1001 Beers: Boston Lager

One of my favorite places to go out and eat... just because Fondue is amazing, is The Melting Pot. They can get a bit on the pricey end but you never leave dissatisfied... unless you get a crappy waiter. I have not experienced that yet. Just throwing out variables. Makes sense, no? Well, Recently I was there and decided to have the beer flight with my Big Night Out. Mainly because I wanted beer, not really because I was trying to pair. The last time I was here I did the wine flight. I think there was one I really liked and I didn't really keep notes on them so it's whatever.

The beers for the flight were split between ones I have had many times before and ones that I have only had a few times. They were Boston Lager, Sierra Nevada Pale, Stone IPA, and Rogue Chocolate Stout. Honestly, I did not really see any correlation in flavor of the food to the beers that they presented but I guess I cannot be too mad. There were a few good selections.



The first course was just The Big Night Out Boston Lager Cheese Fondue. A little appetizer to get us going. Bread Fruit Vegetables, and Beer Number 19 Samuel Adams Boston Lager. I have only had this one a few times before, and I always say I am not really a fan of Sams so this was just a formality since you cannot substitute beers in the predetermined flight... not that they really have a beer menu anyway. Honestly, I found nothing interesting about it... again. Just another beer. A bit of floral hops in the start, a tad earthy and then citrusy... It was way better in the cheese than in the glass but I guess I can't be too picky, I did come here for the food.



The next beer was a classic. Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. I can't say anything bad about this beer. Though, I did not think it paired well with my salad... It wasn't bad, but for sure it was not thought out. Check out This beer Here.



Stone IPA is one I have had a few times and it actually fits into this series, but I will give it it's own post at a later date. It deserves one and will not go into this count. There is just so much to be said about this beer and this brewery, that I'd rather have it organized than just thrown together to get Boston Lager out of the way hah! I guess Lobster and Stone IPA is never a bad choice, but again, the whole coming together thing was just lost. My fault, or theirs???



The last beer, Rogue Chocolate Stout. I thought I had never had this one before, but a little search on Untappd proved otherwise. I am not really a fan of Rogue, but this beer was actually one I might buy get a pint of one day, and not just because I am at the brewery. Again, who ever made these pairing decisions should be fired but I guess the beer and the courses stood alone and that is what matters?

982 Bottle Of Beer To Go!

Cheers

1001 Beers: Black

Not too long ago, about 5 days ago actually, we took a little test in my class on the subject of Cardiology. It was only about 200 questions and only took me around 4 hours to finish it. By the end of the test I was just filling in blanks with my best guesses because I did not want to leave knowing for sure that I failed. I only thought that I was border line when leaving the testing room. We had a long weekend, in which I worked the whole time, but I decided not to do anything school related the whole time and I figured Tuesday I would see what happened from there. There was no way I expected the test to be graded at this point, but to my surprise... They were.

This got me sweating a little bit because I really do not remember anything that I had filled in and at this point in the class it was one retest and then a boot out of it. A little bit of pressure I would say. But I was relieved to receive my test and find that it said 92% on the top of it. I even asked the instructor if this was a typo lol but sure enough, I guess I know what I am talking about. I thought this called for a celebration of sort. I was going to go home and treat myself to a Victory Dinner and a nice beer. I had no idea what it was going to be when I made this decision but I knew it had to be worth it. I almost pulled out the Sierra Nevada and Dogfish Head Life and Limb but I then decided it was not time for that to be released. My next instinct was to go big. Hell, after this feat, I needed to. That is when I decided it was time to open that Mikkeller Black that I got from Bottle Revolution a while back. I think it was just as sweet that it ended up to work out for this series as well!

Brewer Mikkel Borg Bjergso describes this imperial stout as "one of my experiments." It is one of the many that have succeeded as the Danish Brewer has quickly proved himself as a craftsman of challenging beers since the first brew in 2006.

I find it interesting when I explore a new brewery, or in this case, a brewer, and learn a bit about them. I knew before that he was a gypsy brewer and did not have a set location for his production. Just that he traveled and brewed in various locations but before this beer I have only had one or two others from him. I plan to try and check out as much of the line up as I can but the ones I have had before were a great introduction... though, nothing could have prepared me for this.





Beer Number 18: This beer was hot right off the bat. I thought the nose was a bit tamed and you could really pick out the coffee-esque scents from the dark malts and maybe some raspberries and plums. That is where the subtleness ended though. Again, this beer was REALLY hot! I swear I got some pepper in here but it could have just been the alcohol. Which would not surprise me being it clocked in at 16.5%. Though, everywhere I look says 17.5%. I wonder if there has been a change to the recipe or something recently? After I was about a quarter of the way into the bottle and the alcohol relaxed a little, I was able to get a bit of chocolate at the start of this one. It had a very distinct sweetness that was laying over the malty background of this beer as well. The beer was surprisingly not thick and chewy at all. It was still a full bodied beer though and it did not try and hide that one bit. For sure a must try.

For dinner I decided to grill one of the Rib Eyes I had in the fridge and some mashed potatoes. The only thing that could ever make that better would be surf and turf! Plus, I love broccoli... Weird, right? So that made planning dinner very easy.

983 Bottles Of Beer To Go!

Cheer!

Mash House

Being I am new to North Carolina I thought it only made sense to try and figure out what this place has to offer for beer. I know being stuck in Fayetteville is probably not the best place to try and figure out what the state has to offer, especially after having been to an event like Twin City Taps but this brewery was local to me, and that is what it is all about. I have had a few people suggest The Mash House to me. They talk about the beer that is served there and the burgers that they make. It only made sense to me... Though, I ordered a steak... so of course I am going to do it. I guess I will have to pick out a burger next time but here we go...



I am pretty sure you can see what the beers are going around the circle so I will just tell you I started at the top, and worked my way around clockwise. The first beer, was obviously the blonde. I wrote out short hand notes on a napkin while eating haha. I just had to be sure of everything when I went back and decided what I wanted for my growler.

The Blonde was pretty decent. I have been falling for this style and the Kolsch a lot recently. I might even brew one. I mean, why not? I tried once before with the Kolsch but that was way back when in my early days of brewing before I knew that simple things mattered... like sanitation lol. Anyway, the straw color, not much could be picked out of the nose in that environment and glass though it was sweet and crisp. Lemon and wheat stood out. Very dry and light. Decent beer.

The Hefe was very hazy and kind of reminded me of milky orange juice. Not very attractive. Though orange, lemon, some spiciness of clove really hit the spot. The orange flavors kind of blended into vanilla and banana. It drank pretty light but felt a bit heavier than that... if that makes sense. I thought it was decent even though it went through some radical flavor changes.

The Red Ale was really malty. The finish of the hops though was quite harsh. Not a fan of that or the high level of carbonation. This beer was pretty much passed on. The IPA was next. I kind of wish I got the names of all these beers, but oh well. I guess that does not matter. This IPA apparently won gold at GABF in 2001. I am not going back to look in the record books but this gives me some expectations. The bitterness in this was very mellow. I appreciated that. Grapefruit came through quite a bit and it soothed out with a touch of lemon that followed into the finish. I thought this was an all around good beer. Well balanced.

Now we are getting to the darker beers. The porter was nice and malty. Pretty robust and had a sharp malt bitterness followed by a caramel sweetness. The stout, dark brown and a mellow head. Dark roasted coffee like flavors and caramel overtop. Pretty full bodied but not syrupy. That was nice. This beer was given to me on Nitro. I usually do not like beer on nitro. I don't know how to describe it but it has a funny taste... this was the first I did like... maybe, the others I have had were served on dirty lines? or I became accustomed to that flavor of the gas? I don't even know if that makes sense... I thought the gas was flavorless??? What do I know... Lets go with the dirty lines things...

I guess now that I have had a porter and stout they feel that my palate has been cleansed they are going back into the amber ale. I thought I picked up some green apples in this one but not too sure. I may have been losing it because I also got bananas... interesting for sure. The maibock was pretty hoppy and grassy. Just ok. The last beer to taste was the Cherry Blonde. I got maraschino cherries when I was drinking this one. They were all over the nose and into the taste. Cherry cordials is predominately what I thought of when drinking this. The chocolate, the cherries... I think the idea of the blonde was lost completely. It was funny because it was light bodied but still syrupy. I wondered how they brewed this one.

Now that I am at the end of this selection I guess I would say that this place has some damn good food. No doubt about that. I guess I only had one meal so I can't be too quick to judge on that but it was pretty fancy establishment as well. The beer did not really stand out to me. I mean, I did not find much that was very bad. Everything was drinkable. There were a few standouts like the IPA but I am not big on take the IPA every time. I like to experience other beers and that lead me to my decision on the Blonde to take home.



My first local brewery trip, though it was not what I would consider a typical brewery. I will get to some more soon and report back on those as well... but you already knew that.

Cheers!