Thank you for listening to another episode of Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. We are back in your feed this week to talk about beer. In the studio today with me, Roger, is... Jim, Communications. Dan, Spirits. Chris, Wine. Wait till you see the first beer that I have that talk about an old man, a bunch of dudes sitting around drinking beer. And also, don't Greg to complain about it being an old man beer. Right. So, even though it's pretty funny, he probably doesn't want to admit this, but the cool beers that he likes, all these really like tongue burner hoppy IPAs, that's dad beer now. Yeah, absolutely. So, anyway, this week I figured we would do a little bit of a rundown on what's new in beer, with the caveat being that some of these are not necessarily brand new creations, some of it is things that has been out of market for a while and it finally came back, or an old favorite beer that got brewed again. But so it's a nice little mixture. I got stuff from Malty to Hoppy, Sessionable to quite high in ABV, everything in between. So without further ado, you guys want to just get started here? Let's taste some beer. Fire it up. All right. So this was a last minute edition. Yes. I'm very excited. The office was a buzz this morning with this news. Good old Newtzy Brown, Newcastle Brown Ale. All you old souls out there that grew up drinking this, this is the quintessential to me like, oh, they have good beer here beer. In the dark days when there was almost no craft beer to be had, there was this small cadre of imports you could rely on. I'm like, oh, okay, cool, I'll have a Guinness or I'll have a Stella or a Newcastle. Newcastle Brown Ale, been around since the 20s, 1927 is when it first came out. But in the modern era, it's been traded and passed around. Like many English breweries became the target of brewery, mergings and takeovers. So brewing moved from actually Newcastle to Tadcaster England in 2010. But then in the more recent past, once Heineken acquired it, they started just brewing it in the Netherlands. And then in a quite somewhat perplexing decision, they decided to reformulate Newcastle Brown Ale. Somewhat perplexing, yes. They're made in a hazy blood, man. They started brewing it at Laganitas in Chicago. And the idea, someone decided to keep the name and essentially completely change the beer. So it was still a brown ale, but it was what you'd expect from Laganitas. It was like an American style brown ale, commanding hot presence, richer in flavor, roasty, nothing like the original New Castle, which being in the industry, I often joke about how brown ales are the Rodney Dangerfield of the beer world. No respect. No respect. And American brown ales, I mean, even more so. I mean, a hoppy American brown was a thing for like 10 minutes in the 90s, early 2000s. So it was a real perplexing choice. When Heineken decided to shutter the Laganitas Brewery in Chicago, I was wondering, maybe the one good thing to come out of this is that they'll decide to abandon the reformulated New Castle, which wasn't exactly that well received because everyone that loved New Castle was kind of perplexed, like, well, this isn't New Castle. Why did you change the beer I liked? And there weren't a whole bunch of people that dig hoppy brown ales that were like, oh, finally, a New Castle with more flavor. And it was still sessionable, still like a 4.7% beer, but just very different tasting. But quite by surprise, just by noticing it on the shelves, I hadn't even heard the news yet, but they very quietly made the transition. So if you're a fan of New Castle, it's back to being brewed in, not only is it imported again, it is from England again, which has been a long time. I mean, we're talking probably 20 some years. Wasn't that reformulation kind of around the same time that like Fat Tire and Sam Adams did the same thing? Or did those come later? I can't remember. Those came later, yeah. I remember some of those Keystone brands went through that period of reformulating to try to appeal to. But not Keystone. They're still the same. Keystone will never change. Well, what's funny is that the Laganitas reformulation of this was the opposite direction. They took a beer that was extremely easy to drink and not challenging, not super bitter or heavy, and they made it more crafty. They gave it flavors that would arguably appeal to a smaller audience, not a bigger audience. So it was a real head-scratcher. I mean, Laganitas brews good beer, and it wasn't a bad beer, but it just pissed everyone off that liked Newcastle and didn't gain this whole new following of people that were- Yeah, very weird decision. A little background on Newcastle, like a lot of English ales, this is brewed with some sugar, so very light in body. It's the kind of thing that you can just drink. I think at one point, they had single serves of Newcastle ages ago that were like 30 some ounces or something, like a quart or something. But this is the kind of beer you drink in a pint. And when you're over in Britain, it would be a 20 ounce pint. It has nice flavor to it. It's very dry. Even though people sometimes get nervous when you say it's brewed with sugar, it's not a sweet beer. No, not at all. What do you guys think? It's nice. I think it's back to its original form. You get those classic English ale yeast notes of orchard fruit in the nose. There's a little toasty carmeliness. But I mean, the remarkable thing about it is its easy drinking body. I mean, this is exactly what you're saying. This is what you'd down at the pub by the pint over and over. Classic session beer. Yeah, I mean, think of this. I mean, one thing that's striking me is just the, this would be super food friendly with a huge array of dishes, because it's got flavor, but nothing's going to stand in the way of the food, and it'll complement a lot of flavors. Right. I see this kind of as a working class beer. Any British food, sausages. Yeah. That dryness is nice to counterbalance richer stuff like fish and chips. Yeah. Fries, even burgers. Yeah, this is a classic. I mean, we've talked before about how English beer, one of the biggest struggles it has against it is that the English don't really know how to name beers and make it sound appealing. They call things bitter and mild and old and brown. None of these things sound like something that's going to get people excited. So the recent branding of this whole category of beers that's popular in the UK as a pub ale, I think is resonated with people. They can kind of wrap their mind around it. Oh, this is the kind of thing you have in a pub. It goes good with pub food. It's the kind of beer you can drink several of at the pub and still walk out of the pub. For anybody that's digging things like ESBs and milds and bitters, you're going to want to give the classic New Castle Brown Ale a try. Now that it's back to being from England. Absolutely. It's in the process of this transition, so look for it at a Binny's Near You. Hopefully, nearly everything of the old packaging is worked its way out through the pipeline now, but this is breaking brand new transition here, so it may take a week or two to get this in. But moving forward, you'll be able to get good old Newcastle again, six packs, $11.99. So very fun to see this back. I think the last time I was in a store and just happened upon a beer and I got super excited and grabbed two six packs and ran up to my staff and waved my arms around was when Brooklyn Brownial was relaunched a couple of years ago. I think I even texted you, Roger, like, oh my god, it's back. Yeah, and I had been asking for that for quite some time, and it was weird that they were so hesitant for a while. But I think for that exact reason, they're like, well, Brownial's, you know, we don't have people clamoring for it, but the people that know it and like it, I think we're getting there. We're getting people interested in beer, flavor beer again, and not everything has to be flavor blasted and tropical. This next one is a new beer from Noon Whistle. It's flavor blasted and tropical. Yeah, it's not flavor blasted, but it definitely showcases some newer hops that are going to throw some of that tropical character. This is called Fortunate Day IPA. The craft industry is having this kind of crisis of conscience right now, where they know that people are getting excited about loggers, but sometimes they can't command the same price point as IPAs or they're worried that some people still just because of the last 15 years of breweries focusing on almost nothing but IPA. They're not quite ready to abandon the IPA. They're trying to slowly branch off into other styles. What a lot of breweries are making now is essentially India Pale loggers, which when they were first conceived were very, let's just say, not crafted in a great way. They were thin and super bitter and no one liked them. Because of that failure back in the early 2000s, breweries seem terrified to use that term IPL, which is a pretty easy concept to wrap your mind around. Like, hey, do you like IPAs? Well, this is like an India Pale lager. It's just brewed with lager yeast instead of ale yeast, and typically the malt bill is going to be more like a lager and less like a pale ale. So, instead, we've got kind of this like seemingly endless number of alternatives for saying IPL. We have cold IPA, which was quite a ridiculous name and difficult to explain to consumers and customers. Like, it was, you know... I like my cold IPA served at sake temperature. Boiling lava. Hot sake or cold sake? Hot, hot. We have California Pilsner is a new term that's being thrown around a lot. Can you have that when you're doing California Sober? Yeah, right. West Coast Pilsner is another like code word for hoppy logger. Hopewell is really into these and was calling theirs Lupo Loggers for a while. Lupo Logger was kind of an alternative to saying Italian Pilsner, which again is another... Lots of Italian Pilsners are just dry hop lagers. They have nothing to do with Italy at all. So this is a very, very clear cut and distinct category. Right. So the other thing you can do is just brew an IPA with lager yeast and not say anything about it. And that's what this is. Yeah, because there's like five people who are going to be like, this is a lager yeast. I was going to say it has distinct lager yeast character. It has that kind of crisp, almost yeasty edge to it like it's been lagered, strangely enough. And I don't think the hot bitterness is over the top at all. It's mostly aroma. Yeah, that aroma though is like it seems it's straight up resiny like old school IPA to me. I mean, a little more, there's a little more citrus in there, but there's like a ton of resin, I think. Oh, yeah. Very, very much so. Noon Whistle did a collab with Goldfinger not that long ago, and it was essentially an in this, you know, an India Pale Lager is a hoppy lager. It's called Highly Conductive. And this beer, I think, was branching off of the success and how well received that was. This is very much to me kind of a reworking of that. So I think what people liked about it and why it was popular in the tap room and sold well was that, you know, it bridges that gap. It delivers the aromatics and some of that unique tropical hop, little citrus hop, but then it is clean, refreshing, easy to drink. It's 6.2, so it's kind of, I think that's an interesting level to aim for. I like lagers that are a little bigger like that. And this by no means seems hot or anything. No, not even remotely. Because it is a little more heft, it actually seems more like an IPA, and not just a pale ale or a, you know, a Hellas or something, a hoppy Hellas. So, interesting kind of category bridging take that I think both lager drinkers and IPA drinkers are going to dig this. I think the future of IPA is more IPAs like this, things that are not real weighty and sweet, and, you know, moving away from the dessert-like hazy IPAs, which I don't think those will ever go away, per se, but the way they dominated the conversation I mean, I don't want to harp on this, but I think the defining characteristic here and the kind of cool thing about it is that easy drinking crisp body. It's totally dry. It doesn't have the fruity elements you get for male yeast. Yeah. There's plenty of fruity hop character in the nose, but on the palate, it drinks like a lager. So I'm just going to have to add my own lactose at home now, as we were saying. So after having just lambasted hazies, let's have a hazy. Say a word for hazy, Jane. When DDH, which for those that are unaware, means double dry hopped, became the codeword slang for hazy. Revolution here in Chicago had a little fun with it by brewing these IPAs that were not hazy, were very hoppy, had a lot of hop bitterness, but then they were writing DDH on them. So that perplexed some drinkers, and I no doubt frustrated some of them. But then finally acquiesced and started making hazies over at Rev, and they started making some really good ones. I think some of their initial concerns were that they wanted some balance. They were a little perturbed by how the bitterness was completely disappearing from a style, which the first hazies did have some bitterness. You can pretty much usually track it back to Alchemist as being the originator of the style, or for sure one of the very first. Things like Hedy Topper were like 70 IBUs. I mean, they were bitter. They had oats in them and wheat, and the mouthfeel was different, and they were wildly aromatic because of the heavy dry hopping. The style definitely changed over time, and hazies became less and less bitter. I think the pendulum is swinging back a little. Now, you can have hazies that do have a little bit of bitterness to them, a little bit more drinkability. They've dialed back some of the weighty mouthfeel, where you have the really heavy additions of oats or wheat, or they're omitting lactose, which for a while, everyone was dumping in. They maybe skipped that completely. Maybe if they put something similar in, they'll put some maltodextrin, but won't go lactose, which especially as you pointed out before, for everyone that's lactose intolerant, it was pretty ridiculous that breweries were just doing that and not even writing that on the label. But so I kind of would call this a modern hazy and kind of the direction that I see the industry going. So it's got an amazing hop bill. I was going to say, I can't imagine why you would like this one, Roger. The nose is just off the charts in the guava kind of realm. So this is DDH Nelson Hero from Revolution and Nelson Sauvin, obviously, as what is taking its name from. In addition to Nelson Sauvin, other Southern Hemisphere hops we have here are Galaxy and Green Bullet. Green Bullet's one you don't see too often. That's kind of cool. That was one of the OG hops down there. I think it came out in the 70s or so. But both Galaxy, a lot of breweries are having a blast now that Galaxy is back in good shape. Galaxy went through some rough years. There's very much terroir to hops, and then there's very much a, it's an agricultural product that can get bought like any other commodity. So if one company dominates the conversation and takes all the good stuff, and everyone's left with the scraps, it really matters when hops are harvested, and that can totally affect the flavor. So Galaxy is back. It's back to being, I mean, for a few years there, it was the most talked about and coveted hop, and then it just went through a really rough patch. But it's back here doing its cool tropical thing, but then they also, they loaded everything in this. There's Simcoe, El Dorado, and then there's some new hop technologies in play here. So we have Cryo, which is kind of the most kind of, you know, the something a lot of people are familiar with. So cryogenically frozen hops, where they separate the lupulin and make these concentrated pellets. So you can kind of think of it as a supercharged version of the flavors. It's very good for breweries because they're not cheap, but they save on that in the end by using something like a cryo pellet because they don't have to use as many. And also cryo pellets are going to have less of that leafy green flavor to the beer. And you can focus more on the fruit flavor that these hops are getting. They don't absorb as much liquid, right? Right, yeah. And then the other two are flowable hop products. Flowable. The Brave New World. So essentially like the modern extracts that are all about delivering that classic fruit character that you read about in hop descriptions. Again, these are expensive. This is by no means like a cheap product. So sometimes when you say extract, people think, oh, this is a shortcut. This is cheap. It's quite the opposite. This is delivering, you know, it's like supercharging again, kind of the hop flavors. So Spectrum Mosaic and then Lupomax Brew One. That is quite a hop fill there. They should do a DDHFHP. What's the hop? What's the hop? It's an acronym. It's not like an acronym hop. Idaho 7. It's not right. Oh, like CTZ. CTZ, yeah. They should do FHP DDHCTZ. I don't think anybody should do that. CTZ, interesting story for a side note here. So that stands for Columbus Tomahawk Zeus because different farms would call different hops, one of those three names, and they're essentially indistinguishable when you use them. So they're basically the same hop that just were, I think literally they've DNA-ed them and they're either identical or almost identical. So it just kind of became this catch-all like it's one of those three, depending on what you want to call it. But that's the story behind CTZ. This kind of reminds me of the earlier Hazes, like when it just became a thing, and you had people like Topling and Hot Butcher and Noon Whistle. In the early days, it was delivering that crazy fruit flavor, where you just sort of taste and smell the beer and go, there's no fruit in this? I mean, I swear there's fruit in this beer. There is some hot bitterness to cut, which is nice, and the body is creamy, especially compared to the first two beers we had, but it's not over the top. I am assuming there is still some oat in here, which I can feel that in the mouth, but it's really nicely balanced, and it is just explosively aromatic. Yeah, it's remarkably balanced. This is the kind of AC that I could have a couple of these. Yeah. Yeah, like Chris was saying, it's got some bitterness, full-bodied fruit flavor. And it's not sweet. No. Seven and a half, a good standard IPA ABV, dare I say. Even though some breweries will have you believe that's a double IPA. Yeah, great hop bill just is delivering. I mean, you could just start listing off the fruits here. I get like kiwi, honeydew melon, starfruit, gooseberry. There's citrus in here for sure too, like pomelo. There's a lot going on in here. So this is a limited release from Revolution. Grab some while it is out there in stores. DDH Nelson Hero 4-pack, 16-ounce cans, $13.99. Nice. Nicely done, Revolution. Yeah. I don't think anyone in this room is a huge Hazy fan, but that was good. Yeah. Yeah. There was a period of time where I really enjoyed them, but having to try them for the last 10 years, I've become a little burnt out on them. But when someone does one well, I can still very much appreciate it. I think for sure, it's been like 10 years. Wow. They deserve accolades for doing it well. Ollie's a big time Belgian beer geek, and I know I have some fellow Belgian fans in the room. Yes, you do. Oh, yeah. So I wanted to feature this one from Off Color. This is a beer that they haven't made in a very long time, making its debut in cans, in fact. I think the last time they made it, it came in like 12 ounce bottles. This is Off Color Sibling Rivalry, Belgian style triple, with, if you want to talk about old school craft, this features Soriachi Ace Hops. Remember when those were the hot? It was hot for a minute. Sibling Rivalry is, again, like I said, a Belgian style triple. One of the first beer styles that I fell in love with. When they're made right, they're one of the best beer styles out there. Unfortunately, a lot of American breweries, when they had their moment for a bit back in the day, there were a lot of under attenuated beers. It could be really sweet. Some people would spice them. They'd go way overboard on the spice. Fermentation temp is hugely important with these. Then one of the most important tricks is that I think some of the best ones will incorporate some sugar component. Once again, we're back to that. Yeah. Using sugar to boost up the alcohol, but without boosting the body. Again, you're completely fermenting this out, so don't think sweet from that. John and Dave are two of the best brewers in Chicagoland and they have the chops to pull this off and to do it well. They did just that. They use the Shuf Yeast Strain. There's Pils Malt sugar for the base of this, which they ferment cool to make sure that you don't have that boozy harsh alcohol note. It's hopped with Soriachi Ace and Nugget Hops. Clocks in at 8% ABV and 25 IBU. So in Belgium, 8% is a triple, but in America, 8% is a double. This is a touche fantastic, very drinkable, a lot of spice. It's a touch of like sweetness, but not like it's like just a sugar flavor, whether that sounds weird. There is a small hint of sweetness up front. I agree. There is that spice character from the yeast showing off here. It's relatively subtle, I think, though compared to some Belgian examples, where the spicy character of the yeast is really up front. For sure. Yeah. What a lovely drinkable beer this is. Very drinkable, very light. Yeah. Probably, I assume, because of the Pilsner malt. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the color is very, very pale. I just love the mind-bending nature of a triple where you pour it and it looks like a Budweiser, but it's just full of flavor, usually elevated alcohol, and just delicious. Sometimes, you'll read when people are trying to familiarize themselves with Belgian styles, and they'll read about Belgian Golden Strong Beers and Duval and how Duval created that category, and then they'll read about the descriptions for triples, Yeah, for sure. This, to me, I think, is one of those interpretations of a triple that's very leaning towards a Belgian Golden Strong. I agree that the body is more like that. Yeah. It's not as rich as some of the triples. However, I'm going to revise my spice comment because in the mouth, I get a lot of clove, and it really plays well with that just bare hint of sweetness. I think that's really nice. Yeah. It's like a honey to me, like a honeyed sweetness. Again, this is the classic example of how when you treat a yeast right, and you coax the spice out, this is, can you imagine adding spices? Yeah, that would be dumb. That's just what a lot of American breweries end up doing with these beautiful beers is they're like, oh, well, the yeast produces things like clove and coriander, and why don't we just put some of that in there too? Like, knoll or citrus, you know, it's like. Yeah, I could see this beer being completely ruined by a coriander addition. Yeah. Easily. Sibling Rivalry, available, resurrected from Off Color's deep lineup of amazing beers. It's great to see this one back. Again, if you're new to Belgian beer, you need to try this if you're a long-term fan and have never had their take, this is a phenomenal example of it. Probably super affordable, too. They are famously affordable as a brewery. The quality of beer you get from Off Color for the price is off the charts. It is available in a four-pack, 16-ounce can for $12.99. Wow. I celebrate their entire catalog. He does. And you have the clothing. I have the clothing to prove it. You've got the cred. Just yesterday, I was drinking crispy beer for pizza. I have that on tap in my house. Oh, there you go. Where's the invite? Oh, sorry. Yeah, Jim. Gas tank is out. Yeah. See, when did you get a kegerator? I didn't know that. I've had a kegerator for years. Really? I built one. Holy cow. Good man. We just had a Belgian style Triple, now it's time for a Belgian style Quad. This is another one, new in the sense that it hasn't been available here in the Chicago market for quite some time. When I heard that Avery was looking to kind of relaunch in the area and focus again on Chicagoland, this was one of the first beers that I asked about. So I'm very excited to see it back on shelves. This is Avery the Reverend. Yeah. Well, this used to be hot in this market and just disappeared. Avery kept messing around. They didn't know how to package it. So in the bomber days, it did great because when 22-ounce bottles were common, it was an easy corollary. Most Belgian beer at the time was packaged still in 750s with cork and cage in many cases. So a 22-ounce of this beer was great. It's the kind of beer you share with people, have it on the dinner table. It's so food-friendly. Then they ended up transitioning it into four packs. So then people were like, okay, and it did okay, but it didn't do as well as bombers. Then they tried to put it in six packs and people were like, it's a higher ring. I don't know. It was actually the best value in the six pack. But sometimes people get intimidated by six pack pricing. So then it just left the market. So it's back. It is in a six pack. Again, you're getting, it's a 15.99 six pack, but this is a 10 percent alcohol beer. Usually when you're looking at pricing on a Belgian style quad, these are beers that are sold in single bottles for 6.99, 7.99 a bottle. Right. That's a regular, like 11 point whatever. Yeah, 11.2. If you go for the 7.50 Cork and Cage, you're getting way up there. Which I love that presentation. Like you were saying, you put it on tables like sharing a bottle of wine because it's high in alcohol, it's rich, and bottle conditioned often. What do we have here? I don't think this is canned condition, but the malt bill here is impressive. I mean, this is Kara 20, Kara 45, Aromatic, Turo, Special B, and then some yet another beer incorporating sugar, this time the famous Dark Belgian Candy Sugar. Yeah. Well, that makes sense. You really get those caramalts in here, of course. Yeah. It's like toffee and plums and it's what a fantastic beer. What kind of sugar was the off-color one using, I think, just like- Just probably just white. White. Or like cane. Probably not like processed. They're not using beet sugar down there. Yeah, I don't think so. I'll ask them next time I talk to them. I mean, it could be something like maltodextrin too, I mean, who knows. This though is the dark candy sugar, which can either be like in these chunks that look like rock sugar, or it can be a syrup. But either way, very deeply caramelized flavors. It's incorporated not just for the fermentability, but it will impart that very rich caramelized flavor that's accentuated further when they use these highly caramelized malts. Yeah, I mean, this is just like a amplified version of the previous beer, just in every way, just darker, heartier, sweeter, spicier. And it has just enough herbal hop character in there to keep this honest. You know, it's like, yeah, don't get too sweet or anything. It's not particularly sweet to begin with, but there's just enough cut from the hops. Well, as big a beer this is and how rich it is, this is the kind of beer that you, I mean, I just want to stick my nose in the glass for like an hour. I know. Just sit with it and it's contemplative. And for $15.99, I expect that's a deal, in my opinion. The other thing that I really like about this, that I think puts it in a different class, is that when you try some of the really well-known Belgian quads, people tend to, the discussions revolve a lot of times around St. Bernardus, Ep XII, Rochefort X, Westie used to be a big part of the conversation. It's not available here, but very dark in color, rich, heavier interpretations of a quad. The brewery that first used that terminology and made a beer called a quadruple was Le Trap. Yeah, not even Belgian. Right, so the Koningshoven Brewery, their take on this style was definitely a little different, is lighter in color, and the way their yeast strain and fermentation profile, it was very ester-y and it had that pronounced like banana, almost bubblegummy, which I like sometimes, but in very small amounts, and when push comes to shove, I'd rather not have something be real banana-y. So I like that this is styled in, it leans more towards the trap, but it doesn't have that fermentation Yeah, I agree. It is more like the trap. Like a lot of the other ones you mentioned are more like a deep chestnut brown. This is very light and not opaque at all. Burn to umber. And this has more of those like caramel notes and raisinated fruit flavors as opposed to some of the other ones have almost like chocolatey characteristics. So if you are getting into the charcuterie game, you're taking pictures of your boards and posting them on social. I've seen some pretty amazing stuff of people really getting after it. I mean, this beer will pair with anything on the board. I mean, it will work with dried fruits. I mean, we're even describing things like it's got prune kind of plummy notes, it's got raisin notes, it would be great with dried apricots. It'll pair the cheese and options are endless. Yeah. It would be great with- Salty ham. Yeah. Make sure you include a monastery style cheese, something washed rind. Some of the Belgian monasteries make their own cheese, but anything like Taleggio from Italy or Munster from Alsace. Consult your local monger. Yes. Monger. Yeah. It's getting harder to, I mean, I guess when you smell those, sometimes it's pretty intense and maybe that's why they faded away. But you used to see like Chimay cheese. Yeah. Occasionally, you could find Chimay, but rarely these days. The Chicago cheese game has crashed precipitously in the last 20 years. Really sad. I was looking for some authentic Munster the other day at a couple of stores, could not come up with any. As was I, and yeah, I think again, I'm not that surprised that some of the more challenging cheeses have disappeared, but even some of the more common things are getting harder and harder. Or if you want a good blue, it's usually at a pre-cut stuff that's looking pretty gnarly by the time you see it. One of the cheeses I see that's kind of around and more common are aged Gouda's. There's a lot of options with that. You see, like, it's a great idea and stuff. Or, yeah, those really old ones that are super carmely. This would be great with those. So, you know, all right, Avery, the Reverend, it's back in six packs. Fifteen ninety nine and a Binny's near you again. A phenomenal beer. Yes, the six packs a little more expensive, but it's actually an incredible value at fifteen ninety nine. So check this out, share it with friends. Great with food. Next, we have a malt-centric beer here. Well, actually pretty well-balanced beer. There's a little hop character here as well, but opposite end of the spectrum, as far as we went from very high ABV, now we're going to more sessionable. This is from Pollyanna. This is their Czech Dark Lager. If you've been listening to the podcast, reading the beer buzz, we've been very excited to celebrate this somewhat bizarre resurgence in the style Czech Dark Lagers. I never would have guessed that the style would become something that a lot of local craft brewers would jump on and be excited about. I love that they are excited about it, so I talk about them whenever I can. I think it's exactly what the beer world has been longing for and hurting for for so long, our beer-flavored beers that are lower alcohol, that are balanced, food-friendly, the kind of things you can enjoy a nice big mug of. And I hate the stereotype that young people only like fill in the blank, and it's usually they want stuff that's fruity, they want stuff that's flavor blasted, they want stuff that's, you know, it's got to be fruit, fruit, fruit, you know, or if it's dark, then it's got to be sweet, tastes like brownies or cupcakes. Craft beer is supposed to be different. It can appeal to, you know, niche groups at times and not everything has to compete with, you know, malt beverages. Or cherry berry buzz balls. If you like things like chocolate, coffee, roast, caramel, those are all here, but in a beautifully balanced beer that is amazingly easy to drink. Yeah, yeah, totally. I mean, what a style for drinkability and flavor impact, particularly from malt. I mean, this is roasty right up front. That was the first thing I noticed was, was roasty notes. But the body is, again, we're going through beers today where there's a lot of flavor impact, but very, very drinkable. Absolutely. And I think that's, you know, exactly what the industry needs. We went through a period where it was, if you've been around me, I tell this and then give this analogy a lot, but I felt, I feel like a lot of breweries were opening and it would be the equivalent of if someone opened a restaurant and they only sold desserts. Like, oh, are you a bakery? No, we're a restaurant. All right, what can I order? Just desserts. You'll get your just desserts, all right. So, I mean, if you only have, pastry stouts or very sweet, heavy, rich malty beers and then all your hoppy beers are hazy kind of centric beers, these are not the kind of beers they might taste awesome to drink a little bit of it, but that wasn't the identity of beer for so long. It's a social beverage that can't emphasize enough how you can't just separate beer from food. It's always been a cuisine in and of itself. Right. It's meant to be enjoyed with food, so. Food and gematlikut. Indeed. What's that again? Gematlikut. So, if you're unfamiliar with the Czech, if you're unfamiliar with the Czech Dark Lager style, definitely listen to, we've done a couple podcasts on Czech beer now. We did a blind tasting episode, which is actually how this beer came into being. I sat down with Brian over Pollyanna as well as Tom Goldfinger. After we had done my podcast, I had them blind taste test all the Czech Dark Lagers that we had put together for our podcast episode. I wanted to give them a overview of the style. Tom had made one, which was phenomenal, and I've been nudging him to re-brew that beer, but Brian had not made one. I think part of the reason that Brian had not made one is that he has been to the Czech Republic, drank a bunch of them over there, and was not all that impressed by them. Well, yeah. I'm going to point out the fact right now that this is super well attenuated, is drier than a lot of Czech styles, it has a little more hop cut. Czech Republic famous for hoppy pilsners, right? But this style, it's pretty much in the background, just a supporting role. But here you have lots of multi-flavors, but dry, dry, dry. I think when local breweries have been interested in this style, a lot of them are specifically paying homage to one brewery in the Czech Republic called Ufleku, who for hundreds of years only brewed one beer. They finally added a pail, I think, during the pandemic. They caved. Times were tough. Sad days. We need a pail. But I think a lot of brewers are seduced by this place when they go over there, like, can you imagine only having to brew one beer? Hey, man. Do it perfectly. Maybe you can do it. Over and over again, every two weeks. Uflaku's Dark Lager is very roasty and dry and more hop forward. So it's kind of an outlier, whereas many of the Dark Lagers served there are sweeter, kind of what you were saying. And the examples we've even had from the Czech Republic have not necessarily been the most exciting beers. And the most, kind of the key thing, and this is what Brian was saying is, you know, the Czech Republic is one of the few anomalies for it's acceptable to have a presence of diacetyl. Yeah, in your lager. And stylistically, it's part of the culture, and they like it. And for a lot of us, that's, you know, diacetyl is produced from yeast. It's the buttery flavor, mind you, think like movie theater butter. And the problem is that it can be produced, you know, naturally by yeast, but it's also produced in infections and as a brewing flaw. So it's hard when you taste beer, you know, day in and day out, and you're evaluating beers, you can very easily make it synonymous with, oh, this is a bad beer, it's flawed. Or just, I would argue, it's not particularly nice to drink something that tastes or smells like butter, like regardless of if it's a flaw or not. I understand why it's a flaw, like I don't really like it. Well, in the wine world, this is something that is purposely done or allowed to happen, and people love buttery chardonnays. I think there's an argument to be made that a little can make the nutty aspects, you can bring it into a butter toasted pecan or hazelnut region, and with the sweetness. But if it gets too much, it's too much. Right. Everyone's threshold for diacetyl is different. So, you know, some people are completely blind to it. They can't taste or smell it at all. So it's really tricky and it's kind of a dangerous road to go down. You're right. I have had our urban chestnut with their Czech Pilsner. I think they dialed in imperfectly. They wanted it to be as subtle as subtle can be. And they pulled that off. But when we were doing the blind taste test, one of the beers that stood out, I think kind of the unanimous decision as far as beers from their brow check was pretty beloved as far as a Czech dark from the Czech Republic. That was kind of the determination that Brian really liked it and that served as an inspiration for this. But in the true best, I think, case scenario of Kraft, he used that as inspiration but still made it his own take on the style. There is, like you said, a little bit of roast here. There's nice complexity, definite hop balance. It's just, I think, one of the most standout examples of the style that you can pick up. It's nice to see this in the spring too. A lot of people that are making these style, most breweries are not doing it year-round. So I don't think we're there quite yet. It's kind of still a new beer style to a lot of people. So typically, you see them coming out in the fall and the wintertime. So it's nice to have one of them. I don't think it's a... This beer in particular doesn't require cool weather. I think you can enjoy this on a warm day. It's refreshing even though people are afraid of the dark. There's nothing to be afraid of. It's dry, it's crisp, it's pretty delicious. Great point. You could drink this all year for sure. Again, the food potential here, any beer that delivers some good caramel character, just think of when you're cooking, how many things have that caramel character? That old Maillard reaction. Through between searing and grilling and everything else, there's so much potential to pair this beer with food. Like I said, your options of Czech Dark Lager tend to explode in the fall and the winter time, but here's a great one that you can drink right now, available to Binny's near you in four packs, 16 ounce cans, only 11.99. Nice job. Sounds like I'm taking some home tonight. Yeah. I love this story about how you had them taste these beers too. I mean, you're doing a lot to inform what Chicago is drinking these days. Thanks man. I for one appreciate it because he's out there in the trenches. Yeah. I am trying. Again, I fell in love with beer a long time ago, and I went through quite a period of time. I've seen some funny comments from people who online talking about studying for being a BJCP judge or getting a Cicerone, and they're like, I'm glad I put in all that effort so that when I talk to people, they say, what's the best hazy IPA? Which one's the juiciest? There's just so many great styles out there, and I think as an industry, you just sadly just started ignoring all these. I get that if people are unaware of them, and they're not going to seek them out. So I'm trying in my little part here through this podcast and Beer Buzz to just get people to think about that again, and to be exposed to all the great styles that are out there. So again, if you're going to treat yourself to a well-made beer, you deserve to get something that's different. And there's a lot of, as much as people can be hanging their heads a little bit as of late and talk about that numbers are down. And if you seek out the good stuff, it's there. There's a lot to be excited about right now. So, and a lot of it is people that are really hitting their stride. They put in some time and they've really done some great beers and they're finding like this is their time. So, I really hope that people can get out there and experience the really good stuff that's being made right now. Yeah, we hope the great stuff survives and maybe we can weed out a few of the... I'm just saying. It happens periodically. The Purge. Yes. As always, please keep an eye out for our collaborative efforts. We're going to conclude today with one of those. We have a bourbon barrel-aged stout to finish with, which is definitely the way you would want to enjoy this beer. It's not exactly a get up in the morning and crack a 14 percent. Not with that attitude. Unless it's a coffee, then you can do it. Right. You can't tell me when I can and can't drink barrel-aged beers. So this is waxed. So this is going to take me a while to cut through. Roger, your influence only goes so far. Dan's going to drink this whenever and however he wants. Yeah. All right. 20 minutes later. One thing that's been happening lately with barrel-aged beers that's pretty interesting, breweries are really letting some of these age for a while. It's not just because they're losing them in their warehouse. Oh, although it does happen. You know, some of these malt bills are being created in a way that some nice oxidative character can bring a lot to the party here. And I think that they started to realize that there's going to be some common descriptors when it comes to these stouts, especially the ones that fell into the class of like pastry stouts. So things like chocolate, vanilla, marshmallow, a lot of the things that end up getting adjuncted in that stout is kind of the flavor profile that a lot of these were falling into. But when you age something for upwards of, you know, let's say over two years, you're bringing in an oxidative character to the beer. There's small amounts of oxygen seeping into that bourbon barrel. And when it gets done in a graceful way, you get that medirification, charried character that can add some really nice, nutty, fruity notes to the beer. Can be a dangerous game, but worth it when it works out. It can be very risky, right? So then you don't want the bad oxidative character. It can start to taste stale, old, wet cardboard, meaty, umami flavors can start to... Lots of soy sauce sometimes. Yeah. So it's, there's some real risk involved here, but there's a few people that are doing it really well. We had a collaboration with Moore that was aged for quite some time. That was phenomenal. I think maybe no one does it better than the Central Waters. We did a three-year-old beer from them. But this latest collab is with Phase 3. This is called Castaglia. It is aged in Weller barrels, which is kind of had the naming there was a nod to that. But the time in barrel here was 29 months. Wow. So quite some time. They do several different riffs on their barrel aged out recipe at Phase 3. This one incorporated some additional grains besides barley. This was made with both rye and oats. Rye, I like the sound of that. Yeah. I'm a big fan of especially beers aged in rye barrels too. It's not as easy for us to source those. But now that we have Dan here in the trenches trying to grab those whiskey hotline barrels and get them to as fresh. Hopefully, we'll see some more rye barrels to use in collabs. This is Weller Barrels. Weller, of course, famous for being a weeded bourbon. So you're definitely going to get more of the caramel and vanilla character to shine through. So I think it was a great idea to incorporate rye into the mash bill, to add a little bit of spice to complement that extremely thick viscous. This is the very decadent dessert style stout that many really love. And again, I think we really wanted the Barrel to be the star of the show here. Looks like gutter oil. Yeah, it's like motor oil. It's like PX sherry. But yeah, we chose not to adjunct this with anything. And I'm really happy that we want no adjuncts in this. No adjuncts. It tastes like there's so many adjuncts. I know it's so flavor blasted. Barrel blasted. Like coffee and chocolate and stewed dark fruit. Yeah, I just can't believe there's no that. That's crazy. That's not flavor blasted. I want all the vanilla. Yeah. I mean, if you told me this was a vanilla beer, I would go, yeah, got that crazy like Madagascar, that fruity bourbon vanilla note, like that's totally what's here. But no, it's just the barrels. American White Oak gives you a lot of vanilla, a lot of coconutty vanilla. That's crazy. The viscosity here, wow. I was going to say, that's crazy. The oats, this is where oats belong in beer in this style, in my opinion. Man, it's killer, Raj. Such a delicious, just got ganache, meets some. Wow. I just taste it for the first time. That is so chocolatey. That's crazy. So rich. Yeah, there's a little bitter balance on the back end, but it's sweet up front and so rich and lush. Holy cow. I think this glass might be ruined. Have you seen a darker beer in your life? The lacing is incredible. I mean, it makes the glass amber. It looks like tinted glass now. Yeah. Wow. Great job. You know what it reminds me of is when you're making a caramel in a pan, what it looks like against the metal of the pan when you swirl it. How long do you think that they boiled this beer for? I don't know. I know that that's definitely part of where you can get an enhanced weighty thick mouth feel can be. It was like a little blip in the industry where, yeah, they were listing boil times and stuff. Yeah, I'd have to ask. Again, I think the key with this is it's super dessert-like without being cloying. So that's the danger of the pastry style category, right? Is that you still want there to be some semblance of drinkability where you can enjoy more than an ounce. I think some of the spirited nature of this being 14, I think the alcohol helps balance it a little bit. I mean, I think this is such an integrated beer too. All that time and wood, and it is seamlessly one thing with the beer, you know? There's not beer and then wood. It's like everything all at once. It's a very special beer, and definitely treat yourself to a bottle of this before it disappears. This is a great beer to share with friends, family, give as gifts, packaged in a beautiful 500ml bottle dipped in wax. Available at Binny's near you while it lasts before it disappears, $29.99. Please don't serve it ice cold. Yeah, this is something that I've had this warm up into the glass to absolute room temperature. It's just as delicious, if not even more so. The temperature is pretty good. Yeah, I mean, whatever this is, it seems perfect. Yeah, cool, but not cold, sometimes especially with, again, it depends on if you're a bourbon drinker. If you like bourbon, the alcohol will be more pronounced the warmer it gets, but if you're a fan of bourbon, that just means it's going to be more reminiscent of the spirit then. I'm just going to go ahead and say this is the best barrel-aged beer I've ever had in my entire life. Wow, there you go. It's pretty incredible. It's like just, it's perfect. It's exactly what you want in a barrel-aged beer. The more I swish around in my mouth, too, the more nuances coming out. I mean, it seems like it could be monolithic, but there are so many layers here. There's berry-like fruit to it. Oh, yeah. There's all kinds of stuff happening. Now that I've spit it out and it's been just sitting in my mouth, it's almost like bright red strawberry, red fruit. Yeah. Exactly. My point is that you get all those deep, dark dried fruit character, but then there's a bright fresh red berry fruit to it. I think that's definitely the influence of the spirit too. I get that from Buffalo Trace products in general. There's definitely that berry component. Sure. My glass is empty and it just smells like dark cocoa powder. Yeah. It is so chocolatey. Exactly. It smells exactly like dark cocoa, but it's got that bitter sweetness. The finish, it lays on your tongue forever. I mean, the finish is endless. Yeah. But it's very cocoa powdery on the finish too. Yeah. I just think this is so fun when you can sit down and have a beer like this and just keep describing all the different flavors and aromas you get. That to me is infinitely more interesting than when we add things to beer. I just don't get everybody feeling like we need to put stuff in the beer to get the complexity. When you make it well like this, why would you want to add vanilla or add cocoa nibs or add coconut or add all of that is here. Imagine this with the dollop of marshmallow. You can still do that. If you need to do something insane, like pour some of this over ice cream, then you can do that. I'll allow that. For me, the perfect way to enjoy this is, you mentioned a beer of contemplation earlier. You said the Reverend. This I would want to share with two people by a fireplace and really think about this and have some time to talk about it, and other things, you know, just a wide-ranging conversation enhanced by a just beautifully crafted beer. For sure. Agreed. All right. Well, that is our lineup. A little bit of taste of what's new in beer is springtime. There aren't many spring seasonals these days, but the variety of beer out there, you can choose your own adventure here. There's so many good beers, wildly different styles. Keep an eye out for Binny's Collabs. We've got many more in the works. Thanks for listening. We encourage you, if you like what you hear, leave us a review. Tell your friends and family about Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast until next time. I am Roger. I'm Jim. I'm Dan. I'm Chris. Keep tasting.