(Brew) Dog Days of Summer: the Scotland edition

Just because it's been nearly four months since I've updated "the beer blog" doesn't mean I haven't been enjoying some superb hop bombs – in fact, quite the opposite occurred.

After presenting on some of my work at Oxford in June (yes, Oxford, as in Oxford, the University of, ideally spoken with a delicate yet effervescent British accent), I hopped around Scotland for two weeks, hiking the West Highland Way and revisiting that beloved country for the first time in nearly a decade (I spent 2005-2006 studying there). Beyond my incredible adventure through the Highlands and soaking in the magical wonderment that is Scotland, I discovered that the craft beer craze had hit Scotland - and hit it hard. And hoptastically.

So this is how my Scotland trip worked: when I wasn't hiking, exploring ancient city relics, or freaking out about the penguin parade (it's a real and wonderful, wonderful thing), I would Google "best coffee in [city/town x]" in the morning and "best places to get beer in [city/town x]" or "best craft beer pubs in [city/town x]" by the afternoon/evening to dictate my day's wanderings. I highly recommend this travel tactic, particularly if you enjoy coffee and beer as much as I do, and/or walk as quickly/move through tourist areas as efficiently as I prefer.


First stop: Edinburgh
Amid highly excellent beer and burger joints (Holyrood at 9A had epic selections of local Scottish and Irish IPAs, and well, the burgers were kind of the best), I came across one of Scotland's finest breweries: Brew Dog. My first Brew Dog beer was at its Edinburgh bar location, with me flying solo on a fairly packed night. I was having trouble deciding between a number of IPAs and then some nice Scottish lad ordered me a Punk IPA.

Described as an American IPA coming in at 45 IBUs and 5.6% ABV, I wouldn't have though I'd like the Brew Dog Punk IPA so much. However, Beer Advocate's description nails it: "This light, golden classic has been subverted with new world hops to create a devastating explosion of flavour....an all-out riot of grapefruit, pineapple and lychee, before a spiky bitter finish....Turn up the volume. Pay the man. Embrace the punked up, pimped up Maharajah of Pale Ales. Nothing will ever be the same again." This apt description was the main reason I decided to enjoy a bottle at Edinburgh's oldest pub (The White Hart Inn, est. 1516) pre-lunch one day...and then perhaps a few more times along my two-week Scottish fling this summer.

Enjoying a Punk IPA at the White Hart Inn after walking around Edinburgh all morning.

 

Taking in the West Sands at St. Andrews at sunset, Punk IPA can (not) in hand.

When you have 1.5 hours in a small fishing village and there's an amazing beer garden...

Second stop: St. Andrews

Oh St. A's. You magical little village on the sea, you. My home of one year, my first time ever being abroad, experiencing a "different" culture (as much as a fairly posh Scottish university town, populated by a lot of Americans, can contrast with my day-to-day life). A place that cultivated my wanderlust and desire to experience the world outside of "high-income countries," largely thanks to trips inspired by and/or led by JJB to Turkey and Egypt. A place where I experienced the highest of highs (meeting some of the most incredible friends I've ever encountered and truly falling in love for the first time), a place where I questioned so many things and struggled to make sense of it all (as 21-year-olds occasionally do, and naturally with an extra heaping or so of self-doubt and drama). And oh yes – a place where I never sampled its beers.

Enter St. Andrews Brewing Company, a wee brewery located on South Street that opened in 2013. While its staple IPA wasn't on tap or available in bottle-form when I visited (high demand's such a drag sometimes), I got to enjoy some kind of ridiculous double-triple-imperial something soon after I arrived at St. A's. And like any well-crafted double-triple-imperial something (like the Reuben Brews's Life on Mars Imperial IPA I'm enjoying right now after a long day of writing), you couldn't tell it was a 8%-plus ABV beer based on the taste. To me, that's always the best barometer of a beer's structure (as well as the brewery's overall statue): can you make a fairly high-alcohol-content beer without it collapsing into brandywine territory? Is it complex yet drinkable, maintaining an enjoyable flavor profile without falling into booze central? And St. Andrews delivered, with aplomb.

Third stop(s): the West Highland Way

While the beer selections were generally less expansive during my 100+ mile trek through the Highlands, I did thoroughly enjoy one particular Scottish brew along the way: Belhaven's Twisted Thistle IPA. The Thistle's ABV and IBU ratings vary depending on where you look (a range of 5.3% to 6.1% and 50-70, respectively), but I think Belhaven's own description is pretty spot-on: "A stunting IPA....Your taste buds will tingle with pleasure after a sip or two of this golden nectar." Yes and yes.

Enjoying my first Thistle in Drymen, Scotland.

What I believe is a Twisted Thistle after a 23-mile day on the Way (plus Ben Lommond).

Fourth stop: Glasgow 

I had the great fortune of visiting a number of excellent brew pubs in Glasgow (e.g., the Wee Pub at the Chip, Curlers Rest), but the Glasgow-based Brew Dog pub still took the cake. It had a fantastic set-up, and I got to try both IPA is Dead and a rhubarb-infused Hardcore IPA when I visited. The latter, well, I don't understand why it was so fantastic, but it was – and I don't even like fruity beers! At all! (well, unless it's crazy grapefruit-y thanks to Amarillo hop fun). I even gained a bit of Glasgow-beer street-cred, as I had tried this rhubarb concoction before many of the Glaswegian beer gurus had, though they had heard about its lure. Two months later, I still have a bottle of Hardcore IPA I purchased on my last day in Scotland – it was meant as something to enjoy soon after my travels, I don't like holding onto small(er) batch beers for too long since they tend to turn sooner than more international brands. Hmmmmm – who's in for a Scottish beer tasting this weekend? Perhaps M's birthday celebration on Saturday afternoon could warrant such an offering...

...in sum, Scottish beers are awesome and you should try them. Particularly Brew Dog. Let's see if we can get some of our UK-based folks to bring more over for us in the coming months...

Cheers!

N 

Stoup-idly great beer: the Citra IPA

Among the many things I love in the world (malaria, goat cheese, my people, kayak trips — you know, the usual), three great things stand out:

1) Great women
2) Great beer
3) Great puns

If you're lucky, you might get to 2/3rds of this greatness equation: beer and puns, women and beer, women and puns...but all three? At the same time? Oh you wouldn't dare.

But the 2015 Seattle Beer Week boldly went there, and how they excelled. Yesterday's sold-out event at Pike Brewing was a fantastic meeting of the minds, mouths, and livers. Plus, I learned about the Seattle chapter of Girls Pint Out and how this group apparently achieves the greatness trifecta. I cannot wait to join in on some of their upcoming activities, such as Pints & Pages.

Numerous breweries provided samples of their finest wares last night, but one really shone among the bountiful beers: Stoup's Citra IPA.

Let's talk about this new favorite: as a single IPA that allegedly comes in around 50 IBUs (or says Beer Advocate), this wouldn't necessary seem like a beer for me on paper. Where's my imperial and IBUs by the billion? Well, it turns out this old dog might like some new tricks: the Citra was truly awesome. Just the smell wafting off the taster glass evoked visions of frolicking in grassy fields, happily swilling this brew. The taste was light and refreshing, yet complex and — shocker — intensely citrus-y (which I love). I'd need to try it again to confirm, but this one Beer Advocate review might have the Citra nailed: "This thing is almost pure grapefruit juice! Which I like quite a bit. I wouldn't like all IPAs to be like this, but this beer is a super tasty concoction."

If I could only drink one beer for the rest of my life and the Citra was an option, it'd certainly be a strong contender (particularly since I'm a big fan of strong grapefruit notes for my brewskis). And with the brewery's new outdoor beer garden opening last weekend, it just gets more and more Stoup-idly good.

Cheers,
N

Hoppy National Beer Day! Plus the Ultimate IPA Showdown.

You know you're considered a beer lover when your mother, who decidedly isn't much of a hop fiend, sends you an email titled "It's National Beer Day!"

So Happy National Beer Day, the day when beer could be legally sold again in 1933 after 13-odd years of Prohibition. Now if that's not worth celebrating, I don't know what is.

To honor the folks who couldn't openly enjoy their favorite brewskis for longer than I've been drinking (yes, do that math), I'm going to share the results from The Ultimate IPA Showdown.

The ultimate? Yes, we went there - and well, I think it's pretty apt.

Pliny v. Heady v. Brother. I've been dreaming of this hoptastic showdown for the last few years. But it's tough to come by, especially when you're faced with some serious acquisition challenges: Fremont's the Brother is only produced seasonally; Russian River's Pliny the Elder is increasingly challenging to get as its distribution continues to shrink; and well, living anywhere outside of Vermont makes retrieving a can of The Alchemist's famed Heady Topper an odyssey in its on right. But somehow the beer deities helped the hop cosmos to align, and by the end of February, I had at least one can or bottle of each.

The Ultimate IPA Showdown was hosted at J's house, where we received tasters labeled 1, 2, and 3 so we could blindly sample each of these epic IPAs (J's sister, R, kindly offered to be mad scientist unblinded to our shenanigans). R poured and set the tasters in front of us, eager beer lovers brimming with the kind of simultaneous excitement and anxiety a child might have upon trying Pop Rocks for the first time.

We tasted, we swilled, we tasted again. Each of us had our biases - for instance, J and I are huge Brother fans - and despite the beer-blinding, we were convinced that our palates, honed over dozens and dozens of trips to Fremont Brewing's UBG (Urban Beer Garden, for those of you not in the know), could suss out our perceived favorite.

But alas, science, as it often does, prevailed. Heady Topper emerged as the top hop, even though my can of the IPA gold was nearing three months old. Pliny snagged second, followed by our beloved Brother.

J and I sat crestfallen, as if our 30-something joys in life had just - poof - disappeared. O Brother, where art thou, with your citrus-y punch and "about a billion IBUs"? No offense to the other victors, but we just couldn't believe it.

Luckily, I had brought two cans of the Brother over to J's, and being my researcher-self, I popped open the second and compared that one with the Brother used in the showdown. They were totally different - the showdown Brother was skunked! Alas, we actually hadn't wrecked our palates over too many IPAs - the Brother was back! Yahoo!

But wait. We didn't have any more Heady. And the whole blind tasting thing couldn't be resurrected, or at least not that night. Another showdown would be necessary, to truly answer the age-old question of which IPA was the fairest of them all...

...and the saga will continue. And until that happens, enjoy your favorite IPA (coughBrothercough) and Hoppy National Beer Day!

Cheers!
N

Return of the Hops

(From last weekend)
A: Remember when you had that beer blog?
N: Yeah, I remember that. That was fun.
A: Why did you stop?
N: Well, there was no reason really. I guess I should do it again.

And here we go.

So what's happened beer-wise in the last 10 months (or since I last penned a beer blog post in April 2014)? Well, to start: I celebrated my 30th birthday in Bend, OR, which was arguably the best place I could possibly celebrate anything given its status of a beer-plus-outdoors mecca.

Favorites from that adventure included Crux Fermentation Project's Outcast IPA, GoodLife Brewing's Descender IPA, and Boneyard's Notorious Triple IPA. Bravehorse Tavern recently had Notorious on tap, making it the most recent Bend beer I've had in awhile. At a 12% ABV and an estimated 90 IBUs, the Notorious lives up to its name in stats - but not necessarily in crazed intensity. Boneyard's 3x brewski joins the ranks of a precious few triple IPAs (and their brewers) that can blend high hops, ABV, and drinkability without dropping into the brandywine abysss of doom (or at least according to my one-trick-wonder-IPA palate). This is a distinction reserved for only the hoptastic crème de la crème, such as Reuben's Brews (Blimey that's Bitter [10.5% ABV; ~80 IBUs]), Georgetown (Kick Ass Blaster [11.4% ABV; unknown IBUs), and this year's Hop Mob hero (and total darkhorse, according to some of Seattle's beer scene insiders), Snipes Mountain Brewing with Hayduke the Wrencher (9.3% ABV; 97 IBUs).

Oops, be kind and rewind to August 7: IPA Day! I had the distinct pleasure of celebrating this glorious event at Reuben's Brews, which offered a fairly fantastic IPA sampler in honor of this high holy day of hops. I took advantage of Reuben's IPA sampler, through which I got to experience the wonderment of crisp, delightful Crikey IPA (6.8% ABV; 53 IBUs). I completely agree with this untappd review: "Tastes way bigger than the ABV and IBUs suggest - grassy and piney with a background of tropical fruity flavours." Pine plus citrus plus refreshment = a major score in my hoppy book.

In October, I fully embraced Seattle's fresh hop season, ranging from the Pinebox's big fresh hop bash to the Noble Fir's daytime hoppy hour(s). For me, a decidedly amateur beer appreciator, fresh hops season offers the awesome opportunity to really delve into what types of hoppy flavors you - or in this case, I - prefer at a more in-your-face, hops-in-your-mouth level. So what did I learn? It turns out that I love Amarillo hops, which are largely responsible for the intensely citrus-y, grapefruit-imbibed IPAs I happen to adore. It also turns out that Reuben's Amarillo Fresh Hop Ale, one of the most amazing citrus-fresh-hop-bombs out there, makes me want to sing Ben Folds' "I Am the Luckiest" at the top of my lungs upon swilling this stellar brew.

Right before December, I made a beer advent calendar. Yes, that really happened. And Fremont Brewing's social media maven said "Oh my Holy Christmas Beer DIY Goddess...you win everything!" And then my life was made. 

Actually come December: oh boy, Hoppy Holidays to...me. Over. And over again.

(1) Maine beer fun with G & M, and my beloved dog niece R (yes, G "made" me drink my Baxter Stowaway IPA out of a straw. If I lived in Maine, I'd probably designate this IPA as a can go-to for every adventure.)

(2) An epic beer exchange with TM, East Coast v. West Coast IPAs (including Maine Beer Company's Lunch IPA [7% ABV; 88 IBUs] - an incredibly delectable, balanced, and crisp IPA. Me want more. Please.)

(3) An even more epic IPA showdown in upstate NY (spoiler: Fremont's Brother IPA won - a beer that's increasingly becoming my all-time favorite IPA)

(4) My dad managed to procure a 4-pack of The Alchemist's Heady Topper (!!!!!) for me through his work's gift grab-bag/White Elephant/Yankee Swap (which of course prompts all kinds of questions, like WHO GIVES AWAY HEADY TOPPER?????). This turned into a Christmas gift that truly kept on giving, as then I had the opportunity provide some of my favorite beer nuts out here in Seattle with their first HT experience.

So that's the rest of my 2014. Sort of. Not really. But did you really want more? That's what I thought.

Coming attractions: the amazing beer I had when the Seahawks tragically lost the Superbowl (the smallest of small, small, small silver linings); SF Beer Week, otherwise known as PlinyQuest 2015; and Tahoe's finest IPA (preview: it's from Stateline Brewery).

Cheers!
N