Tag: Old Ale
Founders Brewing Co. Old Curmudgeon
Lately, I’ve been been mulling over the phenomena that Founders Brewing Company’s beers have become. Myself, I only really discovered their wares last year, in the fall of 2008. That was when I first tried their Breakfast Stout, and I never really looked back. Since then I’ve tried most any beer from them that I’ve found, worked hard to get my hands on a 4-pack of the Kentucky Breakfast Stout, and am already looking forward to trying some of their newer beers at the upcoming Extreme Beer Fest.
But what’s really caught my attention has been the overwhelming response to their newest beer, Nemesis, a wheat wine aged in bourbon barrels for 9 months. I first saw this announced a couple of weeks ago, although rumors about it have been bouncing about for a while now. Since the announcement of its imminent release, the hype-driven beer culture has gone into full-swing, and more forum posts, news items, etc. have been posted about this beer than I would have imagined, despite it not even being released yet.
I don’t mean to sound curmudgeonly (an awful joke, I know). I’d love the chance to try Nemesis once it’s been released. Whether I’ll be able to, given the high-demand it’s sure to be in, is anyone’s guess.
But here’s the thing, I’m not sure that I’m really so amped to take part in the running around to try and find some of this beer in a shop. I’m sure the beer will be great, perhaps even mind-blowingly incredible. But I think there are three reasons my hesitance:
- My fridge is full of so many good beers right now, some that we still haven’t gotten to from our trip out West, and I’m finding it hard to get super-excited about chasing down something else new.
- Even when I do go to the shop nowadays, there is such a plethora of exciting beers I haven’t tried, and none involve me running around and calling shops like a nut-case.
- Founders themselves are to blame! Their beers are all so good, and some are outright incredible, and while they may not all be barrel-aged wheat wines, they’re super tasty, and much easier to find.
Focusing on reason #3, we can take this bottle of Old Curmudgeon as perfect evidence. Here is a beer that hasn’t been too hard to find hereabouts, and comes in fair-priced 4-packs, as with most of Founders beers. I picked up a 4-pack of it while looking for American-brewed examples of Old Ales, and was surprised to find out when I got it home that it’s also aged in bourbon barrels. Given my unending appreciation for beers aged in bourbon barrels, this was a real coup.
Old Curmudgeon is one of Founders’ seasonal beers, released in late fall/early winter each year. It’s brewed to a final ABV of 9.8% with 50 IBUs alongside. Interestingly, it’s brewed using molasses, in addition to a pretty big malt bill.
A vigorous pour yields a thin head that quickly dissipates, leaving little trace on top of the beer. The color is amber-orange, hazy and nearly opaque. It’s mesmerizing to watch just how slowly the bubbles rise to the surface, like they have to force their way up through the beer. The nose is rich and heady, with notes of caramel, mesquite honey, bourbon, and deep malty flavors. The flavors on the palate are similar, bringing caramel, viscous, syrupy, bready malt, vanilla, bourbon, and smoky honey, with the addition of a subtle hop flavor and bitterness. Very thick and velvety texture, with just a prickling carbonation. The finish has flavors of bready malt, caramel, and bourbon, with no hop flavor but a lingering hop bitterness. Very long, finish punctuated with flavors of bourbon-soaked raisins.
Wow, this is a rich, decadent, dessert-in-a-glass kind of beer. Very enjoyable, but one glass really did it for me. All in all, the flavors just avoided being cloying, instead really leaving your palate coated with layers of rich, warm, sugars. Definitely give it a try, as long as you’re a big fan of bourbon barrel-aged beers.
*Note: despite my detailed explanation of why I won’t be running around trying to find a 4-pack of Nemesis when it comes out, I wouldn’t even be remotely surprised to find myself doing that. In fact, I most likely am guaranteed to do just that, simply because I wrote this post explaining why I won’t…
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Great Divide Brewing Co. Hibernation Ale
It’s that time of year when breweries left and right come out with their winter beers. Snow lies somewhere just around the corner up ahead, the leaves have nearly all fallen off of the trees, and if you haven’t already then you’re seriously considering turning the heat on in your house.
Really, the various winter beers hitting the shelves are a motley crew. There are barleywines, doppelbocks, imperial stouts, spiced beers, you name it. Any style is fair game when it comes to winter beers. But recently my attention has been truly caught up by old ales, a much less common winter brew here in the States.
It all began with Founders’ Old Curmudgeon, their old ale -style beer aged in bourbon barrels. I’m a bit of a sucker for bourbon-barreled beers, and quickly fell in love with the insouciant combination of flavors Old Curmudgeon presented: sweet, bready malt, brandy-soaked fruits, and vanilla, caramel, and a hint of whiskey from the barrel-aging.
But old ales aren’t all that easy to find, and I haven’t been very motivated to do much searching lately, and so it wasn’t until we were heading over to some friends house to help them move that I ended up trying another old ale (and another American version of the style). This time it was the 6-pack of Great Divide’s Hibernation Ale, their seasonal old ale released each fall. That night, after several hours of loading furniture, boxes, and bikes into a giant U-Haul, we all opened up a bottle of Hibernation Ale and thoroughly enjoyed the soothing warmth that it brought back to our tired bodies.
About a week later, I had the chance to try a second bottle of Hibernation Ale, at a moment when I could pay a bit more attention to it. It once again totally hit the spot, and this time I was able to pick up more of the flavors in the glass. I came away pretty excited by what a great, remarkably enjoyable beer this was.
Hibernation Ale was first brewed by Great Divide in 1995, and since then has been one of their consistent seasonal beers. Old Ales originated in the UK and were one of the typical winter offerings from breweries (alongside barleywines). They gained the name Old Ale because they were often left to age for several months before being served, in the process acquiring a darker color and sweeter, nuttier flavors from oxidation. Hibernation Ale is brewed each year in July and aged until October before being released in November. It rolls in at 8.1%, on the higher side of ABV for most old ales that I’ve dug up info about.
The beer pours a ruddy, amber brown, with dark red highlights. A thick off-white head forms and slowly dissipates to a thin film, leaving a trace of lacing. The nose is rich with rummy notes and deep, malty tones, with a hint of smoke and a trace of hops floating around in the background. The palate is deliciously smooth, viscous, and mouth-coating. Flavors of brown sugar, burnt caramel, bran, and molasses rise to the top amidst lots of toasted, sweet, chocolatey malt flavors. I picked up some hop prickliness early on, but as the beer warmed this disappeared. The finish offers flavors of rum, brown sugar, and coffee that lead to a trace of lingering hop bitterness.
This is without a doubt one of the nicest, most enjoyably warming beers I’ve had in a while. The flavors all work together perfectly, offering loads of flavor without overwhelming your palate. Most importantly, it really, really just hits the spot on a cool, November/December evening as you appreciate the austere simplicity that is Fall in New England.
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