the Glacial Trail] was made." But, never fear, the Lac Du Bay may be back: "I am sure that sometime in the future we will be able to get the hops again. In fact, they were just offered to us, but unfortunately we don't have the production space right now. Our plan is to bring it out as a seasonal when the timing is right (hop availability and production space)."

Then, the West Coast started growing hops. Specifically, the West Coast started growing Cascade hops. Cascades are great hops - great for aroma, great for bittering. They typically weigh in at around 5.5% Alpha Acid, so in many respects they are similar in form and function to European noble hops - except the aroma is much more up-front and distinctive. Instead of the soft peppery, earthy and grassy aromas of the European Saaz and Goldings and Hallertaus, the Cascades have an assertive grassy and citrusy aroma - oranges and grapefruit. It is a distinctive aroma which really comes through in the bitterness as well. Together, this flavor and aroma combination can really compliment a sweet malt bill, resulting in amazingly refreshing beverages.

Starting with Sierra Nevada in the early 80s, the Cascade has come to be associated with American brewing, and particularly the American West Coast. What brewers quickly discovered is that consumers loved it. It made its way into the pale ales, amber ales, common beers, stouts, and india pale ales being made all up and down the Pacific Coast. As brewing stronger and stronger beers became a competition in the late 90s, brewers found that the strong aromas and flavors of the Cascade masked the alcohol flavors. So, beers that were upwards of 9% ABV could actually taste refreshing. These now form the basis of what we call an American IPA - indeed, you can, for the most part, substitute "cascade hoppy" whenever you see "American" or "NorthWest" in front of a style name (e.g., American Amber, American Stout, American Pale Ale).

It is in this American tradition that we find Central Waters' newer IPA, the Glacial Trail. As Mr. Graham notes: "Our goal with Glacial Trail was a balanced American Style IPA. We wanted the beer to be bitter (68 IBU's), but not in your face - where you would not be able to taste anything else. The beer has a great malty backbone that we wanted to compliment the bitterness."

Then came the hop bombs - intentionally unbalanced beers meant to show-off the aroma and flavor profiles of the hops. Beers like the Dogfish Head 120 and the Sierra Nevada Harvest Ale are some of the best of this style; but just throwing a ton of hops in the kettle does not a quality hop-bomb make. There must be complexity, both in flavor and aroma, but in the bitterness and malts as well. Tyranena's Hop Whore is really the best Wisconsin example of this third IPA category.

So, we now have, basically, three types of India Pale Ales - 1) the so-called "English" style, which is restrained and malty with a clean, bitter finish; 2) the American IPA, which is much hoppier, usually with Cascade hops, but still focused on balance and typically with caramel and German specialty malts; and 3) the hop-bomb (also called "Double IPA", and Imperial IPA) which is intentionally unbalanced to show-off hop aromas, flavors and bitterness. I like each of them, or rather, I'm not opposed to any of them - I've had excellent examples of all three.

But I've also had really bad examples of all three, and, I think, that this is what Matt was getting at in his essay that we published on Monday - the "bigger" beers can be an all-out assault on the pallette. And, when brewed incorrectly, can be a not-very pleasant all-out assault on the pallette. We can agree to disagree on some of the specifics (e.g., I love the Ruination), but I agree overall that there are way too many poor examples out there.

Unfortunately, this overpowering aroma and bittering flavor can also mask brewing incompetence. Failed to clean out the kettle? No problem, bitter the hell out of the beer with Cascades and no one will ever know. Incomplete fermentation? No problem, with enough Cascades no one will even notice the yeast. Chill haze? No problems, use enough hops and the beer is supposed to be cloudy anyway!

However, the biggest problem is that many of the worst offenders, taking a cue from the wine industry, market their beer as sophisticated with the correlative assumption being that if you don't find the beer to be sophisticated then you, the drinker, just aren't sophisticated enough. And Stone is not the only brewery guilty of this - many, many breweries fall prey to this. Yet many of the beer snobs among us, fearing to lose our beer cred, fall right in line, proclaiming the flavors to be huge but failing to discern that there is only one flavor and when the beer warms up it turns into bitter, syrupy piss. Some of this lemming-ness is a result of said marketing: we're too afraid that the brewery is right - if we don't find the beer sophisticated and complex it must because we aren't sophisticated enough. Some of it is because of a herd mentality - one person, a hop head, loves a beer a posts a great review of it and each subsequent reviewer, seeing that this person thinks it is so great, agrees that it is great - the logic being that one beer cannot both be a 10 and a 1. But it can - and that is the great fallacy of numbering systems, but that's a different post for a different day.

In the meantime, let your taste be your guide. If you don't like a beer, you don't like it.

Glacial Trail IPA (Base Malt: Briess Pale Malt; Specialty Malts: Caramel 10L, Caramel 40L, Munich 10L; Hops: Summit and Ahtanum; ABV: 6.75) (BA. RB. By the way, both of them refer to this as "Glacier Trail" - what is it with people and the "Gla" formative that makes them always think something "glacier"??)

Appearance: served at 45 degrees, a hazy brownish-red, it's approximately the color of the stained wood that my coffee table is made out of; a strong, if not small, off-white head
Aroma: a lemon and pine brightness on-top of a grapefruit hoppiness; a faint bready sweetness lies below the aroma
Flavor: the hoppiness is immediately noticeable, but the first flavor that I can distinguish is the caramel malt with a slight roastiness to it; I'd had this a few months ago and I thought I had remembered more of this roastiness - perhaps it is due to a long kettle boil and the caramelization was greater in that first batch? In any event, there is a slight roastiness; as it warms up, the malts come through both in the flavor and the aroma
Body: oily and full-bodied
Drinkability: I really find myself enjoying this beer. It warms up very well and changes from the hop-forward American IPA to a more well-rounded quasi-amber - in fact, at about 55 degrees you could call this an American Amber and I'm not sure anyone would complain.
Summary: I'm not familiar with the Ahtanum hop, but the Summit is a high-alpha-acid hop with an aroma and flavor profile similar to the Cascade, with citrus and grapefruit notes - it appears to be one of the few high-alpha-acid hops that is also good for dry hopping and late-kettle additions. Brew365 tells me that "[Ahtanum] has a citrus and floral character much like cascade with the addition of some piney or earth notes. Grapefruit quality is more forward in than in cascade as well." Apparently, the Ahtanum is used in Stone's Arrogant Bastard.

Sometimes Even We Go On Vacation

Sorry for the lack of notice, but a road trip came up rather suddenly and it is very difficult to publish this thing from a moving vehicle. I need to get me one of them super-fancy cell phones with full keyboard and internet access, I guess. Though, I suspect corporate may deny the reimbursement request. Anyway. In the coming weeks we'll publish some reviews of the awesome beer we acquired. But, first, we need to tie up a few loose-ends around here.

Central Waters' second Brewers' Reserve of the season is a Bourbon-Barrel Barleywine. A version of their Kosmyk Charley's Y2K Catastrophe Ale (our review can be found here) aged in Bourbon Barrels for one year. Expect there to be some earthy, woody, booziness to one of Central Waters' premiere beers.

Appearance: thin, bubbly off-white head quickly forms and dissipates over top of a deep coppery brown quasi-viscous body
Aroma: sweet and alcoholic, like a not-so-mild bourbon whiskey
Flavor: bright and bourbony, does not taste blended at all; a malty, roasted caramel attack; the bourbon-barrel flavors overwhelm any malt complexity; as the beer warms in the glass, the malts begin to assert themselves more and even some hops begin to poke through
Body: medium, boozy body, with lingering flavors that beg to be sipped
Drinkability: strong and boozy at first, mellows into a whiskey as it warms, then its malty beer base asserts itself
Summary: while fresh off the shelves this beer has already been aged for one year, the bourbon is almost overpowering and can benefit greatly from further aging; this beer changes significantly from cold to warm, yet its complexity is ultimately overshadowed by the unblended bourbon barrel aging - we bought two bottles of this, and maybe when we review it again next year or the year after it will have mellowed a bit

Speaking of (barley)wines. The awesome San Franciscans at Beer at Joe's have pointed us to a must-read article at Vinography about pairing food with wine. The gist of the article gets to one thing that I constantly preach: this is not rocket science - do not be afraid to experiment, and drink what you like.

Lie #1: For any given food/dish there is a "perfect," "ideal" or "correct" wine pairing.

Lie #2: There are a ton of mistakes and pitfalls out there -- lots of wines just "don't go" with certain foods and vice versa.

Lie #3: Because of #1 and #2, food and wine pairing is an art that is hard to learn, requires deep knowledge, and generally is best left to experts.

I can't say it better: "[T]he single most important variable in the success of wine and food pairing lies completely out of the control of every sommelier and chef in the world. And that variable is me, you, and every single person that sits down to a mouthful of food and a swig of wine." If you like American light lagers, drink a Miller Lite; but don't be afraid to experiment. Next time, try a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale with that pizza; try a Fuller's London Porter with your chicken; try an Ayinger Kristal Weizen with your steak salad. If you like it, great; if you don't, the worst case scenario is you are five dollars poorer. If you are someplace like Maduro or Brasserie V, do not be afraid to ask for samplers before you buy.

In other words, at the end of the day, it is only beer. Find out what you like. The experts are paid to be experts and they can tell you the differences between a Kristal Weizen and Berliner Weisse, but they can not tell you if you will like one or the other; be wary of any that purports to do so - they may say that they prefer one over the other, but the sommelier or bartender has no idea if you will like it or not.

One last bit of news: Miller will be expanding distribution of Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy to 40 of 50 states this summer. I can't say I'm suprised, Miller is going to ride the Leinkugel's "crafts are hot" thing for as long as they can. The fact is Leinie's is still a mere shadow of what it was and Brewery Creek (in Mineral Point) makes a shandy that you can actually taste the component beer and lemonade.

A Trove of New Beer - Day 5 - Central Waters Bourbon Barrel Cherry Stout

Well. One of the things that we here at MBR wanted to do in the new year was to post more, you know, reviews of beer. I think we've accomplished that. Hopefully these posts have inspired you to go out and try some of the new seasonal beers that are on the shelves. While we've focused on the limited run beers, also remember that each of these breweries make yearly seasonals like Capital's MaiBock, Tyranena has a dopplebock (they were going to do a maibock again this year, but the Dirty Old Man used up available fermenter space), New Glarus has their Road Slush Oatmeal Stout coming out, Viking has its JS Bock - there is a veritable cornucopia of seasonal beers on the shelves these days.

We'll explore next week what makes Bocks so late-winter-early-spring appropriate. But today and Friday we'll take one last look at stouts and barleywines - the ultimate winter beers. They are styles that keep us warm and satiated and are perfect for those long winter nights. Central Waters has two new special releases that are available in the Madison area ONLY in single bottles (although I've seen retailers stash sixes behind the scenes, presumably for people if they ask or are reserved for those who get their names on "the list") - and expensive twelve ounce bottles at that - upwards of $3.49 in most places. And, in keeping with a popular trend, both are aged in bourbon barrels.

Fermenting is typically done in very large steel tanks. But fermentation is often a two-step, and sometimes three-step process whereby during the last stage of fermentation, the "spent" yeast is removed and the beer is left to age - this is technically considered fermentation because the beer is not filtered at this point and there is some residual active yeast remaining to further ferment the beer. Ales in particular have a long tradition of being aged in, and frequently served from, oak casks. Well, some American brewer somewhere along the line got the genius idea of aging beer in barrels that had been used to age bourbon. By aging in bourbon barrels the beer comes in contact with the sides of the barrel that had previously been in contact with bourbon. Thus, you get beer that tastes of bourbon.

However, the bourbon-y taste can be overwhelming. So, most brewers reserve some of the beer to be aged in regular steel tanks. Before bottling, the two beers (the bourbon-aged and the non-bourbon-aged) are blended back together (and sometimes left to age again for another week or two). For example, Tyranena's Dirty Old Man Rye Porter Aged in Rye Whiskey Barrels, is a 40/60 blend (I think; I'm sure someone will correct these numbers if they are wrong) of 40% aged in rye whiskey barrels, and the remaining 60% aged in the regular manner. Notably, The Grumpy Troll's Bourbon Barrel Aged Scotch Ale was unblended; after it warmed up, it tasted exactly like drinking whiskey/bourbon/scotch - a pretty neat trick for beer.

The first of the Central Waters Brewers' Reserve special releases is the Bourbon Barrel Cherry Stout. It is unknown if this is a blended beer, though presumably it is. Although the label is helpful enough to tell us that the beer is aged with eighty pounds of Door County cherries, and that it is aged for six months.
Appearance: served at 52 degrees, it is a gorgeous crystal deep ruby red, with a nice small tan head that quickly dissipates
Aroma: while the very first aroma is sweet, sweet cherries, the bourbon raises its head quickly with subtle earthy roasted malt underneath and a grassy brightness on the very end
Flavor: exactly like eating a cherry cordial; the cherry flavors burst in the mouth, while the bourbon notes follow soon behind supported by deeply roasted malts; despite the big, sweet flavors it remains nicely complex
Body: not as heavy as you might think, while the bourbon and hops hang around to keep the flavors fresh in your mouth, the finish is nonetheless clean
Drinkability: like most stouts, one is enough, but I would drink this any day and could probably drink two if I "needed" to
Summary: Central Waters hits another homerun and shows yet again why it is one of the best breweries in our state, and probably one of the best breweries in the country; while Wisconsin breweries tend to stay out of the National obsession with "big" beers, its a shame that this one isn't distributed further and can get the recognition it fully deserves.

Is It Beer Or Is It Wine? It's Both!

Welcome to the sweet, sweet world of barely wines. Or, if you prefer, barley wine-style ales. The wine lobby thinks they have a corner on calling things "wine" so us humble beer folk often label our strong ales, which can be as strong, or stronger than wine, as wine-style ales.

The BJCP kindly tells us that an American (as opposed to British) Barley Wine (category 19C) can range from light amber to dark copper and sometimes a ruby brown color with high viscosity. These beers should have an intensely malty aroma with underlying hoppiness throughout. The flavors should be sweet and malty, but not with specialty malts such as roasted barleys or chocolate malts. Some fruitiness and alcohol flavors are appropriate (and unavoidable).

The British, as typical, are not as aggressive with the hops, so will be more relaxed in some of the bitterness and fruity or floral aromas and flavors. The cousin of the Barley Wine is the Winter Ale, which is distinguished by more use of specialty malts (such as caramel, chocolate, or more usually, mildly roasted malts) and spices (such as clove, pepper, anise, etc.) which would be inappropriate in a barely wine.

So, what makes Barley Wine so wine-like? Perhaps it is the higher viscosity body, the sweet flavors, the high alcohol or the barrel aging. Maybe it is the fact that these beers age so well. In fact, a young barley wine may be too sweet, too bitter, too viscous - some may find it cloyingly alcoholic. But let a barley wine sit for 2, 3, 4, 5, or 10 or 15 years and it will mellow out wonderfully. It will lose its bite, its barrel aging will begin to assert itself, the bitterness will fade and hop flavors and the malt flavors will become one in an amazingly complex union of sweet, fruity, earthiness. It will make you talk like a wine-dork.

So, where can I find one of these? Well, not surprisingly, not a lot of Wisconsin breweries make them. Tyranena made one as part of their Brewer's Gone Wild Series called the Spank Me Baby! (BA.RB.) Viking makes one called the Berserk. (BA.RB.) Pearl Street Brewery in LaCrosse makes one called Old Skeezer, though neither Beer Advocate nor Rate Beer have any information. JT Whitneys has their Mad Badger. (BA.RB.) With the exception of one other (reviewed below) we know of no other Barley Wines being made in the state of Wisconsin.

And Central Waters brews their Kosmyk Charlie's Y2K Catastrophe Ale. If and when you find and drink this beer, because like most Central Waters beers these days it can be hard to find, please, please, please do not serve it at refrigerator temperature. The best advice I can give for this beer is to pull it out of the refrigerator about thirty minutes before you actually want to drink it; do not open it, but set it on your counter and walk away for thirty minutes. Go watch Threes Company or Family Guy or half of Law and Order. Then come back and split the bottle with someone else. Yes, it is only a twelve ounce bottle, but do you REALLY need a full pint glass of a 10% ABV beer? One glass will be plenty to pour into two red wine glasses and last you through dinner or sip while watching the end of Masterpiece Theatre. (BA.RB.)

Appearance: A deep ruby red with a thin white cap in a small snifter. While it is on the darker side for the style, the coloring is crystal clear and bright given its deep red hue. Even the head leaves legs on the side of the glass.
Aroma: big and malty aroma with a scent of alcohol and cherries. There is a slight hoppy fresh pine and citrus brightness on the back of the nose.
Flavor: Thanks to the handy-dandy VinTemp, we know that the beer is served at the perfect temperature of 54.5 degrees. Sweet and sharp alcohol starts the show. Meanwhile the soft malty flavors start to assert themselves. Soft and earthy flavors show through an intensely sweet bread-like maltiness. Caramel and cherries give way to a sharp hoppy bitterness that leads into the finish. You are left with a long, bitter and fruity taste to savor as you contemplate the slow ethyl warming in the gut reminescent of a fine whiskey. As it continues to warm into the upper-50s a slight smoky dryness starts to come through.
Body: Surprisingly medium-bodied; while it seems like this should be a full-bodied beer, the overload of base malts and gentle use of heavier specialty malts makes this pleasantly light and viscous.
Drinkability: It seems silly to talk about the "drinkability" of a barley wine; but when I look at a barley wine, I look at whether I enjoy the bottle I am drinking - whether I feel like it is a task to finish my glass; this beer is light and warming and pleasantly sweet - each sip brings a new taste to discover and the beer changes as it continues to warm.
Summary: An enjoyable beer to drink either alone or with a fine French Bourguignon. While its brash and in-your-face youthful flavors are fun to taste even at colder temperatures (this beer could easily be consumed at upper-40s temperatures), it should age very, very well and will mature nicely in five to ten years.

Yet Another Brewery That Couldn't Start Today

I know. It's beating a dead horse. Well. It's more like beating the skeletal remains of a horse that was beaten to death. But, I feel obliged to point these things out, because I think it bears explicit demonstration of exactly the havoc that the legislature has wrought by hastily passing the Great Dane Bill (SB224). So, humor me.

Central Waters Brewing Company first started brewing in 1998. By 2000, the owners Mike and Jerome, were winning awards for their barleywine. After a number of ownership changes that, surprisingly left the beer quality high, Central Waters is now one the hottest breweries in Wisconsin. The regular beers in their lineup, Lac Du Bay, Mud Puppy Porter, Ouisconsing Red Ale, Happy Heron Pale, Junc Town Brown, and Satin Solstice are all great beers for their styles. Infinitely drinkable, and supremely balanced any one of these would make a fine choice at the beer store.

But they also have a few tricks up their sleeves. Kosmyc Charlie's Y2K Catastrophe Ale (BA.RB.) is one of the best barleywines in the country, if not the world. While I'm sure we'll get around to a more formal review of it in the future, rest assured that you cannot go wrong with the Y2K barleywine.

But Central Waters' real juggernaut-inducing beers are its barrel aged beers. Central Waters offers three beers aged in bourbon barrels. The aforementioned barelywine is also available occasionally aged in bourbon barrels. Also produced is an aged stout and an aged cherry stout. Last week, the Bourbon Barrel Stout was released. Its availability is scattered, so if you see it around, make sure you grab it - it may not be last long; even at $16.99 for a 6-pack. In fact, I was told that for the second straight year retailers are getting less than anticipated. Brennan's had ordered 25 cases and was assured that they would be getting them; only 5 cases were actually delivered. While Central Waters' expansion into the Milwaukee area might account for some of this, it is hard to fathom what the full reason could be. Last year's excuse was an evaporation issue: that seems like a lot of beer to evaporate.

In any event, the Bourbon Barrel Stout is considered one of the better stouts (BA.RB.) - the one-year aged version is in Beer Advocate's Top 10 for the style.

Appearance: As it pours into an over-sized snifter, it is dark and thick, but not oily like the Russian Imperials; its coloring is more of a dark ruby brown, not the jet black colors of other stouts; it is accompanied by a thin, wispy brownish-tan head that clings as if its life depended on it to the sides of the glass.
Aroma: roasted and bourbon, with some coffee-ish notes; there's some faint chocolaty smells lurking in the background, but it could be hops mixing with the roasted notes. As it warms up the bourbon notes really come out and the chocolate asserts itself more.
Flavor: Ideally served at 55 degrees, this beer has some kick; the coffee and roasted notes hit first, followed by the bourbon, and a smooth finish of chocolate and a light bitterness; some of the oakiness from the barrel comes through, though surprisingly little hop; this beer is all about the malts and the specialty malt complexity is pretty amazing; a light touch with the sweetly caramelized malts adds a soupcon of brightness.
Body:the bourbon aging rounds this beer out and is it is supremely smooth; for a stout it maintains a soft but not heavy body.
Drinkability: An excellent before bed night-cap to watch the timbers in the fireplace dwindle down while listening to the final strains of Mingus' Epitaph.
Summary: If stouts are your thing - and really, who doesn't like a stout every now and then - go out and grab a six while you can; it is doubtful that retailers will be splitting these for singles, so you will probably be stuck paying the $16 for a six-pack; but drink a couple now, and drink a couple next year, and then two more the year after that - you will find it was the best $16 you ever spent on beer. Between the Leinie's Big Eddy Russian Imperial and Central Waters, Wisconsin is making a strong claim for the top of the stout pile.

So, what does the Great Dane have to do with this beer? Well, to belabor the point, as I promised I would earlier, SB 224 would make it illegal to start a brewery that operates like Central Waters does. How? Well, the new law requires that if a brewing company own a brewpub license that all of its facilities must be brewpubs. Thus, brewing operations cannot be separate from retail operations. It is this same rule that would have prevented Granite City from opening here. In this case, Central Waters has a 7,500 square foot brewing facility in Amherst, WI; its restaurant is 60 miles away in Marshfield. Although the restaurant facility does brew some beer (namely, 6 beers that are available only at that location), the brewing facility does not have a restaurant - though it would be required to have one under the new law. Moreover, if and when Central Waters surpasses 10,000 barrels it would have to close down its popular brewpub. Of course, Central Waters will be covered by the grandfather clause; but any new brewers hoping to mimic Central Waters differentiated brewing system will be out of luck.

ps. the word of the day is "soupcon" - use it in a sentence today and people will think you are twenty times smarter. Everybody can thank Sean for today's word of the day.