Fegley's Brew Works Framboise

We met a friend at Philadelphia Bar & Restaurant and when I looked at the draft list I knew I had to try the Brew Works Framboise. I'm a sucker for sours and heard some decent things about this one.

Solid nose on it, smelled of fermenting raspberries and caramel. The raspberry part smelled pretty natural which is always a nice sign in brewing. Fake ingredients can up the flavor but are still fake. Tart raspberry up front, light caramel followed, and a slightly bitter or something finish. The raspberry and tartness was really nice in this and the natural flavor was pretty good. The only negative on this was the slightly odd, kind of bitter flavor in the finish. It didn't ruin the beer or anything, just threw me off a little. This is definitely worth trying if you see it though just to experience it.

Update: Oddly enough, The Brew Works just posted a blog entry about their lambics over here.

Fegley's Brew Works Bourbon Barrel Insidious Stout

Jo and I visited her home town recently and I brought some beers with me to drink Saturday night. One of those was Fegley's Brew Works Bouron Barrel Insidious, their imperial stout aged in bourbon barrels. I wanted to try this last year and wasn't successful so I was psyched to see it not only available again, but available in 12oz bottles.

Sweet bourbon and vanilla nose, no sign of any heat. Thick body. Started with some bourbon notes, some dark fruit and finished slightly roasty and bitter. As I drank more and my palate got used to it, the vanilla flavors grew and the bitterness and dark fruit flavors disappeared. Very solid bourbon stout and really enjoyable.

As a side note, it's awesome that they went from using 22oz bottles to using 12oz bottles. Generally breweries either move the opposite way or keep things the same since the profit margin is better for 22oz bombers since you can price them higher but Fegley's didn't and that's great. Besides being cheaper, it's so much easier to drink one 12oz bottle by myself too.

Bell's Darkest Day at Devil's Den

Okay, so this event was over two weeks ago at this point, but it was such a great time, I don't want to just skip writing about it. The event took place on December 21st, the shortest day of the year hence the name,  Darkest Day. Devil's Den got about 6 different Bell's beers including the incredibly rare Black Note. When the event was first announced at the end of November, I quickly put it on my calendar since I knew I couldn't miss it. Now, maybe I was a little too excited because when I got there at 4, there were only three other people in the bar and they all left before the event making me the first to arrive for it. I even took a picture!

See, empty bar. Luckily, I knew the next four people that walked in after me so I had plenty of company to pass the time.

Fegley's Brew Works Devious Imperial Pumpkin

I think I have one more pumpkin after this one so expect that one soon. The Devious is an imperial pumpkin coming in at 9%.

Huge cinnamon, allspice and clove nose. Just tons of spice. Interestingly enough, the flavors were way more smooth and understated. Started with some brown sugar maltiness with some cinnamon appearing along with a tiny bit of general spiciness and then finishing sweet. I liked the difference between the nose and body as it got you ready to drink this spice laden monster only to get a nice balanced sweetness instead. Really good pumpkin and something I'd get again.

Fegley's Brew Works Space Monkey

The Brew Works Space Monkey is a raspberry saison.

Sweet raspberry nose with a slight hint of fermentation. Sort of a like a musty undertone to the raspberry. Sharp raspberry flavor, a little tanginess, but finished a little weak and empty. The major flavor was raspberry without much else. The first two bottles I had the saison part was more prevalent and added a nice touch of spiciness which complemented the raspberry really well. Without that, this was just another fruit beer. Not bad if you are looking for that but I thought it was better before. It's my fault for not drinking it sooner though. Still it's not like it was bad so I can't fault it too much.

Pumpkinfest at The Institute

Last year, Jo and I attended the pumpkinfest at the Devil's Den which while fun mostly ended up with me trying two and then heading out since the list wasn't super interesting. While I never expected attending a pumpkinfest to be a yearly event, guess we've made it so after this past Saturday. This year we went to The Institute which had a very extensive list of pumpkin beers and a full pumpkin menu. The list numbered around 24 beers but the bar only has 16 taps so it meant that to try everything I wanted to on the list I had to be lucky. And, for the most part, I actually was although I did miss out on a couple. Gives me something to look forward to next year!

Hanging with PhillyTapFinder

My wife was out of town this past weekend which means time to go out! Since PhillyTapFinder's wife was out of town, we decided to meet up after work and hang out for a while. And, well, a while turned into almost seven hours.

We started out at Prohibition Taproom. Jo and I went there once a while ago but haven't been back since. The most unique part of the place is the oddly shaped bar which is shaped like an E with seats all around it. The inside is really nice looking though and it's a really comfortable place to spend time. When I arrived, Jared had already ordered a glass of Hill Farmstead Abner and was tweeting about how good it was so that's how I started.

Thanksgiving!

I started celebrating Thanksgiving early by going to lunch at Jose Pistolas on Wednesday.  I was supposed to go with a friend of mine and even though he bailed on me I went anyway.  There were quite a few things on draft that I wanted to try (Founders Curmudgeon, Duck Rabbit Wee Heavy, Nøgne Ø Sunturnbrew, and St. Bernardus Christmas) but seeing as how I could probably find all of them again but the Nøgne Ø, I decided to get a glass of that.  It's a barleywine that's brewed with some smoked malt.

Weyerbacher Winter & Fegley's Brew Works Hop'solutely

I had the Weyerbacher Winter Ale some time last week.  Jo and I got a growler of it when we visited the brewery for the Riserva release party.  The Winter Ale is a Winter Warmer.

It had a slight smell, sweet and malty.  Leads into caramel, toffee, and malt flavors with no hops or bitterness present at all.  Pleasant and drinkable as long as you like sweeter beers.  Jo enjoyed this a lot.  We both thought it tasted quite similar to Yards Brawler which isn't a bad thing.  It's also an inexpensive case so if you're looking for something to session, this is a great choice during the winter.

Last Friday night, I popped the bottle of Brew Works Hop'solutely I got from being super early to The Institute.  Brew Works claims it's a Triple IPA and I'm denoting it as such but really it's a Double IPA since the Triple IPA style doesn't really exist according to the mysterious groups that create beer styles.

I expected a huge hop smell, but it was surprisingly mild.  No head with very little carbonation.  Initially, I got some hop flavor with some caramel flavors along with it.  As I drank more, the hop bite grew and grew until it was all I was tasting during and after each sip.  I took a short break between the two glasses which helped me recover a bit, but man was it strong.  Reminded me quite a bit of Stone's Old Guardian.  I liked this, but next time I'd probably try to split it with someone as the full 750 was a little much for me.  Considering its ABV, I'd honestly call this a barleywine or what I want to call it, a Hopwine.  Hell, we have Barleywine and Wheatwine, why not Hopwine?

Pumpkinfest at Devil's Den

Devil's Den has the best fests in Philadelphia (okay not really, but yeah hyperbole!).  First it was sourfest and now it's pumpkinfest.  Yeah fests!  This time wasn't quite as extravagant though.  They had 6 or so pumpkin beers on draft, 7 or so bottles of pumpkin and some pumpkin food dishes.  Thursdays are apparently much busier at Devil's Den (which is a good thing) and the bar was pretty full when we got there.  Luckily there was a table in the back so we didn't have to wait.  The food was quite good once again and the beer, as always, was reasonably priced.  It helps that they do half price drafts from 5-7.  Pretty amazing deal considering the quality of the beers they offer.  Devil's Den is pretty awesome.

I started with Brew Works Devious Imperial Pumpkin (I hope you can guess the style.)

Once again, terrible picture.  Stupid phone without a flash.  Oh well.  Poured a dark orange brown color with no head.  Very little carbonation in it.  Smelled of sweet pumpkin and some spices, more sweet than spicy.  The flavors were three fold.  A little tart at first, then a little alcohol, and finishing with pumpkin spices.  Pretty good pumpkin beer.  Thick, slightly syrup mouth feel but not cloying.  I didn't know what to expect, but I liked the Devious quite a bit. Fegley's Brew Works (Bethlehem and Allentown Brew Works are their brew pubs) makes quite a few good beers.

After that, I had what has been my favorite pumpkin beer, Weyerbacher Imperial Pumpkin.

More pumpkin pie spices than sweet pumpkin in the nose.  Get hints of cloves, nutmeg and cinnamon.  Flavors in this one are a bit smoother than the Devious.  More spices than sweet and they blend really well with the beer's natural flavors.  Some sweetness came out as I drank more.  Even at 8%, this is incredibly drinkable, even more so than the Devious.  This has been my favorite pumpkin in past years and this reaffirmed my belief.  I liked the Southern Tier Pumking I had two weeks ago but it was more pumpkin pie in a glass than beer.  This one is a really good beer with some pumpkin flavors.  Depends what you are looking for as far as what to like, but I prefer the Weyerbacher.

Oh and this was my 50th post on the blog since August 23rd.  Yeah 50!