From my heart to yours - Beers to be drank, pondered, written about

I stopped by one of my favorite liquor stores on Friday night, Lukas Liquors http://www.lukasliquorsuperstore.com/, in Lone Tree, Colorado (thank you, JP & Naomi for recommending such a fabulous place), to stock up on some new beers to try:

Lukas Liquors is called 'The Superstore' because it is very super.  And special.  I am quite fond of the bomber room.  I wanted to take a picture of it, but did not want to stand in front of the 'Bomber Room' doors for too long, in case someone else got the great idea that it's hot, and what a better place to hang out than your liquor stores walk-in beer room?  That, and it's quite small; I didn't want to feel claustrophobic and had a purpose for being there, the temperature change was just an added benefit.

The above four beauties were picked at random; I'm not sure I've had any of these - I probably have had the Duvel before, and I am pretty sure I've tried the Scaldis (this one is the amber, so it differs from the Scaldis I mentioned prior).

As I was wheeling my bombers out of the bomber room, to the front cash register, one of the Lukas Liquor guys stopped and thanked me for coming in, and then looked at my cart with big wide eyes and said, "you really know what to drink!"  I'm glad he approved, I'll let you know how these turn out shortly...

Apothic Red 2010, drinking wine for a reason

Let me start by saying, often times I don't need to drink.  I really like the taste of beer, wine, vodka, scotch, etc.  Not too often do I find myself 'needing a drink' due to a stressful situation, a long, tiresome, angst-ridden workday, or some needless predicament I've found myself in.  Today is the needless predicament, which prompted me to open the 2010 Apothic Red.  It's a California red blend of Zinfandel, Syrah, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot.  It's very tasty and went very well with the steak I just grilled.

I would like to possibly rename the wine 'Apathetic' for the reason I am drinking a glass this evening, which is due to my cat:

I imagine the look on his face is him saying, 'what? WHAT? What do you want from me?!'

I was on the phone this evening explaining to a friend of mine how my cat, Oscar, tends to bring in little 'trophies' from the outdoors if I do not close the balcony door.  He apparently found a nest of bunny tonight and I noticed was dining on his third victim when I let him in.  I explained to my phone friend that the bunny's tend to cry (it's a horrible, horrible sound) but this alerts me to make sure balcony door closed prior to Oscar dropping his catch of the moment.  If I do not close the balcony door, then it's a matter of who gets to chase after the bunny/mouse/etc.  I would rather Oscar do the chasing, but he practically loses interest if I'm involved.  I'm sure there is some cat logic there as in 'hey, I brought you the goodie, you now get to play with it, this is a great honor'. I even said to my friend "mice are the worst.  At least with bunnies you can find them and they run/hop but they are still possible to catch."  I realize now I had doomed myself by speaking those words.

The first thing I noticed after letting my cat instead is that he headed directly to the kitchen, and flatten the entire front part of his body down to squeeze himself under a low kitchen shelf.  He couldn't get himself back much farther...and then I knew.  There was something behind that shelf.

After removing some bags from the left side of my wine cooler, I noticed mouse droppings and then saw a tail.  I started to panic and had to give my friend the 'I am going to let you go, there is a situation'.  Then I saw the tail.

I called my roommate, hauled the vacuum upstairs, told my roommate to move the wine cooler and with the hose extension I would suck that little bastard up.  But that little bastard mouse kept moving, away from the sound of the vacuum, eventually ran into my dining room, across my roommate's foot, and then flung his little brown body to the front entryway and then either into the powder room or to the adjacent main floor closet.  Which way did he go?  Did my cat help?  No..he was laying on the steps looking at both my roommate and I as if to say, 'really, do you think you know anything about how to catch a mouse?'.

Thus I will now refer to this wine as apathetic.  As in, my cat better suck up his apathetic little attitude and do some mouse hunting quickly.  He has no problem killing for sport, but this is a serious need.  I want to see some mouse carnage, until that moment I will continue drinking this red.  It's a nerve-calmer.

Maredsous Triple

I have uncorked the 10% alcohol Maredsous Triple.  Having returned from a four-day weekend visiting my family, I thought what a better way to cap off the weekend than to drink this foamy beer.

At 10% alcohol this should be an entertaining ride.  As you will note the color, it's a bit amber:

Just so you are aware Triple (or Tripel as our brethren in the "Land of Ideas" calls it) refers to a strong pale ale.  Apparently the 2" foam dissipates slowly, according to other beer aficionados.  The first sips seemed to be a bit tart (being very hoppy) and maybe it's the alcohol talking but this beer is starting to go down rather smoothly.  There are some other flavors in there, I cannot say, I'm more focused getting my drink on.

This blog gets updated almost as frequently as my runkeeper.com profile, where I track how many miles I have been riding my road bike.  I'm training for the Triple Bypass, a 120 mile ride, where you gain over 10,000 feet in elevation, in one day.  The reason it's called the Triple Bypass is due to the three mountain passes one must climb over to reach the very delicious BBQ at the end, or so I'm told.  I imagine anything will taste good after being on a bike for about 10 hours.  They should serve this triple for the triple.  Why isn't Maredsous sponsoring this bike ride?!

As to the origin of the name 'Tripel'/'Triple', that should be an interesting story, say a brewer, in order to claim his beer as a 'triple' must climb three peaks in the Alps nobody else dared, in say, a day, and they must also yodel, wear lederhousen and drag that huge horn with them, as well as all the equipment to ferment beer. 

All I can find so far as to the 'triple' designation is that there is a second fermentation, but what about the third?  According to Google translate, 'Tripel' does mean 'triples'.  Triple beers?  Triple headaches?  The Holy Trinity of inebriation?  It is stated that triples have at least twice the amount of alcohol as regular beers, so why wouldn't they be called Doppel...but then there is a doppelbock, which refers to a strong lager, of German origin, which is not a Tripel.  Again, I have been lost in my own wonderment as to why something is something and Google, Wikipedia, and beeradvocate.com are not giving me the answer.

It is very possible that I will not be riding my bike in the morning to train for the Triple Bypass, thanks Maredsous Triple!

CHOUFFE...HOUBLON...DOBBELEN...IPA...TRIPEL!!!

It was between this IPA and another Maredsous...the only reason I picked the Chouffe to drink this evening was because the Chouffe has 9% alcohol content as opposed to the Maredsous 10% alcohol content. That, and I've had the Chouffe before and am rather fond of it.  This is a pretty mild 'hoppy' IPA.  It is a tad on the bitter side but not too much.  Why am I fond of it, you ask?  Oh, I will tell you why...

First of all there is this little gremlin on the front of the bottle.  Said gremlin kind of looks like he is smoking a hookah, but then it looks like he is pulling or 'reaping' grain (although I do not see a sickle).  And then, I just read the back of the label, which made me laugh out loud: "On its journey across the globe the little Chouffe wandered through beautiful hop-fields."  OH, OK.. I am completely amused (and to answer my question, it's hops, rather than a hookah).  The label continues, "The overwhelming aroma of these little hop flowers such as Tomahawk, Amarillo and Saaz mesmerized him."  Really?  Maybe it was the poppy flowers mixed in as well.  Maybe it's because he is a little gremlin, and they don't exist.  Maybe someone in their extremely inebriated state made this whole story up, and thought it was cute.  Yet, I am reading the back of the label, touche, hoppy beer makers, touché.

The label further explains that this crafty little Chouffe created this beer with a "dizzying array of hops".  My that little troll was busy.  It really puts an innocent spin on drinking alcohol.  Is this how it's marketed to children?  Does their grandma entice the kids with a "drink this with your dinner, it's good for you, and look at the cute little gnome on the front"?

My grandma enticed me with drinking a shot of whiskey on Christmas Eve once.  Well, I was 10 years old and it really wasn't that hard.  This was my Great Grandma Giordano, who spoke broken English (she immigrated from Sicily when she was 18 years old), and somehow she was taking care of pouring the whiskey shots pre-Christmas feast.  I walked into the kitchen and she put a shot in front of my face and said something to the effect of, "you want dis?"  If you put alcohol in front of my face, you need not ask twice if I want it or not, even at 10 years old, I took the shot and knew what to do - I stealthily walked back into the living room (or so I thought), found a big wrapped present to hide behind and proceeded to take this situation with all the seriousness that the adults do.  This is adult power I have in my hands and I am going to drink it.  Somehow, I have no idea, my mom immediately discovered what I was doing, marched into the living room where I was hiding, and grabbed the shot glass right out of my hands.  I was so disappointed in her, she was going against my Great Grandmother's wishes of getting me a little buzz before dinner, what was the harm in that?  C'mon, it's Christmas!

So much for my attempt at underage drinking, but it didn't stop my from doing it many, many times until I turned 21.  So put the cute little Chouffe's on the bottles, encourage the youth, drink up!

I just googled what a Chouffe is - it's a dwarf!  Oh, a dwarf, that's right.  It's not a gremlin, a gnome or a troll.  It's a dwarf.  A dwarf, according to all the pictures of it, that is hard at work, picking hoppy flowers, and making beer.  Good dwarf, you harvest those flowers and ferment that beer for us, and we will let you hang out with Snow White and provide beer to our children.  I take it that the dwarves would be named something like Drunky, Surly and Pretentious Douchebag?

To wrap this up, I'd say #1) visit the Chouffe website (look, it's a little dwarf running across the page) http://www.achouffe.be/en #2) drink this beer at some point, it's good, a combination of a Belgian Tripel (I knew that was how it was spelled..) and an IPA, and #3) keep in mind, your children will be drinking with you at some point; nothing says 'drink me' like Stinky Dwarf on the front of a bottle you won't let your kids touch.

Maredsous Abbaye Blonde

(written Friday, May 4, 2012)
On this very somber evening (the passing of Adam Yauch, a.k.a. MCA, of the Beastie Boys), I will try the Maredsous Blonde.  It's a big beer, look at this thing:

It has 6% alcohol by volume, generally the Belgium beers are at around 8-9%?  So this is good, if I drink the whole thing then I will be just as drunk as if I were to drink a smaller Belgium that was higher in alcohol content.  One thing to note before I start drinking, I have not eaten.  It's 9:40pm.

I opened the bottle...

Placed the cork in my 'cork bowl'...

And poured a glass

You know, there is a tad bit of bitterness, but not overly so.  It's pretty light and lager-y.  I like Belgium Blondes so this beer seems pretty typical.  Now for my research, since I'm looking at this label and there is a variety of questions.

I just googled Maredsous, found a very legitimate and strong Benedictine Monestery, and Maredsous also produces the number one cheese brand in Belgium.  I like beer..and cheese...

Along with searching for more information on Maredsous, I'm looking up photos of Beasties Boys in Adidas tracksuits.  My sister told me she would be mourning MCA by listening to Paul's Boutique and wearing tracksuits for a week.

(...to be continued..)

It's About Time I Opened the Scaldis

Mmm.....Scaldis, I've drank you before and you are delicious.  At 10.5% alcohol you will be kicking my ass shortly.

To be specific, this is the Brasserie Dubuisson Scaldis Blonde Ale Triple, 750ml, yes I am going to drink an entire wine-sized bottle of this stuff.  Amazon actually sells this beer on their site at $14.95 which is not what I paid, I believe I paid only $10 at the local liquor store (because who buys alcohol off of Amazon??).

I really love this Triple.  A friend of mine introduced this beer to me awhile back.  I served it to my dad when he paid me a visit a few years ago (his intent was to paint my garage, he was pretty adamant about this, I'm serious).  The day's labor, combined with very little sleep on the train ride out, combined with altitude, combined with a 10.5 abv meant that my dad slept very well that night.  We had to get up the next morning and finish painting the garage, I never asked him how hungover he was that day.  Scaldis, it was what I served for dinner.

This beer is actually pretty smooth, it may be a tad fruity but I don't really notice the finer things in a beer like aromas and character.  What I pay attention to is, does it not provoke a gag reflex?  Can I drink it and not taste anything skunky?  Does it taste like beer?  I answered all these questions with a definite yes.

In case you are wondering, because I always do, Scaldis is a Belgium brewery in the French-speaking part of Belgium.  This brewery has been in operation since before the French Revolution.  I would probably do very well with visiting Belgium.  I like to drink, I speak very little French, and even less of other languages, but I'm entertained with very little and that's without the alcohol.

The worst beer pour EVER...who can pour a beer better than me??  So many people..

To wrap this up, I really like this beer, it's easy to drink, it will get you drunk faster than you can say Belgium Waffles, and showing up with this beer at a party might make you look kind of cool...or pretentious, your call.

Day-after notes: I was watching The Hangover Part 2 while drinking this beer last night and yes, I too had a hangover this morning.  I guess that is what you get when you are drinking these high alcohol beers.  Cheers!