Lindemans Gueuze Cuvée René

One night after work recently, Jeff decided to give Lindemans Gueuze Cuvee Renee a try. It is a beer that has a lot to live up to - the Bros on Beer Advocate gave it a score of 100. The general Beer Advocate score is 91.

Here's what Jeff had to say about this beer:

"One of the few sour beers I've had. For the uninitiatied, be ready for something very different. It's champagne-like with a great red wine vinegar sourness. It's hard to believe this is a beer. It's proof positive that if you haven't found a beer you like, you just haven't tried enough beers because there are just so many different styles out there."

According to the brewery's wesbite, Gueuze is often served during happy hour in Brussels and goes well with seafood, salty meals and cream sauces. Gueuze Cuvee Rene should be served at 5 degrees Celsius.

Widmer Brothers - Brothers' Best Variety Pack

Still in North Carolina - Jeff also picked up this variety pack from Widmer Brothers brewery.

Four different beers were inside the pack - the Hefeweizen, Citra Blonde Summer Brew, Drifter Pale Ale and Shaddock IPA.

Without a glass in his hotel room, Jeff had to resort to drinking these beers out of the bottle (not at all the prefered way to try new beers - but a beer drinker has gotta do what a beer drinker has gotta do).

He called the Hefewizen "pretty pedestrian" because while yeasty and wheaty, there wasn't much in the way of spice or citrus.

The Citra Blonde Summer brew had a nice smell and taste.

"Citrusy, but there's pineapple and mango as well. Really refreshing," he said. "The tagline, 'Satisfyingly Sessionable' definitely applies."

When it came to the Drifter Pale Ale, he admitted he wasn't expected much, but said it was "very surprising."

"I was expecting a pretty boring beer. But this beer actually has a decent amount of flavour - there's nice caramel from the malts and citrus and tropical fruit from the hops," he said. "It's pretty low on bitterness for those afraid/looking for bitter."

Then came his favourite of the pack, the Shaddock IPA. The hop-head in him just couldn't help but love it.

"This one is brewed with grapefruit peels so there's obviously a lot of grapefruit flavour. I'd say this is my overall favourite - which is likely no surprise."

New Belgium Red Hoptober

Jeff was down in North Carolina recently and got to try a few new-to-him beers.

One was New Belgium's seasonal Red Hoptober.

The brewery's website says the beer uses Eldorado hops and has a distinct, piney flavour with a caramel malt.

"Kind of strange," Jeff said of the beer. "Roasty and citrus hoppiness ... but something else in there, too. Not sure what - not something I can place in other beers."

He admitted, "I don't love it, but it's interesting."

Maybe the odd flavour was fig? The website notes the flavour includes sweet fig, tropical fruit, toffee, roasted nuts and hoppy bitterness.

Ontario Brewmaster's Cup

Four Toronto beer writers have decided to host the Ontario Brewmaster's Cup - pitting 16 Ontario beers against each other.

Check out their website

The idea, the website says, came from the LCBO Brewmaster's Cup, which only included one Canadian beer (Moosehead - of all beers ... those doing the Ontario cup say there's nothing "inherently wrong" with Moosehead, but I don't think it should have been the beer to represent all of Canada).

So now, Greg Clow, Ben Johnson, Crystal Luxmore and Jordan St. John have launched this new cup.

There have been two rounds of the draft - so you're not too far behind if you haven't heard of this yet (I just heard about it today). Sounds like a fun way to learn about different beers!

Hops and Robbers

At the LCBO the other day, we saw cans of Hops and Robbers. Jeff hasn't had it in a while, so he picked up a can to enjoy.

Previously, Jeff has had this on tap and really quite liked it.

From the can, however, he's not a fan.

"I don't know if it's just old, and it deteriorated in the can, but I don't get the hops freshness," he said. "Maybe it needs to warm up."

But even after it warmed up, Jeff said while it improved a little, it wasn't by much and he said it was bitter and there wasn't the hop flavour.

Hops and Robbers is from Double Trouble Brewing, which (I believe) contract brews out of Wellington Brewery here in Guelph.

He says he'll try it again, but with this can, "I was just a little disappointed."

Beers from Denmark

I've already posted one beer Jeff enjoyed in Denmark, but here are a few more.

He was disappointed not to find Mikkeller initally when we went to the nearby grocery store, but he certainly found some other beers to try.

(He did end up finding Mikkeller beer later and brought some home).

Hefe-weizen Svane Hvede

Brewery: Indslev Bryggeri

He enjoyed this beer with rye bread and sausages. He didn't realize the beer wasn't filtered, so that last bit was a bit yeasty. 

The brewery's website says Indslev Bryggeri is the only brewery in Denmark that specialies exclusively in brewing wheat beer.

"We do not use as much hops as many other breweries, but focus more on the malt." 

Jeff said he was a fan of the beer and knew it wasn't a hoppy one going in.

Willemoes Porter

Brewery: Vestfyen

"I seem to remember it being really sweet," Jeff said of this beer. "A lot of molasses or something."

But still, he said he liked it.

This brewery, Vestfyen, has a number of different beers. Willemoes Porter has an alcohol content of 9.8% vol. 

The beer is described on the website as, "Munich malt, caramel malt, chocolate malt, colour malt, slightly smoked malt. Warrior hops, surgar and mised with liqourice."

Sounds tasty!

Kalapojser 

Brewery: Pladderballa Bryghus

His last beer, but because it wasn't his favourite, I'm posting it in the middle of this post. 

"It tastes almost gritty," he wrote on Facebook after drinking this beer.

This one is a traditional brown ale, the website says, which is unfiltered and unpasteurized and fermented in the bottle.

Jackie Brown

Brewery: Mikkeller

"Good, not great," Jeff wrote. "They can't all be Draft Beer."

(We'll get to Draft Beer in a moment).

The Jackie Brown is, no surprise, a brown ale and has hints of chocolate, coffee and licorice. RateBeer.com gives it a score of 97 overall.

Draft Beer

Brewery: Mikkeller

"They had to give it such a boring name because they used up all the awesome on the flavour," Jeff wrote, before adding the hashtag, "#ZOMG."

I guess he liked it.

BeerAdvocate.com says this is an American double imperial pilsner. It had a good score from BA reviewers with 89, but The Bros gave it 100 (aka World Class). In fact, the BeerAdvocate review says this beer is "giving the bird to the ho-hum lagers."