The Clue Meter

Went to a beer tasting last week at 99 Bottles, a local store that specializes in... beer. (Fancy that!) Oh, they dabble in hard cider and lately in mead, too, but beer is The Thing.

They do tastings more-or-less weekly, depending. Usually a single brew, but occasionally they do several beers from a single brewery, or a "style tasting."

I'm sure it is no accident that they did a stout tasting the week before Saint Patrick's Day. (I meant to post this before now, but I've been busy and/or distracted. See my comments last month about starting a blog while the house is being remodeled. Done today!)

Stouts tasted:

• Left Hand Brewing's Milk Stout
• Samuel Smith Old Brewery's Celebrated Oatmeal Stout
• Allagash Brewing's Allagash Black
• Mad River Brewing's Steelhead Extra Stout
• The Porterhouse Brewing Company's Wrasslers XXXX
• and Harvey & Son's A Le Coq's Imperial Extra Double Stout

Here's some stuff from the tasting notes:

• At one time porter and stout were synonyms. The term "stout" was first used to describe a "strong" beer in the late 16th Century; in 1820 or so it came to be used to describe a "high alcohol" porter.
• "Milk Stouts" are made with lactose--milk sugar. Not milk. A milk stout is not a "dairy opportunity."
• Oatmeal stouts were a variety of "nourishing" stouts, prescribed by Victorian era doctors, for nursing mothers or ill children. Other nourishing stouts had oysters or milk added to them. These fell out of favor before World War I, but it was revived in 1980 out of curiosity by Charles Frankel of Merchants du Vin, in conjunction with Samuel Smiths.

My own notes are skimpier: Honestly, my palate is not sensitive enough that I'm one of those guys at tasting who gaze off into the distance musing about notes of Limburger, hints of durian, and overtones of crusty sweat sock. (Well, OK, no one would drink that, but you get the idea.) Occasionally I will "get" it--the Granny Smiths apples or latakia pipe tobacco taste come through for me clearly--but usually it's "Yeah, I get the fruity/flowery/spicy tones" and/or "I do/don't like/can take or leave this."

Kinda like art, I can't describe it, but I know what I like.

Of the above, I liked the Milk Stout and the Steelhead Stout. The Oatmeal and the Allagash I could take or leave, the Wrasslers did nothing for me, and the Imperial Russian was too heavily hopped for my tastes.

The latter surprised me, as one of my favorite brews is North Coast Brewing's Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout. It simply is not as hoppy; I don't care for most India Pale Ales, either, due to the taste of all those hops. (Similarly, Mrs. Drang and I both avoided Chardonnays for years, not realizing that what we objected to was not so much Chardonnay grapes as the fact that so many wine makers oaked their chards to the point the wine tasted like bark...)

But tastings are just that--a matter of taste. And if you like a beer or a wine that tastes of Limburger, and smells of a cross between durian and crusty sweat sock, then more power to you.

Just don't expect me to drink it, too.