Bison Chocolate Stout.

I had been sitting on this bottle for a while as I had bought a 6-pack a while ago, drank one, liked it, and then pulled 4 for swag. So I'm finally getting around to it. Bison is already a great brewery in my book. In my experience, the organic gimmick is usually applied at the expense of quality, but Bison pulls it off. This bottle is not as rich and stunning as I remember, but the core quality is still there. It's chocolate-y and as smooth as Guinness without being nitro'd. Aroma is slightly coffee-based. Actually, I'm a little disappointed this time around. I remember it being like a chocolate brownie but this one falls a little flat. Bummer.

• Appearance: Opaque, typical stout/porter appearance. Light tan head, mostly ring with a little moss.
• Smell: Mild cold coffee.
• Taste: Slightly chocolate-y and slightly bready. Not as intense as I remember.
• Mouthfeel: Very smooth, low carb, Guinness Draught-like. Clean finish and relatively light-bodied.
• Drinkability and Overall: A pleasant drinking, pleasant tasting stout. It's light enough that it's not going to weigh you down but still flavorful enough that it can pair with a meal. A reasonable 5%ABV.

Moylan's Moylander Double IPA.

The bottle reads, from top to bottom, "Moylan's | Moylander | Double | IPA | Ale". Is it a double IPA ale? Or Moylander Ale: Double IPA? Double India Pale Ale Ale? In any case, I was excited to see what Moylan's could do in the double/imperial IPA range. Their Nor Cal was a great IPA, so when I saw that they had a double and even a triple, I grabbed one of each. A big whiff is rewarded with a strong, grassy hop aroma with lots of fruit and citrus. Taste is strongly malty actually with an undercurrent of resin-y, bitter hops. There's not as much complexity there as I would have thought. The flat hop character doesn't go well with the long finish as it ends up being a little stale and musty.

I have somewhat mixed feelings about this one. I really wanted to like it, but it's just a little flat, little unbalanced. For all its accolades, I'm afraid that I've had much better. It's not a necessarily bad, but I'd take a Southern Tier Unearthly over this one. For 8.5%ABV, it's not a bad buy, but I'm not sure what I'd put with this. For some reason, fried chicken sounds really good. Or some jambalaya, something Creole and spicy.

• Appearance: Clear, dark gold. Fluffy head with plenty of curtains.
• Smell: Grassy, fruity, a little hot.
• Taste: Fairly malty, strong hop intensity but fairly flat. Ends up coming off as a bit stale and musty.
• Mouthfeel: Resin-y but the carb and weight are all typical.
• Drinkability and Overall: 8.5%ABV so no session but the lack of balance in the finish makes it an odd sipper. Maybe an appetizer beer, whatever that means.

Greylock Gin.

And since I still have a bit of tonic left, I feel obligated to break out the other bottle of interesting gin I found the other day. Greylock is an award-winning gin out of Massachusetts. First nose: thank you, it smells like a bonafide gin. Flowery juniper, lavender, and some sort of dark, homey spices. It actually tastes like gin too. A strong juniper component with cinnamon, grass and citrus on the back end.

Mixed with the remainder of the Fevertree: It stands out in the tonic, but the lavender component mixes strangely with the quinine. Not sure if G&T is the way I'd want to go with this. Wired Gin recommends more complementary drinks like a Mississippi Mule, Lavender Martini or an Aviation, none of which I've had before but will certainly get around to trying.

Bottomline: I like this gin. It's assertive, refreshing, and new without being obnoxious. Tonic is not its domain, but it will probably lend itself well to more subtle, simple drinks.

No. 209 Gin.

I have a few bottles of gin sitting, none of which I really intended to open before I returned back east, but cutting that Domaine de Canton left me with an open bottle of Fevertree, and I shouldn't let that go to waste. So here we have gin No. 209, an SF-based distillery. I am always on the lookout for local/regional product so this was recommended to me by the staff at Beltramo's. Of note, there is also a kosher version of this gin which is $10 more. I suppose the blessing only worth $10, but I'm also not really sure why gin needs to be kosher.

Straight: Fairly tight in the nose, juniper and citrus, orange maybe. Taste is very neutral. With a 2:1 of tonic, the gin gets pretty lost in there. It's five-times distilled "to extract the most subtle flavors in crafting a truly modern gin". Not sure if that's the way I want to go with this. If this is modern gin, following the trend of spirits like New Amsterdam, well, that's not gin. (New Amsterdam, by the way, while not a bad gin, is a gin for vodka drinkers.) The gin I know grew out of Dutch courage. Courageous, this is not.

Addendum: As I get to the bottom of this G&T, I've started to think that maybe I was initially too harsh. While it still doesn't stand up nearly as well against tonic as other gins, No. 209 is decidedly clean and crisp, so that is worth mentioning.

Domaine de Canton.

An interesting mini I picked up the other day. The label reads "French ginger liqueur with VSOP cognac". I am a sucker for all things ginger (the spice, not Ron Weasley kind). 28%ABV and a interesting ridged bottle. Seems a bit high for a liqueur. I also decided to break out one of my Glencairn glasses that I had bought back at the beginning of the summer. I thought to use a beer tasting glass, but I didn't want a bunch of text in the way.

The ginger is prominent in the nose but on the taste, it quickly becomes medicinal. It is a liqueur so it's fairly viscous, syrupy, and sweet. I cut it with some Fevertree tonic water. The quinine bitter interacts well with the sweet bite of the ginger. It reminds of St. Germaine but not as sweet. It may be one of those difficult-to-use liqueurs. Still, it's unique to me, and I wouldn't mind having a bottle of this around the bar. Being as it smacks of St. Germaine, it might work well in the same manner of drinks.

Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron.

A "Malt Beverage aged on Palo Santo Wood". In true DFH style, Palo Santo Marron is a whopper of an unfiltered brown ale, aged in 10,000 gallon tanks made from Paraguayan Palo Santo wood, which sounds pretty fancy. But I don't actually know anything about this wood. A peek at wiki, which even has a reference to DFH, doesn't say much about why this wood is special, but apparently, it is pretty hard and dense (that's what she said) and the locals use it for winemaking.

DFH was not joking when they said "malt beverage". This thing is super malty. It's like drinking a Whopper. A very rich, alcoholic, liquid Whopper without any milk dilution. Up front, it is chocolately but any sweetness there quickly gives was to a malt monster which is throwing a lot of mud and darkly stained, polished, wooden banisters in your face. It's extremely toasty but definitely not burnt. Expectedly, it is a little sticky. The finish is long-lasting and not unpleasant. It is a little woody, but I get more of a sawdust and balsa wood notion as it lingers.

I have a history of belittling pretty much any brown ale that is not Blackstone Nut Brown, but this is pretty tasty. It's a standard brown ale that looks and feels like it's been simmered on the stove until it turns into a rich, thick gravy of a beer. It's intense. Hailing from DFH, it is, of course, high ABV: 12%. Though I must say it is well-masked. Likewise, the 4-pack also carries a $15 price tag. Here's the thing though: you're going to pay just as much, if not more, at a typical bar for four other beers which are probably not as cool as this one. So I don't feel bad about that. Except that I do because I know I can get a 6-pack of Stone IPA for $8 or $9 dollars. But hey, a 4-pack of 12%ABV beers, that's like a 12-pack, in terms of ABV, right. Well, you know, I can get a case and a half of PBR for that much, get more absolute alcohol volume, and get cool cred (as long as you drink it post-ironically). Sigh, and that's the quandary of DFH. Often overrated and almost always overpriced, but you have to hand it to them for being one of the most creative, daring craft breweries out there even whose disasters are elegant. But Palo Santo Marron is no disaster. This is a monster beer, a definite sipper, most probably out of a snifter. Assertive chocolates and cheeses would be appropriate here.

• Appearance: Completely opaque black. No head save for a toffee-colored ring.
• Smell: Very imperial stout-like, coffee, chocolate.
• Taste: Malt and malt. Very earthy with your standard chocolate, dirt, and wood tones. The wood complexity is evolving throughout. As toasty as you can get without being burnt so the finish isn't overly bitter. Despite all of the stout characteristics, it is definitely a brown ale. Also, major props: it is smooth without any noticeable heat.
• Mouthfeel: Just enough carb to assert itself on your palate. About on par with or maybe a touch higher than an imperial stout. Probably a touch higher. It reminds you that you're still drinking a brown ale and not a stout. A bit sticky on the finish but that's to be expected.
• Drinkability and Overall: A definite sipper at 12%ABV. It is something of a cross between a brown ale and an imperial stout. I'd love to try another one of these after some conditioning.

By the way, I wrote the first half of this post in present tense, in contrast to the previous few posts. I think I like that better because it feels more natural as I'm typing that as I drink. I guess I need to think of it as akin to live-tweeting watching a movie, marathoning a TV series, or a poop.

Angels Creek Petite Sirah 2008.

I was uber-stoked to try this PS because it was from Lodi. Off the P&P: Nose is strong and a bit hot. Initial taste is super jammy and rich with black and blue berries, before cooling off into a grape jelly, and then more blueberry and strawberry. Tannins seemed weak on the first sip, and I felt I had to squeeze them out of there. Once I did, the astringency stuck around. Strong leather more than anything woody. Finish is a little stale. We'll see how it is after some exposure.