Point Cascade Pale Ale

'Point Cascade Pale Ale is handcrafted combining special top-fermenting yeast and a dry hopping process to create this truly classic American Pale Ale. The intriguing character is derived from generous quantities of the choicest Yakima Valley Cascade hops and the finest crystal, 2 row pale, and Munich malts. The result is a delicious American Pale Ale with a signature fragrant hop bouquet and soft malt palate. ' From Pointbeer.com

At the price point of $5.99 I can honestly say I wasn't expecting much, which is good because I didn't get much in return. Point Cascade Pale Ale is the most bare bones pale ale to ever touch my taste buds. Fizzy body, ever so slightly hoppy with a good chunk of malt at the finish line. Point took no chances with Cascade Pale Ale and it really shows. What you get with this beer is a standard pale ale with no bells and whistles, perfect for its middle of the road price point.

Maybe I am being a bit too hard on this beer. I put away three of them with ease and was fairly satisfied. Maybe mediocre just isn't enough for me anymore. I could see throwing a few of these in a cooler full of lager to add a little flavor to the rotation. If you aren't into hoppy beers I might recommend this beer as a gateway into the hop kingdom. Not much gets done in the hop kingdom and we are all fairly overweight, but its a nice place to visit!

Musical pairing: Bad Company- Straight Shooter (although enjoyable, its color by numbers rock n roll)

Hop Back Summer Lightning Golden Ale

'A trendsetter in the brewing industry; the original Summer ale brewed all year round. An extremely pleasant bitter, straw coloured beer with a terrific fresh, hoppy aroma. This, coupled with an intense bitterness, leads to an excellent long, dry finish. Probably the beer to receive the most awards in Britain!' From www.hopback.co.uk/

This is by far one of the most carbonated beers I have had in recent memory, as soon as I popped the top off it was flowing out of the bottle and spilling all over my counter top! Every pour was a close call and I think I ended up cleaning up as much as I was able to drink down. Very annoying.

I was really looking forward to drinking Hop Back Summer Lightning after I picked it up at Sam's Wine and Spirits. Great label, a decently priced import and golden ales are usually great summer brews. I ended up being very disappointed with the end result. This stuff has some serious bubbles to it that made it not only hard to drink but the burp factor was dangerous to say the least. What little flavor I could discern through the foamy mess was very tart and thin. Not really worth all the effort, which is insane to say when talking about a beer.

Pass on this stuff unless you have a fetish for hiccups. A total and absolute let down.

Musical pairing: the Monkees- S/T (another bummer of a British export)

Founder's Devil Dancer Triple IPA

'Founders most complex, most innovative, most feared and yet most revered ale produced. Massive in complexity the huge malt character balances the insane amount of alphas used to create this monster. More IBUs than any brewery has documented, more than you would believe and dry-hopped for twenty-six days straight with a combination of 10 hop varieties. Dangerously drinkable and deliciously evil. We dare you to dance with the Devil.

13% ABV 112 IBUs'

I have been checking liquor stores for this beer for almost a year to no avail, now I see why. This my friends is a seriously intense and completely unique beer experience.

I already had an inkling of what to expect having read a few thing online about this beer so I wasn't surprised when I took a sip and tasted that Founder's also triples the malts in this beer alongside the hops. The malts are extremely sweet and sticky which always give me a sensation that the beer is 'milky' even though that is not actually the taste. I suppose that is because it tastes thicker and smoother and that gives me the impression of cream. Don't get me wrong, the hops in this beer still punch you in the face, but the sweet malts are there to soothe you afterwards. You could sit down and analyze this beer all night if you wanted to as it is definitely the most complex beer I have personally ever had. But where is the fun in that?

If you are drinking this to start off your night be warned that not only will every other beer pale in comparison but that 13% abv is going to kick your ass. Luckily I was drinking this on what constitutes as my weekend because after two of these puppys I definitely had to move on to some lighter beers. I had to or I think my head was going to detach and float away. Your taste buds start to feel a bit taxed as well as I am sure you can imagine. Ten varieties of hops used to create this beer? This creates quite a patchwork of flavors. I swear I tasted pine in one sip and caramel in another. I firmly believe that there are either mad scientists or achemists at Founder's after drinking this brew.

Musical Pairing: Van Morrison- Astral Weeks (that's what I was listening to it and I think it is now intrinsically linked to this brew.)

Goose Island IPA

'Our IPA recalls a time when ales shipped from England to India were highly hopped to preserve their distinct taste during the long journey. The result, quite simply a hop lover's dream. And this classic ale adds a fruity aroma, set off by a dry malt middle, to ensure that the long hop finish is one you'll remember.

ABV- 5.9%

IBU- 58'

It took me awhile to get around and do a write up of this beer. This is one of the first IPA's I tried and back then I did not like it very much. These were the dark ages of PBR and Early Times whiskey, before I had a taste for decent beer. That is exactly what Goose Island's India Pale Ale is- a very decent beer.

I have grown accustomed to IPA's pushing the limits with how hoppy a beer can get. Goose Island ditches that for a more accessable IPA but that doesn't mean it is any weaker in regards to quality. a beer that is reasonably priced and widely distributed Goose Island's India Pale Ale is a gem, a definite 'go-to' fridge filler and a good one at that.

Three yeard ago I would have told you 'Goose Island is for yuppies'. What an idiot I was, not drinking perfectly good beer because of my preconceptions.

Musical pairing: Queen- A Night at the Opera (quite a kick yet oh so sophisticated)

Goose Island Clybourn 6/20/2008

It was a nice breezy day when Kristina and I wandered into Goose Island after doing a little shopping (I bought a few videogames, like usual). A bit of a farewell visit actually, since this location is going to be closing shop in a few months and no new location has been announced.

Given the weather I decided on something light- the Midwest Wheat like a good pick. Chock full of citrus with what I imagined to be some sour apple in the aftertaste the Midwest Wheat certainly delivers the fruit. This beer was not nearly as hoppy as advertised but that didn't detract from the overall experience much. A standard wheat brew that met my expectations even if it was a bit too malty for my tastes. Definitely went well with the weather though, which is exactly what you want with this style of beer! 5.5% ABV on tap for $5 a pint.


Bourbon Barrel-Aged Aviator Dopplebock- this definitely intrigued me when I saw it on the menu. At $8 it could be a bit of a budget buster but it was definitely worth it in my opinion.

Up to this point in my sudsy adventures I have only had bourbon barrel stouts so a doppelbock seemed like a bizarre combination but one that could work. Luckily the Aviator is more to my liking than a traditional doppelbock which is much sweeter and with a good amount more yeast. I find that beers that date back to the dark ages definitely benefit from an update, this beer being no exception.

So how was it? Excellent by a mile. Creamy vanilla, sweet sticky bourbon and that 9% ABV had me rambling by the time the check came. My favorite thing about this beer is that the aging process subdued all the flavors I dislike about a d-bock. The yeast was nowhere to be found rather than at the forefront, milky aftertaste rather than a dry finish and I didn't feel like someone just dumped sugar packets in my beer. All in all I was once again wowed by one of Goose Islands more artistic brews. Feel free to start posting 'fanboy' in the comments.

New Belgium Mothership Wit

'Our first venture into organically-produced beer, Mothership Wit Organic Wheat Beer elevates the zesty Wit or White beers of Belgium. Our far-flung Beer Rangers affectionately refer to our Fort Collins brewery as the Mothership, a name that conjures images of earth shot from space and the interconnectivity of it all. Mothership Wit is brewed with wheat and barley malt, as well as coriander and orange peel spicing resulting in a balance of citrus and sour flavors held in suspension by a bright burst of carbonation.'

I am one of those people that assume that organic products are A) more expensive and B) not as tasty. Mothership Wit does a lot to dispel that fallacy by being a fine beer and no more expensive than any other New Belgium beer.

There is an orchard's worth of lemon zest in this beer that would overwhelm your senses if they were not paired with and subdued by some very mild spices. I wish I knew more about spices after drinking this beer because I cannot tell you with authority what might be floating around in this brew, but I can tell you it ain't bad! Some fizzy carbonation makes a beer perfect for a lazy summer day. Too bad I can't set up a hammock in the city, huh guys?

Musical Pairing: The Byrds- Sweetheart of the Radio (another great lazy summer day record, this one a little more country)

Okocim O.K. Beer

'Okocim O.K. is a fine and delicate brew, deriving its quality from a recipe which incorporates the best of indigenous Polish hop varieties, luxurious barley and only the softest mountain water. The beer itself reflects the purity of these ingredients in its taste. 01kocirn O.K. is instantly refreshing. It is quite soft and impeccably balances the aromatics of hop and malt. The pure water of, the Tatra mountain range is the most important ingredient in Okocim O.K., giving it a pure finish and making it universally enjoyable.' from their low rent website: http://www.stawskidistributing.com/p_Okocim.html


Man, there is a lot of Eastern European beer in my area. Okocim seems to be the favorite of the Polish construction workers who left their beer bottles on the curb by my old apartment. I can see why this would be your favorite beer from that region because its competition is mainly awful (see the Baltika label).

Okocim O.K. Beer is a grassy, light lager that is a smooth drinking but plain. A definite step up in quality from an MGD but I would not put O.K. Beer in the premium lager category. There is still something a bit off about the hops from this region that make beer taste a little skunky, but you really have to be looking for it to taste it in Okocim. I was fairly bored with this beer after two or three so I put the rest of the sixer in my 'when friends are over' section of the fridge. Okocim is not bad by any stretch it just doesn't do it for me.

But if you asked me what my favorite Polish beer was? At this point I would go with Okocim's O.K Beer.

Musical Pairing: I have absolutely no clue.

Special Export

'You don’t have to “hop the pond” or buy an expensive import to experience real European beer flavor. Special Export and Special Export Light have been brewed in LaCrosse, Wisconsin for more than half a century and are crafted to be crisp and smooth with a true European taste profile. You can travel the world over and never find a better beer!' From Pabst.com

Now this is an old man's beer! A musty tasting, straw colored lager that doesn't taste European whatsoever! Give me some more of that, right?

I have never been a big fan of Special Export but I decided to give it a shot last weekend when I was looking for a cheap beer to get me through the weekend. Although I wouldn't say I regret my decision I will say that I am still not very fond of this brew. When I think of a European beer I think of a nice clean, crisp lager that goes down extremely smooth (thats what the commercials taught me at least). Special Export is another Pabst brewing company tap water and hops beer that has been tweaked just a bit so it will appeal to the senior citizen demographic. I am not disrespecting my elders here, sorry if it seems that way, but the old men at the local watering holes love this stuff.

I on the other hand, do not love this stuff. I have never had a Special Export (can or bottle) that didn't taste a bit stale. Maybe moth balls are one of the secondary ingredients, or they just sell so little of this stuff that it takes five years to get to me. Its cheap and it has your standard 5% alcohol content, thats the real selling point there. I purchased a twelve pack for $6 a week ago and I would say I got exactly what I paid for.

Musical Pairing: Rick Springfield- Working Class Dog (old, watered down and in the bargain bin)

Gulden Draak

' Gulden Draak is a dark brown Triple Ale, which makes it an exception among the Belgian Triples. The second fermentation offers the nice creamy head, the full body and all the vitamins of the centuries old brewers yeast. It is a "thick" beer, that you can actually "eat" to adventure the complex taste. Gulden Draak balances a natural malt toffee-like sweetness with a mellow happiness and some hoppy accents. The aroma is round, sweet and reveals the 10.5 alcohol by volume' From Ratebeer.com

I told you guys that I was goign to try to get into sweeter beers and apparently my friend Blake read that and was kind enough to bring this beer back with him from Cleveland.

I almost didn't want to crack this bad boy open because it the bottle is so cool looking. White bottle, grenade shaped with a nice label on it. The label has a mechanical golden dragon on it, which you know is right up my alley. Real classy design all around.

What a foamy head this beer pours, I had to let it settle in before takign the picture because the head was 3/4 of the beer once I had poured it. The head reminds me of oatmeal. This is some sweet beer but it still has enough yeast and alcohol in it to give it a nice kick. If this was a solid food I would say it would be a sour bread with some sickly sweet apricot jam on top. Very flavorful stuff, which I can appreciate, but it is still a bit too much sugar for my tastes. This is certainly helping me appreciate this style even though I know I am still a ways off from being an avid Belgium drinker. Good beer, thats for sure. I recommend this to my beer buddies who are a fan of this style as this was passable even by my 'no Belgium beers please' standards.

Musical pairing: Pale Saints- In Ribbons (fairly quiet with just enough feedback to keep me from getting bored)

Left Hand Milk Stout

'This English style of beer, also known as Sweet Stout or Cream Stout, first appeared in London in the late 1800’s. The early brewers touted the health benefits of the milk sugar in this beer which today relates mainly to the increased amount of calories (no real health benefits…sorry). The milk sugar adds a well rounded sweetness to this dark beer and makes it an outstanding, year ‘round stout.'

Milk stouts have a fairly storied past, actually. In England, where they originated from, nursing mothers drank milk stouts because it was so 'nutritious'. Advertising made claims of 'healthy calories'. Calling a beer a 'milk stout' became illegal in England in 1945 because all a milk stout makes you is fat, not healthy. To make up for this I just took some vitamins with mine, so its fortified (right?).

You really can taste the powdered milk in this beer. It makes for a smoother stout than I am used to, a tasty stout. The usual suspects are all there- chocolate, coffee, malts but the milk and sugar round out the whole drink. Left hand did a great job with this beer. I have only had a few in my life but I am now quite sure that I am a fan of milk stouts. Huzzah.

Musical Pairing: The Church- Starfish (yeah, because of 'Under the Milky Way', I admit it)

Goose Island Summertime

'Kolsch, the clean and refreshing beer style of Cologne, Germany, quenches summertime thirst. This pale golden ale with a lightly fruity aroma is cold-conditioned or lagered after its primary fermentation. More simply, our Summertime uses only the finest malts and German hops to create the perfect beer for hot Summer days and warm Summer nights.'

I think I prefer a wheat beer over this style of beer, but this was pretty good. Lots of fruit and bubbles made it a bit on the feminine side for me, but not every beer has to put hair on your chest now does it? I made sure to drink this stuff on a nice hot, sunny, humid day and it certainly was just as refreshing as advertised.

After drinking a few of these I felt like moving on to something a little more substantial. Goose Island Summertime is a nice summer distraction but a beer I don't see myself picking up with any consistency. It is definitely time to bring on the seasonal beers! I feel a theme coming on...

Musical Pairing: Boston- Boston (as far as dumb summer rock records go, this is the best)

New Belgium 1554 Enlightened Black Ale

'The beer is fermented at relatively high temperatures using a European lager yeast that imparts a refreshing, zesty acidity. Based on a 16th century Belgian recipe.'

Oh 1554... Lady Jane Grey was beheaded for treason, the Conquistadors were on a rampage in South America and people were still dying of influenza. Oh yeah, some guys in Belgium decided to make a beer recipe that smells like apricots and tastes like cold dark tea.

My buddy Andy bought me the New Belgium variety pack to blog with, thanks pal. I decided to crack this one open first because, well, I can get behind a pretentious beer here and there. Nothing says 'pretense' like using a sixteenth century recipe for your beer. Read this longwinded description from the New Belgium website:

'Born of a flood and centuries-old Belgian text, 1554 Enlightened Black Ale uses a light lager yeast strain and dark chocolaty malts to redefine what dark beer can be. In 1997, a Fort Collins flood destroyed the original recipe our researcher, Phil Benstein, found in the library. So Phil and brewmaster, Peter Bouckaert, traveled to Belgium to retrieve this unique style lost to the ages. Their first challenge was deciphering antiquated script and outdated units of measurement, but trial and error (and many months of in-house sampling) culminated in 1554, a highly quaffable dark beer with a moderate body and mouthfeel.'

Thats cool and all, but does hundreds of years old recipes and imported ingredients make for a good beer? It's decent, but I'm not sure if it was worth all that effort. You could call this 'malt liquor for monks' as this has some serious malts to it. Slightly fruity, but not very sweet with a stong tea feel to it that I mentioned before. The aftertaste has a bit of chocolate and toffee to it that still don't add to the overall sweetness. Think semi-sweet baking chocolate. This stuff tastes almost as if it were healthy for you. A nice change of pace but I can't shake the feeling that I should be eating artisan cheeses with this beer, which really is not my style.

Musical Pairing: XTC- Skylarking (because no matter how good their records they always sounded like foppish sissies)

Wingwalker Pale Ale

Not everything has to be innovative. Its well and good when you come across something inventive and new but if everything was that way the world would come to a screeching halt rather quickly. I like a little insanity in my fridge, don't get me wrong, but sometimes you just need a simple no frills beer.

Wingwalker does a good job of making all of their beers fairly standard for their style. When I bought this I was looking for something slightly hoppy (but not IPA territory) and still refreshing (but not lager territory). The Pale Ale it was. I have to admit it being on sale didn't hurt my decision.

Wingwalker sticks to the formula with this beer, but it tastes so balanced that there had to be some mastery behind it. Its a damn good by the book pale ale. I think one of Wingwalkers strengths is that all of their beers taste very 'clean'. I assume that this as to do with quality ingredients and the fact that there aren't too many of those said ingredients. The end result is a beer that won't be winning any awards for originality but does a fine job of meeting your expectations and quenching your thirst. My gut approves.

Musical Pairing: Big Star- Radio City (more by the numbers than their other records, but it is still a great album)

Hoegaarden

I am usually not a fan of any beer from Belgium as they are usually far too sweet for me. Something I am working on, but it is certainly taking awhile. Hoegaarden, although technically a Belgian White, tastes a lot like a wheet beer to me with a lot of added lemon zest. In fact it sort of reminds me of the lemon-beer I had last month but not nearly as extreme in the lemonade department. More of an ingredient than a motif, which I appreciated. This beer goes down smooth, almost like it is 'softer' than most beers.

Hoegaarden looks great, thats for damn sure. The extremely fluffy head goes well with the thick, (mostly) unfiltered yellow body. Good summer beer if you are looking for something refreshing and sweet but not overly sugary.

I just did some fact checking and discovered that a 'white beer' is the exact same thing as a 'wheat beer' in Belgium. I learned something today. Hopefully I don't forget it after this weekend....

Musical Pairing: Golden Earring- Moontan (foreign as hell but still knows how to rock and roll)

Heilemans Old Style

Man that photo didn't look that dark on the camera screen. Hell, it was only like 6:00 PM and the sun was out. Can't win them all I guess!

Living in Chicago you are absolutely bombarded with Old Style. Both baseball teams serve it at their stadiums, it is constantly on sale at Jewel Osco and every bar has 'Old Style Specials' (Usually the day after the PBR special, in the middle of the week of course). If you live in Chicago and also drink beer, you know what Old Style tastes like.

Right now I am on a fairly tight budget so when I saw an Old Style 24oz Can for $1.49 I really could not pass that up. I mean that is a steal, right? Well, not really, but it will do.

Old Style was a staple of my diet in my late teens/early twenties which made me thoroughly sick of it, but I still crack one open from time to time. My palate has apparently changed in the last couple of years because I can't understand what the appeal of Old Style was, except for the price. It's watery and tastes as if it is artificially flavored. Chemical induced hoppiness? Your standard ABV of 5%. It's a thin, boring beer... But its on sale for $11.99 for a 30 pack brah!