All right, so Victory, Poppin Victory? Yeah. Poppin to Victory. Victory, Winter Cheers, Hazy Wheat Ale. Can you smell it? Hazy Wheat Ale? Lame. Oh, man. That's re-branding folks. It never used to say Hazy Wheat Ale. That's updating it for the kids. Oats in it as well. Did they always have oats in the Mash Bill? Or is that new too? Yeah. I think that's new as well. I have figures. Is there coriander in this? It's Greek cardamom. No, it's just the yeast. Really? It's not spiced at all. It says notes of holiday spice, but yeah. It smells like coriander, I agree, but as far as I know, the only thing in here from that is it's all from the yeast. They say on their website it's a hefeweizen yeast. Yeah. And it's always has had citrohops in it, so as much as it's silly that they're calling it a hazy wheat ale, it's always had some American flair to it. So really it's just a hefeweizen, and they're calling it a winter seasonal. Yeah, I would probably actually call it a Weizenbach, because it's got some heft, it's a 6.7 percent alcohol. Nothing says punchy, cold open other than landing on Weizenbach. Other than a Weizenbach. All right, guys, the reason that we're tasting this strange beer that I usually wouldn't reach for is because it's the holiday season and we're tasting holiday beers. Hey folks, you're listening to Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. I'm Greg, I do communications here at Binny's. In the room with me via Zoom is... I'm Pat, I do spirit stuff at Binny's. I'm Chris, I do wine. And I'm Roger, the voice of beer for Binny's Beverage Depot. Oh, that's, wow. But not the voice of reason. The voice of the elderly beer lover everywhere. All right, Roger, you got us to in part two of Holiday Beers. I imagine we could do one of these every year, because some of them come out with different batches every year, right? Yeah. So part of the impetus for this was that they do sort of change and they definitely react to tastes and trends. We've seen winter beers that were crazy popular years ago have just completely disappeared. Kind of like this Victory we mentioned, they're billing it as a hazy Weed Ale. So they're definitely reacting to what's popular in beer right now. But there are always some really treasured favorites. We're going to try this year's rendition of Anchor Christmas, which I would say checks both of those boxes. So it does change every year slightly. This year, it might have changed quite a bit. I'm really interested to taste because I haven't had it yet. There are tons of people that just buy that beer out of tradition. I mean, I've been drinking it every Christmas for years, and people tend to hold some bottles back and do little vertical tastings of it and stuff. So just like the holidays, holiday beers are steeped in tradition. So we're going to talk about that one, which we did last time, but I put together a lineup of some other ones that we didn't try in the past. So starting off with a beer too, that for as many people that love holiday beers, there's also people who don't really care for them or don't seek them out. And I think part of that is that people assume that, if you're talking about a holiday beer, it probably has a bunch of spices in it, like holiday spices. Yeah, that's the stereotype. This go around, I tried to pick some that weren't spiced at all. So the first beer that we're trying is kind of a great example of that. It tastes and smells plenty spicy. All that is just coming from the yeast that they use, but they didn't actually add any of the kind of Christmasy spices you find in other beers like ginger, cinnamon, clove, allspice. I think the illusion goes a little further than that because of the citra hops, you get that citrus and spice aroma coming together here, which you wouldn't normally see in a Wiesenbach from the hops like that, but it gives you that impression of It reminds me of a Belgian double. Yeah. So let's talk about what this actually is. So we're tasting Victory Winter Cheers, which they are now calling a hazy wheat ale. It's not hazy. It's a little hazy. It's kind of hazy, a little bit. There's no beer nerd anywhere who would put this on their Instagram and call it hazy. I mean, this is old school hazy in the way that a half a Wiesen or a Wiesenbach is hazy. It doesn't look like a milkshake IPA. So brewed with Pilsner malt, wheat and oats, hopped with the classic combination of citra and tetanang. Classic. I get a lot of coriander out of this thing. There's no coriander in it. That's all from that wheat beer yeast. As Roger mentioned is probably most appropriately called a Wiesenbach, just because of its strength. This is six point something, right, Rog? Yeah, six, seven. You don't see a lot of Wiesenbachs anymore. It's got this lemon citrus cut. It does. Yeah, I think that's the Citra hops. They could have put this out with a pink and green label and called it a spring seasonal, and I would have, I totally think it would be in place today, too. I don't know what is winter about this. I don't think this is particularly wintery. I think you're right, but I think there's some warming alcohol on the finish. I think you definitely notice that it's ramped up a little. Yeah, I mean, what's interesting about, so the holiday ale or wintertime beer tradition really is most closely associated with England, and England famously has some very moderate alcohol beers. A lot of Americans would say weak-ass beers. Like a strong beer in England is like five and a half percent alcohol. So I think if nothing else, you'll notice- That's not even a Bud Platinum, right? Well, let's not go nuts, guys. That's why this category, at least the traditional ones, have been passed by because modern drinkers taste them and they think, oh, they're super moderately hopped, they're not very high in alcohol, they're not necessarily over the top malty either. They're six, seven, eight percent alcohol maybe, and pretty mellow and round and easy drinking. They're not supposed to overwhelm you. They're supposed to be a winter warmer as opposed to like a mild or something. Right. Roger, did you bring anything good to the table today? Shut up, craig. Yeah, are we going to have to talk about wassailing or something while drinking these boring ass beers? So the next beer we're going to try is an example of that. So let's pop out the Samuel Smith Winter Welcome. You notice that they have a hipper, younger dude on the label this year versus years past? His mustache has gotten more ironic. It is. So this year it's called Welcome Back Ale. So the idea is that this is paying homage to all the friends, servers, bussers, bartenders, people in the service industry who were left out of work because of COVID. So they're saying welcome back. I think Samuel Smith probably jumped the gun a little on that one. Yeah, it might be another year. We'll see. A little premature. It does have 2021 on it. The good thing is this beer ages very gracefully. So it could be to sit on it in the basement for a year. Lay it down for a while until you can go back. Yeah, people would sell her this. I've always felt it doesn't really have the body and strength to sell her, but they like to imply that it can. I mean, it's only 6% alcohol, which, again, by English standards, I guess is a stronger beer. But indeed, I think this is like nothing. A classic example of what we were just talking about, a slightly richer, maltier English ale that most modern drinkers won't think is particularly holidayish or wintery. I think because of that flavor profile, though, with like, say, two years of aging, and it picks up a very slight bit of oxidative note, it adds to the flavor profile. It doesn't take away from it. And that's something that's considered complementary with a lot of stronger English beers. Yeah, if you can get this to age and develop a slightly sherry note rather than a cardboardy note, it's really good after a couple of years. I almost never like aged beers more than young beers, but I think I might agree with you on this one. It seems, there's a weird imbalance to- There's a sharpness to it. Yeah, right. You want it to be round and hazelnutty, but it has a fresh, bright hoppiness that comes off as like weedy or reedy. It's the Fuggle, man. It's earthy. Yeah. It's got Fuggle hops in it. And you're tasting those earthy. Fuggle hops, baby. So yeah, as far as for listeners who haven't had this, but have had some English beers in the past. So this would essentially fall somewhere in the ESB type category. Yeah. For a little bit of background here. So ESB, we just think of as a style, but it really was just one brewery in particular, Fuller's renamed their Winter Warmer ESB. Is that really? Is that it? Yeah. That's it. And they trademarked it in the UK. So this English style we think is so canonical, like nobody in the UK brews ESBs and could call it that except for Fuller's. But of course, in the US, we don't give a **** about copyright laws. So we're just like, yeah, it's an ESB. Do something about it, Fuller's. Well, they're not these days. There's not that many on our shelves, but it used to be one of the foundational stories. So a couple of things I'd say about that is, unless I'm mistaken, before Fuller's trademarked it, often the same beer would be labeled pale ale in the bottle and ESB on beer engine, which sounds weird. I know there are definitely differences between the Fuller's ESB cask versus the bottle. So like the casks are always dry hopped, which again, we kind of think of that as just an American IPA type thing, but dry hopping actually has its heritage in English ales, IPAs from England. For sure. Yeah, there was, again, this is kind of the running joke when you have American beers, that it's not uncommon for normal IPAs to be 7.5% alcohol. The cask Fullers would be like 5.9 or 5.6. Yeah. Then the bottle was like 5.9 for greater stability. Come on. Well, harkening back to what you were saying about the old days of American craft. I mean, when I first started drinking beer, you couldn't go to a brew pub worth its salt without having ESP on tap. I mean, it became such a well-known style in the States. It certainly probably your average beer drinker at the time knew more about ESP than any British person ever could have dreamed of. Yeah. And then our generation was born and we moved on. As far as what this tastes like, the thing that I like about this style is that it's like when we do, when we're talking about sweetness and acidity, this is a great example of like bitterness and sweetness balancing each other out. Like this is such a balanced beer that you can easily drink a glass. And if somebody is like, if you enjoyed it, you'd be like, you want another one? Like, no problem. Sure, I'll have another one. Yeah. That sadly, I think is a little bit missing today with a lot of these more adventurous like American styles now. They might have some pretty amazingly like wow-ish flavors to them, but the balance sometimes is just so out of whack that you drink like two or three ounces. You're like, yeah, that's pretty interesting, but I don't even want to finish in like one glass, much less ever think about having another. So if you want something that's just easy, refreshingly easy to drink, this is that, in my opinion. I agree. I would also put a finer point on the counterargument to what you guys were saying earlier is that I think the classic English hop flavor here is nice. And I think it is in balance. I don't think it's disjointed. I think there's plenty of you of maltiness and then a little bit of an assertive earthy hop kick. And I don't mind that at all. I will say I'm finding it more balanced as it warms up a bit. I think when it was cold straight out of the bottle, I again, I thought it was a bit sharp. It's gaining a little more sweetness on the palate to me now that it's getting a little bit warm. I still think it could use a couple months to mellow out. That's a good point, though. I think a lot of these beers we're going to try to do are not necessarily something you want right out of the refrigerator, just a few degrees warmer and they'll show nicely. Well, wine buyer Bill Newton is going to be thrilled that we're finally talking about this beer. We started this podcast three years ago or four years ago, however long it's been. He has asked us repeatedly when we're going to talk about Samuel Smith's Pale Ale and Samuel Smith's Winter Welcome, which is a beer he looks forward to every year. He and possibly he alone now. All right, this one's for Bill. Here's to Bill. Cheers, Bill. I want to do Southern Tears Old Man Winter Ale next. And this is kind of like, this is essentially an American interpretation of the same, basically the same style, moving into something a little heftier. This would be more akin to like an old ale, or not even what we think of as a barley wine, but kind of pulling apart, you know, what is a barley wine? What's a stock ale? What's an old ale? There's a lot of blurred stylistically there, but... This is starting to smell good. For sure. They're all kind of of a piece in varying levels of specific gravity, I would say. But, oh, yeah. Hey, this Southern Tier is a very nice looking beer. Very beautiful beer, like nice color on the head, nice, you know, kind of like that burnt amber color. Just a very beautiful beer. Also, it's the first one to me that actually smells like a holiday beer. Like, I think Roger is right. If holiday beers are all encompassing, I think we're getting a little bit closer to what you'd expect. There's like fig or plum, along with like a little bit of that brown spice and bread quality. Yet surprisingly, what's pretty neat about this is that it's very traditional in that it's not spiced at all. Cool. Which is kind of neat. They're a little cagey about what exactly makes this beer. The description is all of that they use three hops and two malts. So there you go. Thanks, Southern Tier. The grain comes across more apparently than what we've had so far, probably because we're tasting light to dark. I think it's got a bit of a citrus, citric American hop bite at the finish. Yeah. But like you mentioned earlier, Greg, those dark fruit notes, it's got this stewed plum thing, almost like a spiced dark dried fruit thing going on, that I think adds a lot of complexity. Like, yeah, totally. This is a complex beer. I'm really enjoying this. It also finishes with a toasty, roasty kind of note with like a light coffee that I kind of like too. What I think is surprisingly nice about this is the stewed fruit and more caramely notes that you guys described that I totally agree with. You're used to getting those in much weightier, heavier beers. True. So even if you were to think of like other old ales that you may see on the shelf, like something like a North Coast old stock ale, much like heavier, more fuller bodied beer. But this has some good balance to it, much like the Samuel Smith one. Like this is 7.5 percent alcohol, so we're going up, you know, American strength wise. Like this has got some considerable heft, but it's pretty easy to drink. Like it's pretty light on its feet. Yeah. I couldn't agree more. The body is very drinkable for the alcohol content, and it doesn't really wear the alcohol on its sleeve. And I would also add that the nose to me is, there's a lot of floral hop notes to it. It's not just spice, and it is almost surprising. There's no spice in here because it's present in the nose for sure. But there's, I agree completely, lots of fruity esters and those dark plummy style. But the floral hops really ride on top for me, and just that easy drinking body is a bit of a surprise. Yeah. I'm actually starting to get into this. Well, I can see that because this is, if you look at the bent of American beer drinking, with the idea of a hoppy amber or even some of those initial older school IPAs, you could argue that's what they were. They were really hoppy amber beers. So if you're a fan of more traditional IPAs, it's not necessarily kind of the newer, not like a newer New England style, but like an old school IPA, which I know Greg is. This is edging its toe closer to that. Yeah, I agree. Yes, nice beer. I'm going to finish this one. Good work, Roger. Way to recommend something that isn't so boring for once. Well, it is called Old Man Winter, so. Yeah, it's my moniker too. I'm the old man, so I was like, this is perfect. So do you want to try it side by side with the Welcome Back? Yeah, let's do that. Welcome Back, as I go back to it, has a lot more like honey marmalade on the nose in comparison. Higher tone, brighter. Marmalade's spot on and that's a classic descriptor for English hops. Totally. One thing I'd say about the Samuel Smiths is I missed this new label. They took off the old Shakespeare quote, whatever you say, blessing of your heart, you make good ale or whatever. I always like seeing that earlier. But they've replaced it with this Welcome Back friends and servers thing. With this hipster doofus bartender. Yeah. I mean, the sentiment's nice. Yeah, it's nice. Hopefully, he can go back to his job, but... In 2021, they can go back to just referencing really old literature. It says on the back label, supporting the US bartenders guild. I wonder what they're actually giving them out of this. How much per case sold or something. They say 50 cents a bottle, which would be pretty substantial if that's true. That is. It's interesting. These beers are distinctly different, but it seems to me they're driving at essentially the same thing. The color is very similar. The bodies are similar. What I notice, especially when you do them side by side, you pick up on some of the piney American hops in the Southern tier. Yeah. I think that segues perfectly into our next beer, which is undoubtedly the most famous of the winter Christmasy beers. Anchor, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, Beer. Isn't its official name Our Special Ale? Yeah, I was just gonna say that. All right, Roger, you gave a speech at 2020 and to 2019, so we're just doing them both at the same time, side by side? Yeah. So, sorry for the rerun, regular podcast listeners. There's somebody in plainfield or wherever who's like, damn it, they already tried the 2019 Anchor a year ago. Holy cow, this 2020 is like a porter. Oh, no, Roger, what if it's actually like s'mores? It might be. So, my initial guess when I came across the description of the 2020, because some background on this beer, they've been brewing it since 1975, which is pretty crazy to think. I mean, that's a pretty long heritage for American craft brewing. We've talked about Anchor in the past. They pretty much were the first to do fill in the blank. First people in the US to do a porter since Prohibition. They literally weren't even brewing porters in England anymore when Anchor brewed a porter. They were the first Barley Wine, Liberty Ale was arguably the first IPA, and this Christmas beer was the first holiday festive commemorative beer since Prohibition. I can't believe how different these beers look now. Yeah. The 2020 is black and it's got that beautiful tan head. Wow. Yeah. That chestnut color has been more common in recent vintages, I think. This might be the darkest one I've seen. I've been drinking this for, I was thinking earlier today that I've tried every vintage back to maybe 89, if you can believe that. I was eight. I believe it. I was hoping you would crack out some super crusty one. Well, I probably have something that dates back possibly to the late 90s or mid 2000s, but I did go and I just grabbed the first one I had. I've got a magnum of 2011 right here. So it's only nine years old. Wow. So you're going to take that to the face tonight, huh? Sure. I'll open it for this just for science sake. See, that's probably like a nice light refreshing holiday beer that tastes like juniper compared to this one. I guarantee that the color on that one is even lighter than the 2019. Well, let me open it and we'll see. 2019 was surprisingly darker in general, but even according to Anchor, they were like, this is the strongest and darkest, how, you know, our special ale we've ever done. The 2020, right? The 2020, yeah. It smells like a stout. Yeah, no doubt. Actually, it smells like gingerbread. You guys get that? I think it's got a licorice note to it. It's got a coffee note to it for sure. Coffee for sure. But it has that unmistakable Anchor House Yeast tang in the finish. Yeah, it does. That tangy yeast. It does. I don't mind it. You know, that's something fun. I like their IPA because it doesn't taste like any other IPA out there. Because it has the same rotten yeast. That old ass yeast. Wow, look at that. So this is from the Magnum, still producing a very aggressive head. Wow. It's a shade darker than the 19. Interesting. The 19 comes in at what you would expect like a really heavy porter. Well, also that Magnum has, as it's aged, it's going to pick up some color as well. Yeah, I was going to say, nine years old, you're going to pick up some color, exactly. So interestingly, I mean, look at the head retention on this. It's not a lot of times older beers like this, the pedal be real fizzy and dissipate quickly. But it's really dense and creamy. And I was going to say, it looks like a very fine, creamy foam on there. Were the Magnum's bottle condition? They might have been in the past. I don't feel like they are now, but... I don't think so. I don't think Anchor ever bottle condition things, but their standard carbonating procedure for all of their beer is either croisoning, so the classic old style method of adding fresh beer back into a fermented beer and re-fermenting it, and capturing the CO2. The other method they use bunging, which is just instead of croisoning, you just when it's got just a little bit of fermentable sugar left, you just seal it off and capture the remaining carbon dioxide at the end of the ferment. I haven't tasted any of these yet, but what the 2011 is bringing is definitely some of those really umami-like notes of soy sauce that sometimes develop in these old beers. That's too bad. No, it's actually pretty nice. It blends in with, I would say, a sprucey note in this vintage. That's what I always think of classically for these beers. And it's not just because it's a pine tree on the label, but you know. Well, you know, over the years, they've had like oak trees and all kinds of things. They're not always pines. It's conifers most of the time, but not always. What's the tree on the 2020? So the 2020 is a giant sequoia. Yeah, it's the three graces, which are three iconic towering sequoias from the Mariposa Grove in Yosemite. Last year's is an Arborvitae, which is a conifer as well. Okay, we have to have a Barrel to Bottle, you don't know conifers edition. Yeah. Oh, all over it. Pat, with his Oregonian Washington state tree project. I think I'm one of a dozen followers of the American Conifer Society on Instagram. Recommended follow, by the way. A lot of trees. So I just tasted the 2020, and the first thing that sticks out to me is a much more roasty, toasted grain profile. And it's definitely some coffee. Definitely roasty. Yeah, very roasty. And I don't think it works with that anchor yeast, man. It's too tangy. I don't want that tang with the coffee note. I think the tang is mellowed as it's warmed up a bit. But I know we were kind of dogging on them for saying it, describing it as s'mores, but it has this like not the kind of s'more I would cook because I cook a s'more properly, like some jerk lit their marshmallow on fire and it tastes like that kind Yeah, I think I'd say that this most s'morey thing about this is it actually smells a little bit like a campfire. There's definitely a smoky note in the nose. I'm not picking at it. Is there? I think so. Yeah, I guess you're right. What it reminds me of is a stout that you expect to be sweet, but it's not that sweet. Because it's not that sweet. It's heavy, but then it's like dry and tangy. I don't think it's sweet at all personally. You know what it's kind of similar to? Their old stout that they used to make. Compare the nose of the 2020 to the 19. The 19 is much more light and fresh smelling, floral, fruity. Yeah, it smells like grandma's bathroom soaps. Yeah. Yeah, the 19 is piney and floral. 19 tastes like a Christmas beer. Like if someone just handed me a glass of this beer and this is a Christmas beer, but the other one is just like, okay, it's like you've brewed an average porter is what I would say. Well, it does taste like a goofy. After 45 or 46 years of changing the recipe every year, you got to be running out of ideas at this point. Yeah, this is the 46th year. Even Acre floated the idea of retiring this, and there was so much backlash that they decided to continue it. So I think even the people at Acre are getting bored of it. That's because Rogers across the country were like, I demand the right to buy one. Exactly. This is a real departure, though, I have to say. This is the first year in a while that I've really been surprised by what's in the bottle. Just in every aspect, color, nose, and flavor, it's all very different from what I'm used to. Yeah. I mean, I think they're experiencing the whole reason why they're sick of it, because if they do change it too much, then you get people who are like, I don't like it. You messed with it and you made it into this weird porter thing and bring it back to what it used to be. I think it should just be a resinous high malt double IPA. So I'm going to also revisit the 2011 here. It's tasty more and more kind of venous to me. You know, it's a little more attenuated at this point. And I don't know why that would be since I don't think there's any live yeast in it, but the body is kind of light and it has kind of a venous profile. I really enjoyed both of these, our special ales. I mean, yeah, the 19 is a little more Christmasy holidayy, but I think the 2020 is not bad. It's just, you know, an anchor porter to me. It's fine. It feels like a little bit of a cop out. It feels like they're kind of trying to court. I mean, I guess bully for them for trying to make a buck and actually sell some of this stuff if it's getting endangered. But it doesn't feel as true to the spirit of this beer as it has in the past. Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. I was kind of laughing though. I really thought that this wasn't going to taste like s'mores at all. And it was just somebody being like, yeah, if kids like beers that tastes like s'mores, why don't you just say that this tastes like s'mores? Yeah. Roger. So that means that the language wasn't pandering. That means the beer was. Oh, exactly. Yeah, which is worse? Speaking of big heavy stouts, what do we got next? So we're going to conclude today with a classic American Russian Imperial stout. We're going to be tasting some Brooklyn Black Chocolate stout, which I think really kind of dovetails nicely into this past conversation for a couple of reasons. One, it is vintage dated, like the finest French champagnes. So this is definitely seller worthy and something that they encourage you to put down in your cellar. And at the very affordable price, this used to come in four packs and now it comes in six packs of $12.99 for a 10% alcohol Russian Imperial stout. This was an $8.04 pack forever, like eight bucks, ludicrous deal. Look at how gorgeous this beer is. It's pretty shy on the nose, in my opinion, it doesn't reveal a lot, but I would say it looks absolutely beautiful. It's totally opaque and black and the head is a very, very deep tan brown color and dense and creamy and quite beautiful. I mean, you want to talk about opaque. Yeah. That is dark as dark can be. I mean, it is ably black. Nighttime. I'm expecting chocolate and coffee and roasty qualities abound on the nose as well as the palate, and it's not, it's sharp. But it tastes delicious. I'll tell you one thing. I've often talked about how when you drink other things previously to trying anything, be it a spirit beer or wine, the receptors in your taste buds can get thrown a little out of whack. Since we just tried those really tangy anchor beers previous to this. And then you pour it into the same glass. All right. Let's all take a shot of tequila and then come back to this. I've got seven individual glasses here, so I don't have that problem. So you mentioned chocolate, and I think what's really interesting about this beer is that it's called Black Chocolate Stout, but it's been brewed for so long now that it was brewed during a time where adjuncts just weren't a thing like they are wait, are you saying that this is malt-derived chocolate in it? It has no chocolate syrup in it? It has no cocoa pebbles? Dude, I can only imagine what your young pastry-style drinker would think trying a beer like this, because it's so dry. I mean, to call this chocolate, it's bittersweet baking chocolate, like unsweetened 90% cacao. This is not candy chocolate. I don't know that I call it dry, though. Yes, it has a bitterness and a clean, bitter finish to it, but I don't think it's lacking on the palate as far as dryness would go. It's dry compared to like that. It doesn't taste like chocolate syrup. Cocoa nibs, vanilla bean, and golden grams. They're not advancing their rank in the pastry-archy, that's for sure. That's for sure. I mean, I think you're right. The finish comes across as relatively dry, and it's like the combination of relatively noticeable hot bitterness with the slightly bitter malt notes, just kind of coming together as a gestalt of kind of coffee, chocolatey bitterness. And it is definitely dark chocolate. This is not your milk chocolate lovers beer. When I was saying dry, yeah, I just meant dry as in like chocolate with no sugar added to it. Bitter chocolate. Yeah. I mean, also known as the best chocolate. I think it's pretty fantastic, actually. Despite the kind of reticence on the nose, the palate is quite nice. So they often recommend this with desserts. And I don't know, like I think some of the more interesting pairings with this are the savory kind. And so we use this. Cheese is like blue cheese with this is the bomb. No doubt. I would also add that, that kind of bitter maltiness and savoriness in this beer would go really nicely with well brown roasts and stuff like that. Anything where you get a really strong maillard reaction like duck skin or prime rib roast, I could see drinking it. Possibly a turkey leg. Yes, indeed. Ooh, there you go. Once again, I think this needs salt. I think this would be amazing with salty foods, pretzels, salty snack foods. I have some really nutty and robust aged Gouda downstairs that I'm going to finish this bottle with when we're done. Yeah. If you have a three to five-year-old Gouda, that has almost reached the stage where it's like caramel, and it has little crystals of- The little salt pockets or whatever they are. That's actually- They're not salt, right? What is that? No, it's lactose or something crystallizing over time. And you'll find it in Parmesan and anything that's really long-aged, hard cheese. Manchego. But yeah, delicious. This beer has got some real depth to it and a lot of potential, and it's deserving of your attention, especially for what a great price it is. So every time you share an Imperial stat with someone, they go, oh man, this taste of it is really good, but I don't think I could finish a bottle. And I'm always like, well, that's not the point of this beer. You don't finish a whole bottle of port when you up one one. But this one, it finishes dry enough, and it has this like leaves you wanting more quality that I might actually go back for the, not just me, I'm a monster, but normal people might actually go back for a second bottle. And that has nothing to do with the drinking. You're just a monster, sir. You know, I would agree, this is a really good beer. And as I'm nosing it over time, I'm sussing out more roasty notes and more chocolatey notes with it. I couldn't really find it first. It's opening up and getting better. Yeah. It needed, so whatever it was, it blew off. It needed something to blow off. Yeah. It's awesome. What an awesome beer. But it's really, really well put together, and it's quite delicious. We're talking about, is this sweet or dry? It's definitely not like a milk stout or a cream stout from britain, and it's not an Irish stout for sure. But one thing that it's lacking, in my opinion, for the style, and my benchmark, strangely enough, is always the Samuel Smith's Imperial Stout. This is much higher in alcohol, but what Samuel Smith delivers, in my opinion, is that kind of dark fruitiness. And there's a little bit here. But it doesn't have all that prune and fig. There's no fig or plum. None of that. Cherries show up. And that's what I prize in a real classic Imperial Stout, is that deep, dark fruitiness. Now, this is all about coffee and chocolate, things like that, and it's delicious. Well, I mean, that's a delicate balance of the different types of roast bar that they're using. If you're using, like that Samuel Smith isn't quite as heavy on the overly roast barley, so like dark malt barley gives those classic dark fruit flavors, whereas like something like blackened barley and really roast barley is going to give the chocolate and the coffee that we see here. I mean, and combined with the difference between like, I mean, yes, Brooklyn makes traditionally English style ales, and I'm sure they're using English ale yeasts, but like in those classic English Imperial Yeah, I think you're right. It is the mashbill. But I think even even more importantly, it's probably the yeast selection, because I think a lot of that comes from, you know, yeasty esters in conjunction with those dark roast malts that really bring to mind those dark fruits. Hey, Roger. Yeah. What makes this a Christmas beer? What makes this a holiday beer? So a couple of things. It's the fact that it's vintage, you know, dated. It's only sold for like two months a year. Only comes out once a year. And as I was kind of getting at before, you know, stylistically, especially with your, I would say English and Belgian beers are two of the more popular purveyors of these holiday beers. And whenever they do like a Christmasy beer, they're usually pretty high in alcohol. You know, you want that kind of warming effect from it. So this clocks in at 10% alcohol, which you can't really tell. It tastes big, but I wouldn't have necessarily guessed 10%. Oh, God, no. The alcohol is so well carried in the spirit. It's almost ridiculous. Totally agree. It's built like a steakhouse, but it handles like a bistro. All right. Yeah. And I think it pairs well with a lot of holiday fare. Like Chris was saying, you know, if you're making a big holiday roast, a prime rib type of deal or anything that has some really big umami, roasty, Mellard type flavors, this is going to go really well with that too. So doesn't Garrett recommend making ice cream floats out of this? I know I've had one out of this. Actually, it's very good. Yeah. He does it with black ops too, which is kind of crazily decadent and expensive, but I've had that. I could see putting, you know, maybe especially if you use like a chocolate ice cream in this, it could be pretty good. Oh my God, you can do that? I literally never thought of putting chocolate ice cream in a float. Oh, come on. I don't know. Yeah. What if you use cookie dough, chocolate chip cookie dough? Oh my God. Greg and I, we were at Goose Island that one time. They made some pretty unbelievable. That's true. Yeah, they made suburban county. How about a nice Spumoni? So, Roger, this year is kind of weird. A lot of the suppliers aren't going long on seasonal beers, and when this episode drops, people who are interested in winter beers should get to stores pretty quickly to pick up the remaining winter beers that we still have, right? Or use Instacart and get it delivered to your home. Or use the curbside pickup and have it delivered to the back of your car by a friendly, attractive, smiling Binny's employee. Yep, that is very true. So a lot more people are purchasing stuff this year. Stuff's going a lot faster than normal. But most of these beers, you know, barring some major changes, should be around next year, hopefully. So even if you don't get a chance to taste them this year, consider them for next year or also consider other beers from those breweries. I think we probably mentioned a different beer besides the one we were drinking from nearly all these breweries. So there's a lot of other awesome beers from these. These are all breweries that we love and that make lots of good beers besides the one we tried. So. Right. How about that? We're actually drinking recurring seasonals, not this week's flavor. It's kind of amazing. Yeah. Yeah. Very different from the current. Imagine how many more people would listen to this if we drank this week's flavor. And you can't have it. It's already gone. It'd be too old by the time it came out. Well, yeah. I mean, the nice thing about these, I hope when I try to select some of these beers, the idea is that the label doesn't tell you exactly what it's going to taste like on most of these. Well, ironically, the black chocolate style kind of, but that's the problem with a lot of the adjunct beers now. I thought the idea, I thought your purpose behind selecting these beers was to confuse and infuriate me. Did it work? Yeah, we definitely didn't go, that was another goal too, is to kind of that stereotype of that all Christmas beers are just like overspiced, like messy overspiced beers. There's some of those out there, but- Yeah, just perfumey spicy messes. Yeah. Yeah, none of these were like this, not even the anchor that has spice, whatever they may be. I enjoyed all of these. Obviously, I enjoyed a couple more than others, but like all of these beers, if I was given a full serving of this, I would finish the beer. Like no problem at all. I liked all of these. Yeah. That Southern Tier surprised you, didn't it? Southern Tier did surprise me. I mean, listen, we're going to hang up from the Zoom meeting, and I'm going to upload the file to the cloud, so Jim can edit it, and I'm going to go in my basement, and I'm going to crush a six pack of hams. But that Southern Tier was really good. Christmas hams. Everybody needs a Christmas hams. Yep. Oh yeah. You've been listening to Barrel, the Bottle, the Binny's Podcast. If you enjoyed this, maybe leave us a review. Tell your friends, tell your neighbors, tell your mom. More importantly, if you have a question, email us a question and we'll literally give you free money to Binny's. That's comments at binnys.com. I don't know why we don't get more questions, but comments at binnys.com or hit us up on social media of your choice at Binny's Bev. But ask us a question that we can answer on the podcast and we'll give you 20 bucks. It's pretty simple. $20 Binny's gift card. And if you live on the south side, bring us rainbow cones, okay? Bring us rainbow cones. And then we'll give you 40 bucks. All right. Roger, thanks for setting up this lineup. This is a pretty great one actually for a change. And everybody thanks for listening. Until next time, I'm Greg. I'm Pat. I'm Roger. And I'm Chris. Keep Tasty.