Last month I visited heaven on earth. It was during a recent vacation, part of which was a day-trip up to Portland, Maine. I’d always wanted to stop at Allagash Brewing, and so we made this one of the first stops of the trip.

All things told, Allagash is a fairly small brewery. They’re located in an unassuming building in a small industrial park, and produce ~4,000 barrels per year, 80% of which is their flagship beer, Allagash White. The remaining 20% is made up of a whole host of beers that includes a mix of year-round, seasonal, and one-off brews. They brew only Belgian-style beers, including the year-round Dubbel, Tripel, Four (a quad), and Black (Belgian imperial stout), seasonals such as Victoria Ale, Victor Ale, and Hugh Malone, and such inventive one-offs as Fluxus (a unique recipe each year), Confluence (fermented with Brettanomyces), Interlude (also uses Brettanomyces and is aged in red wine barrels), and Vagabond and Gargamel (beers fermented 100% with wild yeasts and fresh fruit). They’ve even produced a 100% spontaneously fermented beer, produced a dedicated building they built just to ferment this beer.

Curieux is part of their barrel-aged series that also includes Odyssey, although the similarities between the two stop there. Odyssey is a dark, high-alcohol wheat beer, a portion of which is aged in stainless steel and the other portion in medium-toasted American oak barrels. Curieux on the other hand is the result of taking their Tripel and aging it in Jim Beam bourbon barrels for 8 weeks before bottling. The barrel-aging imparts a profound change on the beer, and if you ever have the chance to try the Tripel and Curieux side-by-side, it’d be well worth it – the comparison is pretty exciting.

But these aren’t the only beers that Allagash ages in barrels. Several others are aged in barrels, not to mention a whole collection of barrel-aging experiments that they have going on at any one point in time. Thus how we ended up visiting heaven on earth.

Specifically, this was Allagash’s barrel room. Or rather, their barrel rooms. Since they are barrel-aging beers that use wild yeasts at the same time that they’re barrel-aging beers not brewed with these yeasts (such as Curieux), they have to avoid cross-contamination by separating the different groups of barrels into different rooms.

One room houses all of the non wild-yeast beers aging in bourbon, wine, or toasted barrels. While we were there this included many barrels of Curieux, Odyssey, and others – I honestly don’t remember them all. One I do remember though, were several bourbon barrels filled with Allagash Black*. I nearly fainted when I saw those. I desperately was hoping someone would come by with a wine thief and offer to pull a sample for us. Holy cow, that would have been amazing!

Anyhow, the other room full of barrels was the one housing all of their wild-yeast beers. There were a lot of barrels in this room, a number of which we’d never heard of and of which there were only a couple of barrels at best. Needless to say, these are not beers that will be bottled, but will only show up at special events. Keep your ears peeled!

The coolest part (ok, besides seeing all of those beers aging in bourbon-barrels!) was seeing how they treated the two sets of barrels. Each room was maintained at a different temperature, with the wild-yeast room being about 15-20 degrees cooler than the other room. I’m sure there are myriad reasons for this, among which are the much shorter amount of time that beers spend in the non-wild-yeast room. Several of the beers in the wild-yeast room had just begun their aging, having been there for a year or less, while others had been there long as two years or more.

On to Curieux! This beer uses Allagash’s house Belgian yeast strain, and is brewed to an original gravity of 1.080. This particular bottle was packaged in March 2010 from a batch that resulted in 789 cases. The final ABV is 11% (some of which was imparted by the bourbon barrel).

Tasting Notes

In the glass, Curieux is a slightly hazy, heather-gold with a tightly beaded pillowy white head 2-fingers tall. The nose has notes of sugared lemons, coconut, lavender, a faint whiskey note, and a hint of Belgian phenolics (think clove, cardamom, grains of paradise, and citrus). The palate is very effervescent, with plenty of carbonation blending nicely with the creamy, velvety mouthfeel. It’s here that your really get the full blast of the bourbon barrel-aging, as flavors of almonds, toasted coconut, vanilla, citrus, sweet malt, and just a hint of bourbon flavor float across your palate. The long, lingering finish leaves you wanting for more, with notes of lemon gumdrops, vanilla, caramelized crust of bread dough, and a whiff of wheated bourbon.

The nose on this beer is mesmerizing, and it does a fabulous job of setting you off on the mesmerizing journey that this beer is. I find the Tripel itself to be an okay beer, but it doesn’t wow me. But man, put it into a bourbon barrel and it turns into a heavenly elixir.

I have the bad habit of overlooking Allagash, simply for the (bad reason) that they’re right here in my background. But on the occasions when I get the chance to try some of their more off-the-beaten-path offerings such as this, I’m consistently amazed at how good the beers are.

*By the way, I recently got the chance to try the bourbon-barrel-aged Allagash Black at American Craft, and it was, as I’d hoped (and surmised), awesome!

Great Divide introduced Colette this past spring as one of a trio of beers that the company they re-released in new packaging (alongside Hoss and Claymore Scotch Ale). Colette had been previously released as Great Divide Saison in the spring of 2009, available then only in 22-ounce bottles. This time around, along with the renaming would also come new packaging, 6-packs as opposed to single 22-ounce bottles.

Saisons and farmhouse ales are one of the beer styles that has really risen to prominence in the past couple of years, as evidenced by the increasing number of American brewers producing some variation on the style. And herein lies the real beauty of this style, that it lends itself to myriad interpretations. Just take a look at two of the more prominent examples emerging from Belgium. Saison Dupont is generally considered the paragon of the farmhouse ale style, and it’s a fabulous beer. At once spicy, malty, refreshing, with layers of flavor and a notable yet restrained hoppiness. Then there are versions from Brasserie Fantome, perhaps the most iconoclastic of all brewers of this style. Their range of saison-inspired beers are usually inflected with some measure of brettanomyces, lending each beer an earthy character that is more pronounced in some versions than others. The Fantome Saison is very enjoyable, flavorful, and refreshing, while the seasonal saisons (“Ete”, “Hiver”, etc.) tend to have a more noticeable brett character, lending them a range of inspiring and challenging flavors found in few other beers.

American brewers’ versions are no less unique relative to one another. Ommegang’s Hennepin is fairly clean and refreshing, while Smuttynose’s  Farmhouse Ale has more spice character. Pretty Things’ Jack d’Or is quite hop-forward, and Jolly Pumpkin produces the masterful, brett-influenced Bam Biere, while Goose Island ages their saison-styled beer Sofie in Chardonnay barrels. The result: you could head down to your local bottle shop, pick up a half-dozen bottles of Belgian and American farmhouse ales, and end up tasting six beers that had a clear familial relationship, but were utterly distinct at the same time.

Great Divide brews Colette using malted barley, wheat, rice and a blend of four different yeast strains. Fermentation takes place at high temperatures (saison yeasts tend to produce the bulk of their unique flavors at temperatures in the high 70’s and mid 80’s, much higher than most brewing yeasts like to operate), and the beer finishes quite dry, resulting in a final ABV of 7.3%.

Tasting Notes

Colette pours a pale, slightly hazy lemon-gold with a huge meringue-like  head that drops very slowly, supported by a wealth of effervescent carbonation seething up through the beer. The nose has spicy belgian phenolics of cloves and grains of paradise, alongside lemon peel, leafy hops, wheat and grains. The palate is softly textured with effervescent carbonation. The range of flavors opens up with sweet malt, balanced by citrusy lemon and orange, followed by herbal leafy hops and clove and cardamom spices. Rounded sweet flavors make up a persistent, medium-length finish.

This is a lovely, refreshing beer that is perfect for a summer day spent outside, preferably while grilling. It’s refreshing and bright, good for both sipping slowly or diving right into and enjoying. I’m really falling in love with Belgian beers this summer. They’re proving to be so enjoyable and versatile, working well on both the days of striking heat or cooler rain!

Sofie was introduced by Goose Island Brewing last year as the newest member of a series of special edition Belgian-style beers, joining Matilda, Pere Jacques, Juliet, and Fleur. Each beer in the lineup is either Belgian-inspired or brewed to (however loosely) resemble a specific Belgian-style of beer. Pere Jacques is an abbey ale similar to a Belgian dubbel, Matilda is similar to a Flanders red, albeit more sweet than tart. Sofie lies somewhere between a tripel and a saison, although the method they use to produce it is distinctly American in its approach.

The beer itself starts fairly simply, brewed with a blend of pilsner and wheat malts and Amarillo hops. But it’s at this point that things begin to get interesting. The yeast used includes some brettanomyces, and 20% of the beer is aged in Chardonnay wine barrels. They add orange zest from 20 pounds of oranges to the barrels as well. The combination of the brett, Chardonnay barrels, and orange zest ends up playing a significant role in the finished flavors of this beer.

All of the beers that I’ve tasted from this series have been excellent, most notably Sofie and Matilda, both of which I’ve enjoyed on a couple of occasions. Sofie particularly intrigues me on account of Goose Island using brettanomyces to brew it. It’s so interesting to me how much more commonplace it is for American brewers to use wild yeasts these days. Even just four years ago, when I first became especially interested in beers, and fascinated by Belgian lambics, it was very unusual for American brewers to use wild yeasts. Today, along with the brewers who really pioneered the use of wild yeasts, such as Lost Abbey/Tomme Arthur and Russian River Brewing, loads of other brewers have taken on the challenge of incorporating these beers into their brewing systems. What’s most exciting is the range of brewers doing so, running the gamut from rather large breweries such as Goose Island, to smaller, local breweries such as Cambridge Brewing Company in Cambridge, Mass., or White Birch Brewing in Hooksett, NH. These last two breweries are absolutely stellar by the way, and you simply must try their beers if you ever have the chance. Top-notch, locally brewed, creative…very inspiring breweries.

Tasting Notes

Sofie pours pale gold, with lots of carbonation seething up out of the glass, and a billowy white head that settles into a thin layer with a fair amount of lacing. The nose has soft belgian phenolics of sweet, subtle spices, alongside notes of lemon, wheat, and green grapes. Effervescent carbonation supports a soft, lightly textured body. Flavors include citrusy and herbal hop bitterness, lemon-lime sorbet, orange peel, bready malt, and a hint of clove-like spiciness. The wine barrel aging comes through in a white-wine-like dryness that runs like an undercurrent throughout the beer. On the finish, sweet maltiness gives way to wine grapiness followed by the sweet tartness of Meyer lemons.

This beer is perfectly suited to a gently warm summer day. The texture and flavors combine to lend the beer a wonderfully refreshing character, and the 6.5% alcohol is almost unnoticeable as a result. This is a beer I’d happily choose to a accompany dinner on a summer evening.

Several years ago I spent part of a summer studying in Mainz, Germany. All in all, an incredible experience. It was the first significant amount of time that I spent outside of the US, and what better place than Mainz, a university town with a mix of historical old buildings and city center, and more modern, contemporary architecture around the university itself.

One of my most distinct memories is of the beer gardens along the Rhine River. Mainz is located in central-western Germany, and the Rhine runs right along its eastern boundary. I quite clearly remember evenings spent sitting at the long picnic tables in these beer gardens, listening to the conversation and trying desperately to figure out what the heck people were saying. I mean, let’s face it, my German wasn’t the greatest, and drinking beer didn’t really help. Although, I definitely remember feeling more fluent after a couple glasses.

The beer left its impression too. Each beer garden offered just two or three styles, with a lager and a hefeweizen being the most common offerings. I was already a fan of wheat beers, and it was during this time in Mainz that I really came to appreciate hefeweizens as sterling summer beers.

German brewing is governed, of course, by the Reinheitsgebot – the German beery purity law stipulating that only four ingredients can be used for brewing: malt, hops, water, and yeast. From this arises the beauty of hefeweizens. Using only these four ingredients, brewers in Germany have produced a style of beer that offers a wealth of aromas and flavors in the glass. Classic traits of German hefeweizens are their cloudy appearance (due to the amount of wheat used and the yeast that remains in suspension), the spicy nose, and the rich, sweet, and spicy flavors. That nearly all of these flavors are derived from the yeast alone is just remarkable.

American brewers have generally taken a different approach to brewing wheat beers, producing beers that on the whole are much cleaner and brighter than Germany’s hefeweizens. Very few American breweries have produced a German-style hefeweizen as a year-round beer, and so it was a pretty big surprise when Sierra Nevada announced that the newest addition to their lineup of year-round beers was going to be a classic, German-style hefeweizen.

Before rolling out Kellerweis Sierra Nevada conducted a wealth of research into how to brew a style of beer that their brewery really wasn’t outfitted for. In particular, they had to introduce a whole new strain of yeast, and figure out how best to ferment a hefeweizen using their existing facilities. As it turns out, the same open fermenters that they use to produce their Bigfoot barleywine each year were perfect for fermenting a hefeweizen, a style whose yeast strain actually prefers open fermenters in order to fully develop the range of aromas that the beer is so well known for.

With the yeast and fermenting process in place, Sierra Nevada was ready to unveil Kellerweis, and in spring of 2009 the new beer hit the shelves. The reception since then has been very positive, and today the only thing preventing Kellerweis from being readily available is the limited production capacity on account of the small number of open fermenters they have.

Tasting Notes

Sierra Nevada uses a blend of pale, wheat, and munich malts to arrive at an original gravity of 1.052, and Sterling and Perle hops to reach 15 IBUs. The beer finishes at 4.8%.

Kellerweis pours a hazy, golden yellow, with 2-fingers worth of fluffy, white head. The nose has strong notes of clove, grains of paradise, lemon, and just a hint of leafy green, noble hops. The palate bursts with effervescent carbonation and sweet flavors of bready malt, yeast, citrus, honey, and spices. The beer finishes off with notes of honey and malt. This beer is a clear case of beauty in simplicity.

This is an excellent, classically styled hefeweizen, and is right up there with the best examples I’ve tasted, either in bottles here or on-tap abroad. The bottom line is, if you’re a fan of hefeweizens then this is a must-try beer for you. Sierra Nevada has done a great job of recreating this style.

Full Sail Brewing Company, located in Hood River, Oregon, is one of the breweries that I’ve looked forward to visiting during both of our trips to Portland in recent years. Hood River itself is supposed to be a cool town to visit, and Mount Hood has always been a destination of ours. Yet, despite Mount Hood looming on the horizon from almost anywhere in Portland, beckoning us to come and check it out, we’ve never made it that far east of Portland. Thus, we’ve yet to check out either the mountain or the town, and have not yet visited Full Sail at their home base.

We were fortunate to stop by their Portland tasting room during our last visit. This is definitely not the same as visiting them in Hood River, but it was still pretty cool to see so many of their beers on tap in one place. Several of them were rarities or one-offs, and so we enjoyed spending a couple of hours resting our feet and trying some great beers. Later on during the trip (in Fort Collins, no less), I was amped to stumble upon a stash of bottles of their Black Gold Imperial Stout, a beer I had really been hoping to lay my hands on.

The imperial stout that becomes Black Gold is brewed each winter, and then released the following winter after aging in bourbon barrels for many months. In this case, the beer was brewed in February 2008, and spent 10 months in barrels before being released. The brewery uses roughly 60 barrels, which works out to somewhere between 3200-3600 gallons of Black Gold (based on a bourbon barrel typically holding between 53 and 60 gallons). Not a bad haul, but fairly limited all the same. The beer is bottled at 10.5% with 65 IBUs.

What’s interesting is that they use barrels from a variety of different distilleries. In most cases, this is because they’re buying their barrels from a barrel-distributor, who themselves are collecting barrels from a number of distilleries. In contrast, there are some breweries who only buy barrels from specific distilleries. For instance, when we visited Allagash Brewing recently, all of their bourbon barrels are from Heaven Hill, makers of Jim Beam. At the release event for the most recent version of Black Gold, held this past February, they offered a horizontal tasting featuring pours from various different barrels, including Maker’s Mark and Four Roses bourbon, and Stranahan’s Colorado Whiskey. Alongside this was offered a blend of the various barrels (representative of what the finished, blended beer would be like). You can read an interesting report about the event here.

Tasting Notes

Black Gold pours nice and thick, with 2-fingers of tan head that forms after a steady pour and drops slowly. The color is pitch black with ruby highlights at the rim. The nose has rich, alluring notes of bourbon, vanilla, oak, and blackstrap molasses. All in all, the nose is amazing, and the palate fulfills the promise it implies and more. The texture is soft and mouth-coating with a layer of prickly carbonation. Loads of rich dark maltiness form the base on top of which the other flavors play out: resiny oakiness, malted milk chocolate, vanilla, a hint of coffee, and mouthwateringly creamy whiskey flavor. The long, lingering finish is richly flavored with notes of toffee, caramel, and bourbon. Throughout, the whiskey element plays a big role, equal parts sweet caramel and vanilla, and heady whiskey flavors.

Quite simply, this beer is stunning. I’m a complete idiot for only picking up 1 bottle. What was I thinking?!

If you haven’t tasted this beer before, enjoy bourbon barrel-aged imperial stouts, and are in a region Full Sail distributes to, then rush out and find two bottles of this beer. Open one, savor it, enjoy it, and rest comfortable in the knowledge that you’ll be able to experience the amazing-ness that is this beer one more time.

Who knows if I’ll get to taste this beer again in the future, but let’s all cross our fingers and hope so.

Wow.