Out of the Bottle: Big Beers and a Haze

I'm doing a 4-for-1 with this installment, and will be bundling my finished beers going forward, rather than writing a blog for each.  That should leave me space for more brewing oriented posts.

This month, I've got beers I posted the recipes for back in November, December and January.

First out of the gate is Enchanted Nightmare Imperial Stout. This beer is an amalgamation of extra grains and hops I had that were combined with some 2-Row and additional hops to create a 9.95% ABV Stout for the depths of Winter. So what if it wasn't actually ready until the Spring Equinox arrived? A beer like this can't be rushed.

My beer pours nearly pitch black, and has nice ruby highlights. The head could stand a touch more staying power, but is appropriately dense. In the mouth, the body is a little lighter than I expected. The carbonation is very soft, and feels just about right for this beer style. 

When I bottled this beer, I was slightly worried that the whiskey and oak were a little too out front. A month of bottle conditioning toned them down. 

With the whiskey out of foreground, the aroma leans towards vanilla and dark fruits, with a hint of cocoa in the mix. There's also the slightest amount of smokiness, which was a pleasant surprise. In the mouth, the roasted malts cut through, but take a backseat to a fair dose of caramel and toffee like sweetness. The bitterness is just high enough to strike a solid sweet/bitter balance. A little warmth appears in the finish, with a lingering whiskey and oak flavor going down.

All in all, I'm quite pleased.

Next up, we have my take on Great Divide's Old Ruffian Barleywine. Given that I don't have any bottles of Old Ruffian lying around, I can't make a fair comparison. Since I can't focus on my beer relative to theirs, let's just talk about my results.

The finished beer clocks in at 10.8% ABV, which makes it one of the strongest I've ever brewed. 

Primary fermentation was surprisingly quick. So quick, that I feared a stuck fermentation. Thankfully, my hydrometer said otherwise. After 18 weeks of aging and 4 weeks of bottle conditioning, it's ready to drink.  

This first thing that struck me is that my beer isn't as bitter as I, or QBrew's IBU calculator were expecting. While it still is quite bitter, it's not up there with a lot of American Barleywines I've had. Instead, the malt/hop balance; while admittedly leaning toward the hops at this young age, is more.....balanced. That's honestly a good thing to my palate, as I prefer balanced beers over ones dominated by any particular component.   

The nose is dominated by pine and oak, plus a hint of grapefruit citrus. In the mouth, the bitterness is pronounced. It carries a pine like bite that seems bolstered by the flavors from the oak spiral I used. As the bitterness lingers, an orange marmalade flavor comes through. The malt backbone is quite toasty, with just a bit of caramel sweetness. Despite the beer's strength, the alcohol is well masked, outside of some late warmth in the finish. The body is full without being dense, with carbonation that is very soft and velvety.

Overall, I'm extremely happy with how the beer came out. A few of these will definitely be getting aged. 

My first ever lager is the third beer in this list. It's a Maibock I brewed in the Winter in preparation for Spring. 

The color of my beer is exactly what I wanted. It's pale with orange highlights, and has a fluffy white head. A nice amount of lace is left in the beer's wake. The only area of disappointment is that it developed a slight chill haze. I'll have to revisit my notes and figure out what might have caused it.

Everything else is exactly what I wanted. The beer is slightly hoppy, without being particularly bitter. Although the nose is mostly filled with bready and slightly sweet aromas from the grains, the taste in the mouth has a nice spicy hop flavor that offsets it. A touch of warmth lets you know this is a relatively strong beer. The finish is long, with a lingering sweetbread flavor that coats the mouth. Throughout the experience, the clean notes of a proper lager cut through, with no noticeable DMS or other weirdness.  

I feel my first stab at this style was a solid effort.

I've saved my New England/Hazy IPA for last.

As I stated in my original post, this is a style I've had a really hard time getting into. Has brewing my own changed my mind? Not entirely. 

I'm pretty sure my beer checks all the style boxes, which is what I was hoping for. 

Hops dominate, as desired. While the bitterness level is moderate (although perhaps a touch higher than the style guideline dictates), the aromas and flavors are very strong. I'm generally pleased with my hop choices too. The combination of Amarillo, Cashmere and El Dorado creates a fruit-forward experience that's very tropical. If mango and passionfruit, with a dash of pepper is your thing, this is your beer.  

The beer is hazy as is to be expected, and is topped by a generous head that has great staying power. Orange highlights put the beer on the darker side of pale. This may be due to my inclusion of Red Wheat in the grain bill.  

My grains provide what strikes me as a Witbier-like malt backbone. A combination of Barley, Malted Wheat and Flaked Oats creates an experience oddly reminiscent of Blue Moon, but with a fair bit more body. The overall effect is very bready in both flavor and feel.

For me, the end result is what I'd call a beer that hits the style points, but isn't my favorite. The heavy hop flavor and aroma presence, combined with a dense body from the wheat and oats, creates the hop salad effect that most every Hazy IPA I've had has. 

That's not to say that I think I brewed a bad beer. Friends who dig Hazy IPAs have said they like it. It's just that it's still not my type of beer. Perhaps one day, that will change. 

By the way, an actual hop salad made with low bitterness hops, endive, edible flowers and a Witbier Vinaigrette dressing is quite lovely. I strongly recommend trying one out.