OT: Whatcha Drinkin' II: Another Round!

[Havoq]

Is it actually any good?

Drinking a cheap french red right now. Pretty bland, but for a $7 wine, far from terrible.

Haven't actually opened it yet - plan on aging it a few years. Also need to pick up Ward's "Unmask", as I would like to have both. But once I do, I will be sure to post a review.

 

[Roboturner913]

Drank a 30-can case of High Life over a two-day span this weekend, mostly while fishing. I've still got the farts.

 

[StormCast]

Drank a 30-can case of High Life over a two-day span this weekend, mostly while fishing. I've still got the farts.

I'm assuming you were fishing for crappie. High Life would be the perfect match.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

Haven't actually opened it yet - plan on aging it a few years. Also need to pick up Ward's "Unmask", as I would like to have both. But once I do, I will be sure to post a review.

Are they "age worthy"? Unless they have some good fruit and a decent amount of tannin, aging won't help the flavor and may even hurt it (although I suspect a couple years won't have much impact). I have a few bottles in my cabinet that are now over 20 years old that I save for special occasions, and am almost afraid to open them. So far, I haven't had a stinker, but it's bound to happen.

As far as cheap red wines go that are pretty decent, Australian shiraz/shiraz cab blends, cabs from Chile are some of the best values that I've found. Of course, everybody has different tastes but I find they aren't bland and have decent flavor.

 

[Roboturner913]

I'm assuming you were fishing for crappie. High Life would be the perfect match.

If I'm in a situation where I must drink cheap swill (high volume drinking or no selection, which was the case here) I usually get High Life. At least it's got a taste to it. Budweiser just tastes like fizzy water, Coors original is headed that way, and Michelob's plain lager is damn near extinct. I will not even look at Old Milwaukee or Busch at this point.

 

[Anton Dubinchuk]

yuengling or pbr if you want cheap

 

[StormCast]

yuengling or pbr if you want cheap

Thought it wasn't in the form of a question, you are correct and control the board.

 

[Carolinas Identity*]

he's wrong tho

they are not *cheap*

they are *inexpensive*

 

[the halleJOKEL]

yuengling, pbr, high life

the holy trinity

 

[Anton Dubinchuk]

Thought it wasn't in the form of a question, you are correct and control the board.

swords for 400

 

[Roboturner913]

Yeungling is fantastic actually, but not available to me anymore. I dream of that stuff.

 

[StormCast]

Yeungling is fantastic actually, but not available to me anymore. I dream of that stuff.

Not available? Curious minds want to know why?

 

[Discipline Daddy]

Can't stand Yuengling. Bleh.

A couple friends and I did a blind taste testing of 27 pumpkin beers. One of us made the pours and the other two didn't know what we were drinking. We ranked beers on a 0-5 scale for a number of qualities (such as maltiness, alcohol bite, floral qualities, etc) as well as on how much we enjoyed each one. I ranked em and did a writeup with a taste graph for each. Each rating is averaged for the 3 of us.

Check it at http://www.pumpkinbeerranking.blogspot.com

I'm Philip on the blog, and I did the writeups compiled from our tasting notes.

 

[DaveG]

No Dogfish Head Punk'n?

 

[the halleJOKEL]

i like gourd rocker a lot actually. i dont recall it being super vanilla-y at all when i had it, but i did have it draft in 2014 and not from a bottle so maybe that would make a difference.

harvest time is also super hit or miss for me. i can almost never get through a full 6 pack of it by myself over a period of months. sometimes it tastes amazing, sometimes it tastes like dust.

 

[Discipline Daddy]

We've all had Dogfish Head's Punkin, but it wasn't part of the lineup this go round. We tried to do as many NC beers as we could find and then pick a handful of other well known breweries nationally. I can safely say that Punk'n would've easily made our top 10 had we judged it. I rated it a 4 out of 5 stars on Untapp'd last time I had it in November 2014.

Yeah, Harvest Time is hit or miss. But when it's on, it's on.

Does Gizmo do a pumpkin beer?

 

[DaveG]

Nope, that we don't. We might do a cask of something in the future but nothing in the pipeline right now as far as I know as far as seasonals go. I know when we do one it's going to be a massive allspice, etc. hit too because we want it to go full on pumpkin pie if we do it. Probably use the smoked porter for the base.

 

[Havoq]

Are they "age worthy"? Unless they have some good fruit and a decent amount of tannin, aging won't help the flavor and may even hurt it (although I suspect a couple years won't have much impact). I have a few bottles in my cabinet that are now over 20 years old that I save for special occasions, and am almost afraid to open them. So far, I haven't had a stinker, but it's bound to happen.

As far as cheap red wines go that are pretty decent, Australian shiraz/shiraz cab blends, cabs from Chile are some of the best values that I've found. Of course, everybody has different tastes but I find they aren't bland and have decent flavor.

Honestly I am not much of a wine guy (have a pretty solid bourbon collection), but here is the exert from the site on the bottle:

"This year we made the Cross Check as powerful as its name. This dark purple Bordeaux style blend is two-thirds Cabernet Sauvignon and one third Merlot. The nose is dark with black cherry, violets and dusty cocoa. Some white pepper and gunflint mineralogy is also apparent. The palate is lush due to the Merlot and has more scorched earth and gravel with small amounts of blueberry pie. The wine has firm chalky tannins and bright acid and should age nicely over the next 6-7 years "

So we will see

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

Honestly I am not much of a wine guy (have a pretty solid bourbon collection), but here is the exert from the site on the bottle:

"This year we made the Cross Check as powerful as its name. This dark purple Bordeaux style blend is two-thirds Cabernet Sauvignon and one third Merlot. The nose is dark with black cherry, violets and dusty cocoa. Some white pepper and gunflint mineralogy is also apparent. The palate is lush due to the Merlot and has more scorched earth and gravel with small amounts of blueberry pie. The wine has firm chalky tannins and bright acid and should age nicely over the next 6-7 years "

So we will see

Sounds like it should do fine then. Have fun and good luck. Keep it in a spot that doesn't get too hot or too cold and doesn't have rapid temperature changes and it should be fine.

On a side note, I always get a kick out of the descriptions that wine makers/marketers use when describing wines. "gunflint mineralogy"? "scorched earth and gravel"? That said, I do get that it's many times hard to describe a taste, but some of them are pretty funny.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

Speaking of wines, here's what I'm cracking open Friday. Bought a few of these in 1997 and have been storing them ever since. Drank 1 bottle a couple years back, but waiting for the right occasion to drink another one. Also, it's too strong to drink that much so need to share it with a few people. Anxiously waiting to see how it tastes.

 

[Surrounded By Ahos]

I'll sometimes check out BeerAdvocate when looking at what to buy, and man are some of the reviews hilarious.

Here's a quote of a beer I recently tried:

Taste - One of the easiest IPA tastes I've come across in my life. Not a palette-wrecker when it comes to the hop character, but silky, almost buttery smooth, as it makes its pine-forward hop character known. Finishes with a decadent and subtle grace, almost a wink, as it exits your mouth.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

I'll sometimes check out BeerAdvocate when looking at what to buy, and man are some of the reviews hilarious.

Here's a quote of a beer I recently tried:

That's great. Some of the beer reviews are almost as fun to read as the wine ones. Last time I opened one of the Vintage Ports I just posted above, my wife's cousin's comment after her first sip was. "OMG, this is like sex on the tongue". Probably not original, but first and only time I had heard it.

 

[Roboturner913]

Not available? Curious minds want to know why?

I'm in southern Indiana. Closest they distribute is Ohio and Tennessee.

gunflint mineralogy is also apparent

Can confirm, it's exactly like sticking the business end of an an 1850's musket right into your mouth.

 

[Finnish Jerk Train]

Can confirm, it's exactly like sticking the business end of an an 1850's musket right into your mouth.

Hey man, you OK there?

Edit: On a related note, I have experienced that metallic taste one time, but with a beer. In college, I ate some canned salmon and immediately followed it up with a pale ale (can't remember which one, but this would have been '08-'09, so one of the longer-standing breweries). That was not a good idea. The only worse experiences I've had with craft beer were both from Sam Adams. I like most of their stuff well enough, but their cranberry seasonal was WAY too sweet and their scotch ale was like drinking the ashes out of a fireplace.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

My worst experience was with Aviators "Frost Nipper" a number of years ago. The smoke "flavor" was just way too overpowering and I thought it just ruined the beer. I've been told by friends that they've since toned down the smoke and it's much better now, but I'm not inclined to even try it.