Quad Day: Take 2

#QuadDay is back in full force this year! The Second Annual and celebrating one of the most bad ass of styles. There seems to be more interest in it this year and I even had people telling me that it is not a real holiday without an Untappd Badge. Well maybe that is the problem... You can't drink what you like without having someone tell you that you have to. That is why we have Quad Day. Glorious words from the Founder of this awesome day. And oh yeah, Happy Birthday Beer Drinker Rob!

Seriously, though, before you get too much into another "beer holiday," keep in mind that this one was invented to basically mock the other "corporate" type evangelistic ones. Just so you know, I don't really give a shit if you drink a Quad or any beer. I don't care if you post pictures or use the hash tag. Drink whatever you want. If you want, go ahead and curse at me in the comments. There will be no fanfare or prizes or badges (at least none I worked on setting up). There are no clubs. Let's just drink some delicious beer!

I got this Saint Arnold Divine Reserve 13 in a trade while trying to procure beers for 1001 Beers. He said, well the ones you asked for are fine but here is some real Texas Beer. Awesome. Just awesome.



I also thought that same thing about the beer. Up to light Divine Reserve 13 is a Deep Ruby born with a short lived, bubbly brown head Quad that also boast some amazing clarity. Dark fruits and a bit malty on the nose with a very warming alcohol sensation filling your nostrils, which comes at no surprise since it clocks in at 11%abv.

The body is a little thin but the maltiness, plums, a hint of cherry, some very awesome chocolaty notes, and residual sweetness work together fantastically. There is a bit of alcohol warmth keeping all those flavors in check and making me feel oh, so good. The alcohol does not really come through much in the flavor at all and it finishes quite dry. I think this is a great beer to show you just how big and bad a Quad can be. Glad this was my beer of choice this year.

Cheers!

The Cloak Of St Martin

When I first heard about Quad Day, I had no idea what Quad I should be drinking. I decided to turn to one my of favorite brewery tweeps and ask if they had one available, @AbbeyStMartin. Lucky for me, THEY DID!!! But it was not going to be easy to find.

This beer had a very limited release and it came to America two month prior for The Great American Beer Fest. I knew no other information about it either. The press release was some of the best information I could find since it wasn't even on the website.



Found at BeerPulse.com

Press Release:

(Rongy, BELGIUM) — The Cloak of St. Martin is a limited-edition Barleywine-style Belgian ale, ready to warm the North American autumn and winter (fermentation details seen below).

The Cloak is Brasserie Brunehaut’s first Abbaye ale brewed using doubled fermentation capacity gained via three new vats installed on Leap Day 2012. This increased capacity delivered enough vat time for the first batch of this labor-intensive 13%+ ABV quadruple. On October 10 at 4pm (during GABF), Brunehaut CEO Marc-Antoine De Mees visits Falling Rock Tap House — Denver for a first tap pull of his signature, long planned passion project.

The Cloak of St. Martin is a new Belgian Quadruple celebrating St. Martin’s famous charity of “sharing” his cloak with a beggar!

A very dark quad, The Cloak of St. Martin’s first fermentation, to 9% ABV, uses Brasserie Brunehaut’s signature, centuries-old yeast strain. Rare, exquisite champagne yeast boosts ABV from 9% to 13% during a six-week second fermentation. The Cloak is then cellared six more weeks before final fermentation yeast is added.

The low foam pour, due to high (13.2% ABV) alcohol content, announces with an extraordinary aroma. Robust, complex notes include blackberries, coffee and bitter Belgian dark chocolate. Only 1200x six-bottle cases of engraved, individually wrapped and corked with-muselet 750ml bottles were shipped. Demand seems certain to outpace supply.

Ingredients – Pure Belgian H20 + four malt types, three yeast strains, three hops varieties and candy sugar.

Now, like I said, the issue was trying to find this beer. I am so glad Bottle Revolution tweeted me and said that they had a few of them still sitting around and they would put one away for me if I liked. Of course I said, HELL YEAH!!! I went and picked it up and had it with my Christmas Dinner. DUCK!!!

So, I have never had or made duck before but it was delicious! Just a side note. The beer though, that was the biggest thing of the night. So amazing and so good.



This beer was a little warm on the nose but the dark fruits are the biggest thing to land in there. On first sip you do get a little citrus, or was that the orange glaze on my duck? followed by some cherries, plum a bit of spice and really sweet. It has a very full body and the flavor lingers with you for a good amount of time. This is seriously one of the best beers I have tasted this year. Loved it and I cannot wait to try some more.

Cheers!

1001 Beers: Three Philosophers

For those of you that didn't know, December 2nd was Inaugural Quad Day. I know this is pretty late, but hey. It's the holidays. I didn't, at first, know what to think but as I learned more and more about it I just let it be and celebrated all that is the glorious style that is, The Quad. Straight from the mouth of the founder:

I picked the Belgian Quad as the focus of the newest and greatest holiday this side of Christmas, and it was no mistake that December 2 will be the annual celebration of this glorious day (it's my birthday too).

It is a shame though that I did not earn a badge. But, what's that you ask? What beer did I drink for The Inaugural Quad Day? Beer Number 22: Brewery Ommegang Three Philosophers.



They say this beer was made for contemplation and we actually had a good discussion about it being it seemed to be the number one beer of choice for Quad Day. Even coming up with the recipe or I guess the concept of this beer seemed to give the brewer some issues.

What is your ideal beer? A hoppy British ale? An aromatic German hefeweizen? An Oregon home-brewer named Noel Blake sat down a number of years ago and pondered this question for a "Create a Great Beer" contest. For him, the matter of one's ideal beer is not simply about style or even ingredients; it's really a philosophical question whose answer can be debated endlessly.

I agree with this 100%. So much talk out there about one beer being better than others or how one beer should not be drank based upon things such as who brewed it etc, etc. Taste is subjective. Each beer could be someones ideal beer. I mean, someone had to think it was good to want to sell it? But hey, lets focus on this.

Things that I really picked out were the cherries on the aroma. Obvious I know but that really stood out to me. Even when I went in for my first sips, the cherries were over top of everything else. When the Belgian yeast started to kick in things may have became a little tart and raisins started to come out and maybe a little bit of chocolate. Very smooth and malty. I had to keep coming back to this. I am glad that I had the bottle all to myself. If you have not had it, get it... but you have to wait until Quad Day To Enjoy it.

979 Bottles Of Beer To Go!

Cheers!