Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode 128 - Christmas Beers 2023
123 Plays2 years ago
Merry Christmas or whatever you may celebrate!
Brandon and Tony drink through four different holiday inspired beers.
Beers on this episode:
Penrose - Snow Boots
Solemn Oath Brewery - We're All Misfits
Illuminated Brew Works - War On XMAS! Peanut Brittle Edition
More Brewing Company - Henna: Gingerbread
Theme music provided by Myke Kelli (@mykekelli)
Break music provided by Cel Ray (https://celray.bandcamp.com/album/piss-park)
Outro music provided by @FluidMinds
Check out all our episodes at www.themaltinghour.com
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Holiday Greetings
00:00:04
Speaker
What's the hats on the house? Got yeast and speech? This the molten hour where we talk about our drink And tell you what we think, every other week And if we get drunk, well we might slur our speech Got the gift of gab, the friends you wish you had Join us for a drink, join us for a laugh Time is never wasted, way you getting wasted The molten hour here, people, people taking places People, people taking places, people, people taking up
00:00:33
Speaker
Welcome to The Malting Hour. I am one of your hosts, Tony Goit, joined always with... Brandon Winninger. And today is Christmas. Merry Christmas, if you celebrate. I bet it's Christmas. All over again. I don't think we have to worry about copyright stuff because you sang it like it wasn't the actual song. Yeah. I think we're okay. It wasn't that good either. I thought it was great.
Tony's Cold and Recovery
00:00:55
Speaker
I'll be listening to that. I'm coming off my... I've had a cold for the last couple of days. I'm pretty sure the listeners can tell because you still sound slightly congested.
00:01:05
Speaker
I'll be sure to up the volume on that one. It's funny because this morning when I was talking, I felt fine. Yeah, I was surprised to get a phone call from you. I thought for sure. I was like, if anything, cancel it. Well, and I was like, I'll just go get a beer and do a solo thing just so we can do a Christmas. No, and I was like, I pretty much felt great all day until I came home from running some errands and then we've been nonstop.
00:01:35
Speaker
One of the bedrooms we have upstairs, we use to kind of store stuff. And we've been moving that down here because we're having guests for the holidays. So we're clearing out the rooms and I'm like, I stopped like after like doing it for like an hour and a half. I'm like.
00:01:51
Speaker
I'm fucking tired. And then I was like, oh god, I'm coughing again. I'm like, here we go. I'm done. Yeah, so the cough started to come back. But other than that, I feel normal. You sound fine. And you normally don't want to. I've had no desire to drink the last four days. And this is the first day where it's like, I would like a drink. I have not felt that way. And I have had some drinks.
00:02:20
Speaker
Yeah, so coming off that, now we're enjoying a nice tasty beer.
Review: Penrose's Snow Boots Hazy Winter IPA
00:02:24
Speaker
Yes, the first beer for this year's Christmas beer episode comes from us, or comes to us from Penrose. It is the Snow Boots Hazy Winter IPA. 7.3% ABV baby Brandon. Tell us all about it.
00:02:38
Speaker
AZ Winter IPA. The temperature isn't the only thing freezing around here. Our hops are too. Using hops processed in a cryo process that concentrates the hop goodies, we are able to maximize our aroma compounds and limit the green matter and bitterness, harshness that can come with. Yeah, that's it. Snow Boots debuted a couple years ago to a great reception and is a bigger, more hop aromatic version of our Goofy Boots. Okay. Yeah.
00:03:05
Speaker
those other boots that they've done. They've done some other iterations of it. Now that makes sense. Because before we started recording, I said, what makes this a winter IPA? And that's a really clever way of doing it.
00:03:17
Speaker
Wait, and then as you were saying that I looked over at the description, and it's like, oh, cryo. That's awesome. Yeah, it's honestly, the cryo hops really help hazy IPAs to be fruitier than bitter, or more fruity than bitter. And this does it for me, man. This is a solid, not too sweet, juicy type of,
00:03:43
Speaker
hazy IPA. What's interesting to me is that's not something that I have thought of being that we've brewed with fruit before and I always freeze the fruit first. Oh, interesting. And then I would have to try to extract more of the sweetness and the flavor out of it. Because all the moisture inside of it freezes the crystals and it helps break up. So it literally makes sense that process works for hops too. Sure.
00:04:09
Speaker
That's cool. That's a pretty good idea. This is crazy drinkable. I think I said 7.3, but it's 7.5. It's really good. It's a good, hazy IPA. It doesn't smell fruity. To me, it smells hoppy. It smells like bitter hops, but it's not bitter at all.
00:04:30
Speaker
No, it's not bitter. I'm getting some of that like West Coast kind of stickiness, like reminiscing, you know, and it's a little bit dank on the nose from what I can actually pick up.
IPA Characteristics and Cryogenic Hops
00:04:45
Speaker
But I like it, man. This is when you poured it first. I went to the bathroom and I was asking Tony what we were going to drink and he's like started talking and I went to the bathroom, came back out.
00:04:55
Speaker
I thought you poured Prost for a second. I was like, all right, I guess we're starting with Prost. We're going with a big cinnamon milk stout. And I was like, that's fine with me. The profile, the way it looks, is very similar to them. Yeah, it's really good. And if anybody else gets a chance to try the other boots that they do, they're really good. I have not had a bad version of this beer from Penrose.
00:05:21
Speaker
It's a very good haze on it, too. Yeah. And the color is like a nice orangey. I might have some, it looks like I've got some... Sediment. Yeah. Some like hot matter in there, which is crazy because I don't get any hot burn or any of that green that they talked about for using the cryo hops. Are the other versions of the boots, are those also hazy IPAs? Yes, they're all hazy IPAs. But not cryo hops as far as I can remember. Got it.
00:05:47
Speaker
Well, yeah, I would I would assume like that would be the variant of this. Yeah, that would kind of defeat the purpose. No, I think this is very well done. And I you sent me a picture of what you had picked up and I wasn't exactly sure. I didn't look at like zoom in on all of them, but there was a penrose or whatever. And I didn't look in to see what the beer styles were. But
00:06:09
Speaker
If you're calling it a winter IPA, I mean, this, you know, the process that you're doing it, you could do this year round, obviously. Absolutely, absolutely. But it's a nice gimmick to have something to, like, especially an IPA to release during the winter. And not a shitty gimmick. Exactly. No, like, that's a, it's an impressive way to get some very great aromatics and, you know, flavor profiles out of your hops. I would say it's more of a clever way of making it a, quote unquote, winter IPA because you're using, you know,
00:06:37
Speaker
cryo, hops, cryogenically frozen hops. Agreed. Agreed. Yeah, I like this a lot. Brandon, if someone was throwing snowballs at you, how many snowballs? Terrible. How many snowballs would you give this? Are the yellow snowballs? No, they're straight up just normal snowballs, baby snowballs. Then two. Now if they were yellow, I'd be like five.
00:07:05
Speaker
No, I'm like three eight three nine. You're not a big hazy IPA fan to begin with. I, so I, not that you don't like it, but it's not your go-to style. It's not my go-to style. And what I, what I say is it's not something that I seek out. Um, and when I have one, if I'm impressed, I will let you know that I'm impressed, you know, cause there's good ones. I've had like that again, suck it off older again. I, there's so much.
00:07:33
Speaker
Like, they make great hazies, too. That kind of got me thinking about enjoying them a little bit more. Again, I don't naturally go and seek them. But if Old Irving does one, I'll try it, because they're usually pretty good. Their collaboration. Someone in Canada. I-P-A-E-H. Oh, yeah. If you get a chance to try that. Did you try it? I didn't. You should. It's really good. It's very subtle, smooth drinking. And I think that's close to almost 8%.
00:08:03
Speaker
It's really good. It's a very, it's like a hazy pale ale it feels like. Did you have that when you went with your mom or? No, I had that when I was hanging out with Matthew at Beer on the Wall in our office. Oh, okay. This was a lot of fun. Yeah, that was a great time. I would say for me, someone who likes hazy IPAs, I also judge hazy IPAs off of my burp.
00:08:28
Speaker
I think you've said that before. I'm saying it again, baby. It still tastes good, Murphy. Yeah. I would say it's like a 4-3 for me. A 4-3. It's up there pretty high. It's a really, really well done hazy IPA. And I like the play on it being a hazy winter IPA with the cryo hops. I think that's a fun way to make a Christmas IPA.
00:08:54
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, bravo. Good idea. Yeah. Love it. And at seven and a half, that's easy drinking at seven and a half. I'll be asleep by the end of this episode. Yeah, Braden's going to fade fast. This might not even be a full hour episode. I don't know what we're going to do.
Introduction: 'We're All Misfits' Xmas Brown Ale
00:09:11
Speaker
All right. Let's move on to beer number two as we're just plowing through it. This is
00:09:17
Speaker
We're all misfits. Oh, I got sediment at the bottom of mine too. Oh, sick. And I did like go back and forth for the can at the end there. This is We're All Misfits from Solemn Oath. Brandon, I might need you to look that up so we can tell the kids all about this. It's an Xmas brown ale with holiday spices.
00:09:37
Speaker
So as you all know I'm a big fan of brown ales and I did grab another brown ale that had like cocoa, vanilla, and cinnamon in it and I just thought it might have been too much to have two brown ales that were going to be spiced. So I decided not to bring that one. Thank you.
00:09:56
Speaker
I don't know if we've had a salamoth beer on here ever or in a while. It's been some odd times. So I'm filling this glass here. I'm pretty sure that's probably close to half, Brandon, just so you know. Okay. So don't feel like you have to drink this in the rest of the 16 ounce can. You can save it and drink it later to help you go to sleep, but I don't think you'll have a problem with that.
00:10:16
Speaker
I will say that the design on this can is super cool. It's a bunch of like random toys that look like they're not happy as the Misfits toy, Misfit toys you'd expect to look like. Right away it's a very nice, it's a nice clear brown ale. It's like a tannish white head. There is definitely a little bit of spice I want to say
00:10:45
Speaker
It's like that holiday spice mix of like, you know, there's a little cinnamon, maybe nutmeg, something like that going on in here. What are you getting from that, Brad? Let's see. Listen to him sniff that beer. I'm getting traditional like brown ale.
00:11:09
Speaker
Like, predominantly. It's funny that you say that, because if this was poured... Or like a porter, almost. If this was poured for me, not knowing what type of beer this was. Like, not knowing. Like, you said porter? Not knowing that it was... No, I would say, oh, it's a good brown ale. And I think my mind, because I read, you know, Christmas spiced beer, right away, I was like, oh, I can smell this. And I take a sip. I don't get... I get very subtle spice, if any. Agreed.
00:11:38
Speaker
It's a really good brown ale
Expectation vs. Reality: 'We're All Misfits' Flavor
00:11:40
Speaker
though. Yeah. And it is a little more chocolatey that leans closer to a porter. Yeah. And this, so I just found a description, um, on untapped and I'm not getting laid on us.
00:11:55
Speaker
Housed in a portable dedication to 1964's Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer stop-motion animated classic, this is S.O.B.'s first ever Christmas Ale. A rich and deep X-mas brown ale with fresh orange peel, cinnamon, and a mix of holiday spice. Silky and layered with holiday nostalgia and holly, jolly aromatics of graham crackers, and a chocolate bumble bounce.
00:12:24
Speaker
We got the wrong beer. It tastes like a roasty brown ale. Yeah. It's not bad. No. Especially for brown ales. I love brown ales. This comes off as a heavier brown ale to me. It's not a light crisp beer. This is definitely a bit heavier.
00:12:50
Speaker
I get some spice, like I said, and now that I'm like, it's not a front, but it's like in the back end, like aftertaste wise, sure, there's a little spice there. Yeah, it's an orange though. It lingers a little bit. Yeah, I'm not getting any orange. I don't get graham cracker. No, cinnamon, no. Chocolate, I'm getting more than anything. I get that in brown ales, not all brown ales, but that's subtle in some brown ales, you know, anyway.
00:13:20
Speaker
Even if it's not the predominant flavor for me, like I could, you know, depending on the malt that they use, I can usually pick up on some chocolate, but I don't know what the fuck a chocolate bumble bounce is, but apparently that's supposed to be in here, so. I mean, sure, some chocolate. Yeah, I remember the bumble bounces. Stop bumbling and bouncing in my mouth. You're just like supposed to be jumping around and then he's coughing. I'm trying to burp. This is great. That's why I got a mute button. This is tough.
00:13:47
Speaker
for me because I was really excited and I feel like maybe I should have brought the other one. Like I thought this was going to wreck our pallets because of all the spices. Yeah. Like a spice beer. Like yes, there is, there is like a slight spice aftertaste lingering in my mouth, but I don't know if I, if I didn't know what this beer was supposed to be, if I would be perceptive of it. I would say
00:14:14
Speaker
If we do end up recording next week, bring it next week. We have to. Well, no, I'm just saying. Whenever we end up recording next week, bring it. Okay, yeah, that's fine. Yeah, because we always need a beer to share, multiple beers to share for that. Yeah, I'm not mad at this beer. I like... But you like brown ale. Yeah, yeah, that's what I mean. I like it as a holiday beer.
00:14:41
Speaker
I was hoping for a little holiday spice. You know, Great Lakes Christmas Ale is one of my favorites, which by the way, I did have one can of the bourbon barrel aged one left and somebody drank it, so I apologize. They didn't know they couldn't have that. Who the fuck was your mom? Who was my mom? I'll tell you off mic. Who am I murdering? I'll tell you this. For that one, the Great Lakes Bourbon Barrel Aged Christmas Ale, it's okay. I liked it.
00:15:11
Speaker
The Christmas ale itself, though, we don't need to mess with it. Just drink the regular Christmas ale. Yeah, I mean, that beer is fucking fantastic. I'll grab that. I'll grab it again if I see it, but... Exactly, Aggie. You know exactly what I'm saying. Yeah, I mean, Christmas ale can do no wrong in my love. The more I get into this, it's like there is a spice in there, but then all of a sudden it just retreats and it's just a...
00:15:37
Speaker
It's a brown ale. It makes me wonder if it's like sitting at the bottom, like the spices fall. If there's anywhere left, give me a little bit of that. Maybe, but you'd think that with like, you know, a beer of this standard wouldn't... No, it still smells like a brown ale. Yep. I mean, it's good. It really is good.
00:16:00
Speaker
I'll tell you this, I'll give you my rating. We're gonna go off of Misfit Toys. How many Misfit Toys would I rank this? If I'm rating this on a Christmas beer that says it has spices in it, I'm giving it a 3.25. If I'm going straight up on a brown ale, I'll give it a 3.9, maybe a four. This is a really good brown ale. I like how much they lean into it.
00:16:27
Speaker
It's a brown ale because it does kind of like get really close to a porter for me as far as roastiness and chocolate goes. It's not like super roasty like coffee but it is a bit heavier and thicker than a brown ale I'm used to. Like I like a nice crisp brown ale that has like a nice roastiness that comes through that's almost subtle but still perceptive. This has the aftertaste of like
00:16:53
Speaker
chocolate. It almost hits. It does really does. The color is perfect though. I mean, that looks like a damn brown ale, man. Yeah. You kind of nailed it on the head though. But the, what, what, what nailed it on the head. I love it. Um, like just kind of what I was going to say, but what is interesting is it's five and a half percent. Oh wow. That's interesting. Um, and it like, it feels like it should be more. Yeah.
00:17:21
Speaker
Wow, that's pretty cool. So here's an experiment we should do in the future. We have so many ideas. Just taking any beers that we haven't had before, or that we have had, and maybe haven't had them in a while, and just drinking them, and then just by flavor profile, trying to guess the ABV. Ooh, that'd be interesting. That'd be a nice way to do the next mystery beer episode, instead of it just being mystery beers, but try to figure out where the ABV lands.
00:17:50
Speaker
Cause then it lets us off the hook for Clark and I at least to, you know, not say it's a, it stays on. It's a paleo. Indeed. Yes. And you guys still keep listening to this show. Brandon, how many Misfit toys are you giving this one? I'm in, I'm in the same wheelhouse. Um, the,
00:18:14
Speaker
the fact that it doesn't match the description, I'm at like close to 325, like 31, 32. And then if I was going just to brown now, I'm with you on that, like 375, maybe 38. Yeah, I would say if you want a holiday themed beer that is subtle with the spices, I mean, like there is that lingering like spice in my mouth right now. Yeah.
00:18:42
Speaker
I don't know, certain people are gonna not, who would enjoy this, for sure. And certain people like us kind of want just a little bit more. And again, these ratings are just based on right here, right now. Yeah, and I also wonder, like, it's a good beer. If it's fallen off, it was canned three months ago. Yeah, I'd have a hard time believing it'd fall off that much. Exactly. Like, you wouldn't notice any of it? Yeah, Salmoth beers, Salmoth, they're on their shit, you know what I mean? Most of the time when you're making beers,
00:19:12
Speaker
that are Christmas years. Yeah, they come out in August, September, but they're made to last through Christmas, at least. Yeah, it's a good beer overall. I don't dislike it. I do think I would buy it again, mainly because it's a brown ale that I really like and it's five and a half percent.
00:19:31
Speaker
You know, maybe just today's the day where, you know, you're getting over your cold. I might not have the, we just drank, you know, snow boots. Maybe that did something to our pallets as well. So it's, it's not a bad beer by any means. It's just the ranking. We're giving it right here right now.
00:19:45
Speaker
And I like it. Overall, I do like it. I would definitely have it again. Yeah. When I do the whole swish in the mouth thing, I feel like I'm getting a little bit more. Sure. Oh, that's what I'm saying about the aftertaste in my mouth. I feel like, oh, this is... Sure. The only thing I will say that I don't get is the orange peel. No.
00:20:08
Speaker
No, but there's some spice that's coming through that I can identify as holiday spice. Not bad. Way to go, Solid Growth. You made a solid brown ale that I'm definitely looking forward to trying. I'm curious if there's a base beer for this. Good question. We always ask that question. We always ask the hard hitting question.
00:20:29
Speaker
The reason I asked that would be, I'd be curious, like to do a side-by-side between the two. I mean, I'm always down to try a brown ale. I don't care. I will have a brown ale any day, any time. I know that about you. Yeah, thanks, man. Hey, you know we should... Like the brown beers. You know what we should do? Take a break. We should take a quick break. And we're gonna take a quick break. Just so you guys know, this song that's about to play,
00:20:57
Speaker
You guys, if you listen to the show, you know that after the Final Four is performed by my cousin, Kevin, composed, even though we came up with the idea. He and his wife did that. Kevin is also in a band called Celre, their local band here in Chicago. Super cool. And we're going to play a song from them right now. We'll tag him in this episode. Be sure to check him out. They're pretty rad. We'll be right back.
00:21:28
Speaker
Where we can all hang out You'll pull up your van next to mine In the parking lot And we can swap clothes and balls
00:22:12
Speaker
Talkin' about shoes and breaks But don't take any of that to heart
00:23:04
Speaker
And we're back! Oh shit, have we ever stopped? Well yeah, good hit stop. Then we played that song. What was the song? Uh, that song. Oh, I just...
00:23:16
Speaker
That was from, you guys know him, Kevin Goggin. He did the After the Final Four theme song. He was on our American Pale Ale episode. That was his band, Selray, C-E-L, Space Ray. The song was called Lake Small. Be sure to check him out on Spotify. Check him out on Bandcamp. Find him on Instagram.
00:23:37
Speaker
I know that that's the only social media that they're on, I'm not sure if they're on anything else, but good music, they're good people, I got a chance to hang out with them, all of them, one time at Dovetail, or Dovetail and Legile for their Oktoberfest, which was super cool. Is that when they played? Yeah, it was rad. It was rad to see, and I feel like it's a little taste of my youth with those guys.
00:24:01
Speaker
They're fun. They're a fun band. Are they all, like, 15 years old? No. They're closer to our age. Uh, anyway. Really? Yeah, so check them out. C-E-L space R-A-Y. Bandcamp, Spotify. Anywhere you can get your music. Brandon, what are we drinking next,
Review: 'War on Xmas' by Illuminated Brew Works
00:24:19
Speaker
baby? We are drinking illuminated brew works. War on Xmas. If you want. It. Or if you want to. It's a white peanut brittle stout. 11% alcohol by volume.
00:24:32
Speaker
I will tell you this. What do you think of it? I'm on the, just the aroma. I'm getting like, peanut brittle-ish. Absolutely. It's kinda like mixed with marshmallow fluff. Yeah, there's like a butter scotch. Okay, this is gonna be tough. I took a sip, made a face of Brandon. Brandon took the sip. Brandon, what do you think about this beer?
00:25:01
Speaker
It's hella sweet. And it's not like a great way. No, this is... It's maybe the first time we know tag a brewery. I can't do it. Yeah. Yeah, that's too much. There's... When it comes to like adjuncts and things like that, obviously we're not...
00:25:21
Speaker
shy to trying crazy stuff. This one is not for me, unfortunately. And I've, okay, so I also have disclosure. I've had a handful of illuminated beers. I really have. They have, I went to the brewery. Their beers are fantastic. It's really good. They keep making this beer. At least this is like the second or third time. There's also another variation of this beer that is not the peanut brittle.
00:25:50
Speaker
I, just me personally, I do not care for this. It reminds me of, like, um... Why'd you do that to me? Sorry. It reminds me of, like, the smell of old, bad pancake syrup.
00:26:05
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. I don't like it. I'm so sorry I eliminated. Yeah, so I think that's what I was getting. Like when I was smelling it, I was, you know, in my head I was like, I guess I just kept thinking peanut brittle, peanut brittle, peanut brittle. That's what I wanted to get. Yeah. I felt like I was getting that mixed with like marshmallow fluff before I read the description that actually says there's marshmallow in there. We haven't read the description. No, I know. But I read, I was reading out the can. Everybody, the salad description, Brandon.
00:26:35
Speaker
Things change, the center will not hold, and IBW is no exception. We've updated our annual favorite war on Xmas to celebrate yet another holiday favorite, peanut brittle. So do they change it every year? I hope they had two out this year. I'm not sure what past years have been.
00:26:52
Speaker
We got the same white stout base we've always used, but now we've added peanut and toffee with a little kiss of marshmallow to bring you a new holiday adventure in a can to help you deal with your family for one more year.
00:27:09
Speaker
Guess I'm dealing with my family. Yeah, this isn't going down illuminated not knocking you guys I'm not knocking any of your other beers because I have I've been to the brewery It's great great little spot tucked away in Park Ridge on Northwest Highway very tasty beers unfortunately this one I Do not like it all. It's too sweet. It just tastes man kind of bummed out and
00:27:37
Speaker
I really wanted to like this. I did too. I thought it was going to be something that would have been in our wheelhouse for types of beers that we get into. So now we've got some friends that have drank this.
00:27:56
Speaker
Again, this is just me and Brandon We're so and this could be because it was last week So we've got some friends that drink this so Ron checked into this last year last January or no this January January 14th and gave it a four Such a good beer and Ron doesn't normally rate beers. He'll just check in beers. Yeah only rates things that he's like Oh, yeah that that's worth reading. Oh
00:28:21
Speaker
Yeah, I've got a hand, just like literally a couple of people, the lowest rating, you know, from friends that I've had that have had it, the lowest rating is 3.75. Yeah, so this is definitely just- And that was last year's edition. I don't have anybody that's done it this year.
00:28:37
Speaker
So, maybe it's this year's batch, maybe it's just us. It's just not a beer that we like. But again, they're a local brewery, so you tell us. If you guys have this or had had it, let us know. Like, are we missing something here? Is it just us right here, right now? Because, like I said, I've had illuminated beers before. They're very tasty, very good. I love their
00:29:00
Speaker
can artwork as well. And their little taproom is really cool. It's really rad. It's a fun bar type situation. And yeah, this is not a knock on Illuminated by any means. I am just, this beer is not for me. Yeah. I'm not even gonna rate it. I don't, cause then it's just like,
00:29:22
Speaker
It's pointless. It's pointless for me to rate this just because I just don't care for it. Yep. Agreed. I'm bummed. I will tell you this, next year, or if I see the other, because I did see two, I thought I saw two versions out this year. If I see the other one or I see it again, I will definitely try it because, like I said, I
00:29:43
Speaker
i like illuminated and it would be cool to maybe it's just this variant or it's just us tonight i don't know but brandon that leads us to our final beer of the night so when i saw this by the way i picked up all these beers at uh beer on the wall in park ridge today which i'll
00:30:02
Speaker
You talk it up, I'm going to go rinse our glasses. Fantastic. That would be great. One thing I was going to point out was that normally I've never been there on a Saturday evening, especially before a holiday to grab anything. This was crazy because there was a lot of breweries have their sections of where you can grab their beers.
00:30:23
Speaker
A lot of off color was gone. There was barely any revolution. There was barely any old Irving. And I felt very lucky to come across this one because the past few months I've seen random variants of the Henna series from more.
Tasting Notes: More Brewing's Henna Gingerbread
00:30:43
Speaker
And this one definitely popped out. This was the one, the very, this was the third beer that I grabbed when I was building the four pack.
00:30:50
Speaker
This screams Christmas. It's henna gingerbread and has gingerbread vanilla. It's an imperial stout 14% alcohol. This is why I saved it for the end because I figured It's a big beer It's got gingerbread You and I have had I don't know if we've I think we did a henna. Oh my god. This is corn Fucking oil. There you go. Is it black as your soul?
00:31:18
Speaker
This one, the Henna's have always been good. And if you've been to more for their parties and things like that, or just stopped in and tried the Henna's, Brandon and I, if I'm not mistaken, you still have two Henna's in your cellar over there. Likely. I think you have a birthday cake one. I do. I'm not going to lie. Because these are so good, we really need to have those. Yeah, agreed.
00:31:46
Speaker
Pouring this, it looks as thick and as dark as motor oil. Swirling it around. Ooh, man. The head on it has a nice deep dark brown. Makes me wanna go put it in my car and see if it will be in my car oil. I get gingerbread cookie right off the top for the aroma. Oh boy, did you see your sip? What do you think about this one? Sick boy.
00:32:15
Speaker
way better than the last. Oh, sorry. We still like you. Wow. There's a slight, I don't want to say it's like an oxidation. There's something that I'm kind of getting, but again, that could just be my palate right now. But everything else is coming through like, dude, it's like the perfect like thickness, like the mouth feels perfect on it. It's super smooth, carbonated perfectly.
00:32:45
Speaker
And then like those hints of like gingerbread cookie are definitely in there. And that is, that is pleasing. It's sweet. It is thick. There's a nice vanilla undertone. The only problem I have with this beer, the ginger comes off almost for me personally.
00:33:09
Speaker
it reminds me of ginger from ginger ale and not a gingerbread cookie see that's what it that's the thing that i'm getting it's more of i'm getting like the gingerbread spices that are typically in there but that one thing that like i can't put my finger on that's what it is it's like ginger yeah and
00:33:26
Speaker
It needs cookie. It needs cookie, some type of biscuity. Yeah, if you're going to call it a gingerbread, I mean, far and away, this is much more palatable, sorry, than the gingerbread. Would I not? Would I have, like, if this comes out again next year, I'll grab it again.
00:33:43
Speaker
And to have it with some gingerbread cookies. Yeah, like the ginger is just very potent for me. It's not a bad beer by any means. It is just, I feel like the ginger is a bit strong for me. Another reason why I can say that is because I've had ginger ale this week and I love ginger ale. I try not to drink soda as much as I can or try not to drink soda as much as I want. So I rarely have soda and I got a ginger ale this week.
00:34:13
Speaker
And the spice from ginger ale is very specific. But I think it's the ginger and the sweetness is what's drawing me to that. Now, again, just like any other beer, it just kind of burped a little bit.
00:34:26
Speaker
It's kind of like a gingerbread cookie. It's like I'm eating a cookie. I just wish the flavor of the beer while I was drinking it, there was like a biscuity, cookie type flavor because it's sweet, vanilla, ginger, and even like a roastiness, it's just kind of subtle. Two things. First one, it's funny that you said the thing about drinking ginger ale. I've switched my normal everything I drink to the Canada Dry Zero sugar. Fantastic. It's so good.
00:34:54
Speaker
And now you don't come down with a glass of ice. She's like, what are you doing? And I'm like, I'm going to drink some ginger ale. Because normally, there's times I'd come down at night. And if we weren't recording, or I was just in here playing video games, I'd sit here and drink a liter of Diet Coke. And then I wonder why I'm up till 2 in the morning. So I'm like, I'm going to drink. I'm drinking carbonated water. I'm just a tiny person, because I'm up till 1 or 2 as well. The second thing is? But I'm also playing Mortal Kombat 1 a lot. Yeah.
00:35:20
Speaker
The second thing is, I'm going to go grab some fresh-made gingerbread cookies. Interesting. I like that. And I'm going to talk through this, because I don't want to edit this out. Definitely not knocking this beer, or even the last beer. These two just aren't in my wheelhouse of what I was expecting.
00:35:40
Speaker
The illuminated one, I'm definitely looking forward to trying it again next year, because maybe it's just this peanut brittle one is not for me. A white stout is very tasty. As you know, we love Old Irving's Prost, which is a white stout as well. There's more, oh geez, I'm not gonna step over it. The henna gingerbread, I think it accomplishes what they're trying to do. There is a gingerbread cookie,
00:36:09
Speaker
like flavor to it because of the sweetness and vanilla and ginger. I just wish that there was a little bit more cookie in there and I feel like a biscuit malt would have would have helped this.
00:36:25
Speaker
Again, not a beer that I wouldn't try again, and Brandon and I are, you know, these are just our opinions, and all the other Henna, you know, variants are fantastic. I feel like this beer specifically is very good for, to share, because it's a 16 ounce can. It's a good beer to share between two people, especially around, like, Christmas. This is the best time to want to go ahead and
00:36:48
Speaker
and try this beer. Brandon has just come back down with a gingerbread cookie. He is walking in front of me. He is, he's gonna take a picture. I'm, I hope, I don't know where he's gonna post it. Maybe to his personal. I don't know, the wife told me to take a picture. Maybe a personal Instagram. Maybe it'll be for the molting hour. But I wanna try a piece of this gingerbread cookie. Now for what I've told my godson, Benjamin, did make these today. There's icing on this too, so that's where the villa is coming from.
00:37:20
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Oh, man. I love gingerbread cookies. So, point out a note that's very important. Come on. These are not ones that he touched. I mean, I'd be okay with that. No, there's literally a tray that were his cookies that when he was like pulling out the candies, he was eating them. Yeah, thanks for that. I appreciate it. Yeah, like gingerbread could like
00:37:46
Speaker
If this stout was supposed to be reminiscent of gingerbread, or gingerbread cookie, or gingerbread cake, or whatever, they nailed the sweetness, they nailed the vanilla, the ginger is just a little bit much. Yeah, and it's not even like it's the wrong ginger. It's just strong. And it's even like me taking a bite of the cookie with the sweetness, because there's frosting on top of this cookie,
00:38:14
Speaker
The only thing I get when I take a sip is the ginger. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, again, makes it better, but yeah, not a knock on more. It's just, it's not, again, just like the last one, maybe not my, my jam, but it's enough to be like.
00:38:27
Speaker
Would I buy it next year? Yeah, I would. I would because like, especially if it's like, Oh, I'm going to go to a bottle share of it's like me, you and somebody else or like even back up. Like I would drink, I would drink a couple more ounces of this. I like ginger. I do like ginger. So that's the thing. Like this beer tastes good. It's 14% to top it off. Um, well that's a dude I'd love.
00:38:49
Speaker
When I eat sushi, the first thing I eat is the ginger. Pickled ginger is delicious. I eat the shit out of ginger that way. And I love gingerbread. These cookies are really good. It's funny because she went looking for...
00:39:05
Speaker
like Betty Crocker's like pre-made mix because she didn't want to deal with it because she was going to make it with Benjamin. And it's quicker to just have that mix. But you ended up pulling up a recipe. I don't know. It may have been my mom's recipe, but like they're like super like they're soft. They're like the icing is really nice. Yeah. I think story. But but also like if you remove the icing, I bet these cookies are also still just very good. Apparently I was told I was corrected when I was bringing this down. This is a ginger girl.
00:39:34
Speaker
We fucked up. Damn it. Sorry, everybody. Gingerbread girl. It's a gingerbread person. No. Brandon, how many gingerbread women... No, no, no. How many gingerbread people are you giving this beer? Number one, you can base it on what they presented, just like we did the last one, or for all the beers, based on what they presented, and also just based on what you like about it.
00:40:01
Speaker
I'd love to give two. I'd love everything about the beer, except for the, and I even love the ginger. It's just too much ginger. So I'm like three six, three seven, because everything else is really well done. And we've also had other Hannah's before. Yeah. Yeah. I'm with you there. I might, man, this is going to sound shitty, but I'm like three two. It's just like, only because I really was super excited for gingerbread, you know?
00:40:31
Speaker
But again, I like ginger as well, and the stout sweetness of vanilla is very good. I'm just kind of bummed that it's not gingerbread, and it's just like ginger, vanilla, and sweet stout. Yeah, it makes me wonder like what the... My assumption is it was not intentional.
00:40:49
Speaker
Because it's very noticeable, like right off the bat. Yeah. I mean, it reminds me of ginger ale. And if I was just drinking it right away, like, you know, so it is, hey, try this, drink it right away, take a sip. And I would be like, oh, this is fantastic. And then kind of as I did that, like I stopped and I was like, oh, there's something going on. And you were like, you had already taken a sip and you're like the ginger. And I was like, oh, that's what that is. Like, that's the ginger.
00:41:14
Speaker
what was the same thing with the illuminated bear like i wasn't i wasn't purposely trying to make a face but you didn't even notice that well you didn't even seem like that makes sense because you didn't even seem like turned off by the aroma
00:41:29
Speaker
but when you took a sip, you and I both kind of made the same face. We was like, ah, it's just kind of not something that we're, we're feeling. Yeah. Like, and it, and it's weird because it's, it's hard to find a beer that I just don't like as a meaningless cookie or like, and again, it's not that like,
00:41:49
Speaker
I would probably enjoy, again, we know people that checked us in last year and really enjoyed it. So it makes me question if something changed. Maybe they had it undrafted, it was different. I'm also sure that if some of our friends, even if it's Dan or Clark or whoever, if they had this Henna,
00:42:09
Speaker
they might have thoroughly enjoyed this. Again, just based on our own opinions. What is it? Is it a henna gingerbread? Yeah, henna gingerbread. A henna gingerbread. A henna gingerbread. Um, again, I would, uh, we've had, I have no friends that have checked into it. Oh, what's a regular check-in on, um, Santa four. Yeah. See, I get that. It's just like when we're talking about bourbon county this year, you and I,
00:42:39
Speaker
really love banana's foster. There are people who I've seen was like, banana's foster, this tastes like banana runt. Oh yeah, what the hell are you talking about? So, you know, taste is subjective. This is just how we're feeling tonight. For sure, go ahead and try all these beers. I would say that the snow boots was my favorite.
00:43:04
Speaker
Samo, second, the hen and gingerbread, third, and the war on Christmas, I'm, I guess that's fourth. I feel like you might be the same way. Oh yeah, 100%. In fact, like the brown ale.
00:43:19
Speaker
As a brown ale might be number one for me, but snow boots. I thought it was clever for the winter IP. Yeah No, and I I love that idea and I mean I don't have anything to like cryogenically freeze stuff, but you should get something But I do I would love to experience like even if I ever do like something with fresh hops Freezing them and seeing if that does something. I'd be interesting. Yeah, then dry them
00:43:47
Speaker
Then crush my new powder. And then snort them. That's what I was going to say. You took my Christmas wish away. Snortable, snortable hops.
Holiday Wishes and Next Episode Preview
00:43:57
Speaker
Oh, good. Now I've got the intro to the episode. So there it is, everybody. That's our Christmas episode. We hope you're having a nice Christmas or whatever holiday that you are celebrating. Monday. Yeah, today, which is lame because I have to go to work Tuesday. Brandon, are you off on Tuesday? I'm off all week. God bless America. I spent too many vacation days earlier this year. Next year, I'm out. Thanks.
00:44:25
Speaker
Yeah, but everybody I hope you have a nice Christmas and if you have a chance to try these beers Go out and try them and let us know what you think Obviously, we're this is an episode where we're very torn. Yeah ears. So Maybe it's us tonight. We don't know. We'd like to know it first two are great Oh, yeah. No, I mean again, the henna wasn't bad either. I just that war on Christmas was not yeah my jam. Oh
00:44:50
Speaker
Yeah. Brandon, Merry Christmas, and I love you. Merry Christmas, man. Love you, too. We'll see you everybody next week for the multis, which Clark. Insert applause. Clark and Dan are probably not a part of, but going to have some recordings of them because they have their top years of the year.
00:45:10
Speaker
We'll see what happens next year. It's probably more me and Brandon and bringing Matthew back in. But when Clark and Dan can make time, they will. So we'll see you guys next week. Merry Christmas. Happy Hanukkah. Happy Kwanzaa. Happy Festivus. Whatever you celebrate. We just hope you are having a great time with your friends and family. Bye.
00:45:36
Speaker
This has been The Malting Hour. Be sure to follow us on all social media by searching The Malting Hour and at themaltinghour.com. You can also follow us individually on social media. Brandi can be found on Instagram as bmdub81, on Twitter, bdub81, and on Untapp as bdubdrinksbeer. Tony can be found on Instagram and Untapp under Ace of Hope Chicago. On Twitter, The Ace of Hope Chicago. Clark can be found as Clarkowski on all three.
00:46:04
Speaker
Dan can be found on Instagram as hip underscore underscore hops and hip hops on YouTube. Be sure to subscribe, like, and rate the show on your preferred podcast listening platform. Until next time, cheers from all of us at The Malting Hour.