Beer Review; Mikkeller Centennial Single Hop IPA

Mikkeller Centennial Single Hop IPA is now on tap in town at both Crane Alley and at Radio Maria. Last night, I sat down with a glass of it.

Beer Advocate has a hops guide, here's what it says about Centennial:

Centennial is an aroma-type cultivar, bred in 1974 and released in 1990. The genetic composition is 3/4 Brewers Gold, 3/32 Fuggle, 1/16 East Kent Golding, 1/32 Bavarian and 1/16 unknown.

A relatively new hop on the market, this hop used to be called CFJ90. Described by some as a "Super Cascade" and we tend to agree, but it's not nearly as "citrusy". Some even use it for aroma as well as bittering. Bitterness is quite clean and can have floral notes depending on the boil time. (alpha acid: 9.5-11.5% / beta acid: 4.0-5.0%)

At Radio it's served in a chalice for $6. It's a dark brown, with a quickly dissipating head. However the remaining foam clings well to the glass (both a function of the beer and of a clean glass). It's opaque. It also appears to have some things in it that add to the opacity, it doesn't look like yeast, or anything that would be wrong, it just looks like it's unfiltered.

It smells woody and sweet. I didn't get a citrus or pine aroma. I got wood. It wasn't completely an industrial arts class in highschool smell, but there was wood.

It felt thick, almost a wee bit syrupy. Additionally, it seemed too cold. (A function of the cooler). I allowed the beer to warm up a bit, and that produced even more of a woody smell.

It tasted oaky, sweet, and then bitter. It wasn't piney or citrusy. The hops provided... bitter. If you were going to make a homebrew and wanted something to provide bitterness, this would be a good one for it. As you see from the hops guide, it does have a large amount of alpha acids, that contribute to the bitterness.

It was a damn fine beer. It was both mouth watering from the initial sweetness, then drying from the bitterness.

The woody-ness of it reminded me of New Holland's Oaked Mad Hatter (without the sweet tarts).

I'm going to need to try it again (probably at Crane Alley) to see if it's always this woody. I expected more pine, although citrus should be more evident (after reading more about the hops).

Beer Review; Mikkeller 1000 IBU

Saturday, before going to work at Radio Maria, I stopped at Crane Alley to have a beer and lunch.

I remembered that Aaron had mentioned they had bottles of Mikkeller 1000 IBU, so I figured, why not attempt to remove the taste buds from my mouth.

I drank it with a Reuben (I really enjoy the Crane Alley Reuben sammich), also, I figured, have a 1000 IBU beer, with a sammich with 1000 island dressing.

The beer comes in paper (like some Belgian lambics or some Belgian xmas beers). Also, it has a cork and cage. I don't think the cage is necessary, as there wasn't a whole lot of pressure behind this.

It poured opaque, had some real good head retention, and laced the glass well. It was a dark wood color, almost was the same color as the bar.

It smelled like hops. Not necessarily fruity or floral hops, it smelled like piney hops. It reminded me of (i think) a juniper bush. It was the smell of my childhood of climbing up evergreen trees and getting the sap on my clothes, and that smell wouldn't come out, neither would the sap.

It felt thick and coated the tongue.

It tasted, initially, (go figure) bitter. It had a sweetness in the middle. But then there was a strong bitter finish. It took a while to get there, but the finish of the initial sip almost made me gasp, it was so bitter. You can tell there's a lot of malt in this thing to balance out the hops, otherwise, it could easily be an undrinkable hop bomb. It was piney, yet sweet. Oddly, it seemed to sweeten my mouth. As the taste left my mouth, it felt like I had just eaten sugar.

The beer was so bitter, that it left a sweet-sugary taste in my mouth. I had earlier drank a mountain dew, and I thought that I possibly still may have had some of the sugars in my mouth, but then realized that there was no way anything could have survived the onslaught of hops that this thing provided. It was so bitter that after the taste went away, it made the air I was breathing taste sugary.

In the Skinny Puppy song, "Inquisition" off the album Last Rights, there's a line that says "desserts so sweet, leaves bitter taste in the mouth... forever". This beer was the opposite, it was so bitter, it left a sweet taste in the mouth (not necessarily forever).



At Crane Alley, the beer is $15. They will present it to you in a tulip. It comes in a 375 ml. Which is more than enough for a person. I recommend sharing it with someone; it's something you'll want to bounce flavors and the experience off of, just to see what you both get out of it.

Would I get this again, hell yes. It's not that high in alcohol at 9.6%, and it didn't hit me as being even that high. You could probably let this beer sit for 5 or 10 years and it'll still be a hop bomb. They say you can't detect bitter at above 100 IBU, so this thing will have quite a few years before it gets below that threshold. It is in a green bottle, so keep it in the paper, if you plan on letting it sit for some years. Remember, light struck hops will degrade normally into a skunky flavor. This one has a lot of hops to degrade. If kept in hot or well lit areas, it could quickly turn into the 1000 skunks beer.

Beer Run to West Lakeview

I didn't mention on here (I don't think) that yesterday I was gonna go up to West Lakeview Liquors for a backyard party. WLV was having Mikkel, his twin brother Jeppe, and their older half brother Kasper over, as Mikkel was over at Three Floyds brewing the next special release.

This years beer is going to be Havregoop, and is going to be an oat-wine-ish beer.

I got to spend an amazing amount of time with all three brothers; I wasn't really expecting it, but it kind of felt like I (and Zoe) monopolized their time from about 5 until 10... oops.

Let me backtrack a little. No one was available to go up there with me. Everyone I called was busy, or was too whiney (hippie!) to make the trip. So when I woke up on Saturday, I texted Zoe to see if she was free. I didn't even hear back from her, so I head up 57 around 1:15 (the party started at3, and that would put me slightly fashionably late). Just as I passed Gilman, Zoe texts me saying she's doing nothing, so I call and tell her where I'm going, and she says sure she'll go, sounds fun.

So I had just passed Gilman, and Zoe lives in Chenoa... So, I drive up to the next exit and turn around. This is Interstate 57, the next exit was 9 miles up the road. !8 mile turn around, then a drive on Route 24 for 45 or so minutes, and I pull into Chenoa around 3. Chenoa still has about 100 miles to Chicago on 55, so we head on up again. We finally pulled into the wrigleyville area around 5, but it's cool, I'm going with a good friend.

We find our way into the backyard party, and have a beer. They had three beers on tap (well, only two at first) Great Lakes Blackout Stout; Surly Fest Lager; and then eventually Founders Devil Dancer triple IPA. They also had some good food out: Zoe really like the goat cheese and was raving about the pork too. Also, the stuffed grape leaves were outstanding. Oh, and the potato salad that Kristina made was amazing.

Earlier I asked Kristina what time the store closed, she said 11. I saw an empty bottle of Sierra Nevada Chico Estate Harvest Wet Hop Ale, and asked her how it was, she said amazing, and said she'd sell me a bottle or 2, someone later mentioned they only got something like 8 bottles.

This was a very informal backyard gathering, but still, as informal as it was, how do you go up and start talking to the guy who's listed as one of the best brewers in the world? I did it by asking which one of them was Dr. Erikschon. After that, Kasper (the older brother) came up and videotaped me for something for the guy who did that video.

As Kasper and I discussed their blog, doctor erection, and other things. We moved from where we were standing, to go sit on a bench at the side of the party. Zoe had already sat there as Kasper and I were talking for a while, a bit about politics, some about cartoons. Kasper works with people moving into Denmark; teaching them to ride bikes, helping them get jobs, and other things. After a bit, Jeppe (the twin) came over and we started talking about beer. Jeppe runs an import business bringing in some great beers to Denmark.

How hard is it to go into a brewery and ask them to ship you beer, when your twin brother is Mikkel? They were going to be going to Michigan today, to go to Bells, Founders, Jolly Pumpkin and I think another brewery to try to set up some distribution.

After a bit longer, Mikkel came over and chatted with us too. I tried to keep the conversation somewhat light, but when you are sitting there having a beer with the guy who brewed two of the beers that got you messed up on Wednesday night, and also on Saturday, when you had the beer and went "Holy SHIT" you gotta talk some about the beer.

So I thanked him for making beer, and mentioned Saturday with the Black, and then Wednesday at pool with the Monks Brew, and It's Alive. I asked about how it works for him, being the gypsy brewer and all; he said he can only work with breweries he trusts, and basically, they correspond over email while the beer is fermenting, and when it's done, they let him know. He doesn't babysit the beer the entire time it's being made.

I had mentioned about how I'd love to reduce the Black down to even more syrupy and put it on pancakes, and he said that they'll be putting out a stronger version on Black, I think called Ice Black (or Black Ice) which will be the Black, but Iced. He mentioned it would be about 24% ABV. I asked if "It's Alight" would be coming to the U.S. and he said it had to have a different name, and would be called "It's Alright" (it couldn't have "LIGHT" in the name, due to some stupid U.S. rule that says that a light beer has to have nutritional information or something stupid like that). Another of his beers that had a naming issue was the American "Monk's Brew" which every where else in the world is known as "Monk's Elixer" but can't be "elixer" in the U.S. because that means it's a medicine.

The brothers got tired of sitting around chatting, so we went over and played bags for a bit. It wasn't played the way I normally play it, but I had fun playing anyway. (We played it where one side was the team instead of the familiar my half... uh.. how to describe it... North was a team, and South was a team, not East vs. West... I guess that's about it).

I guess we did kind of fanboy out and took our pictures with them, but hell, they were cool, and we spent an afternoon and evening with them, so we kind of deserve it...And they were cool about it too.

After that we went shopping inside.

Here's the haul:

Founders Harvest Wet Hop ale (4 pack)
Avery the Beast 2006
Struiselensis (yes I've had it before, but it was amazing, and I think I'll let this get old)
Struise Witte
Baladin Xyauya (the last bottle they had on the shelf; not sure exactly what I'll do with this; either me, or Andy, or send it to California)
J. W. Lees Harvest Lagavulin
J. W. Lees Harvest Calvados
J. W. Lees Harvest Sherry
J. W. Lees Harvest Port
Dogfish Head Theobroma (2 bottles)
Sierra Nevada Chico Estate (2 bottles)
Mikkeller Black (it was too awesome to not get another one of)
Hanssens Mead the Gueuze
DFH 120 (heading to California)
Taras Boulba (because last time, I just didn't remember it)

Zoe picked up a bottle of cider, I think this one, .

So that was a cool day, I got home around 1, so it was a long day.