Mikkeller - I Hardcore You

I enjoyed the description of this beer from the Brewdog Blog so much that I'm just going to quote it here,

"I Hardcore You is a 9.5% Imperial India Pale Ale, an international collaborative effort between 2 of Europe's most rock 'n roll brewers. This beer is a blend of BrewDog’s Hardcore IPA and Mikkeller’s I Beat You. After the blending, the beer was then dry hopped a further twice. Making I Hardcore You a beer which has been dry hopped four times, or maybe even six times. We kinda lost count."

Oh, and from what I can tell, this was a one-time brew collaboration between the two that was originally brewed back in mid-2010, but recently enjoyed a resurgence in May of 2012.  I appreciate Mikkeller more every time and drink it and while my experience with Brew Dog is limited, I haven't been disappointed yet.  Let's pour!

Aroma 11/12

There's a great citrus blend happening here and rushes out as soon as the cap is pried.  At first the nose is sweet with honey, but in short time the citrus blend harmonizes with it and the results are splendid.  The citrus fruits are pineapple, lemon, and some lesser mandarin oranges.  There is a funk behind it all that comes across as a bit earthier than normal and some distant hop notes of grass and a little spice.  The beer begins to warm a bit and that funk note from earlier has started to open into a full resiny blossom.  It never overtakes the citrus/honey blend, but it is a concentrated, dark smell that hopefully translates into a big, hoppy flavor.  Other aromas are hints of the alcohol and a toffee-like malt that blends so well with the sweet hops that it is difficult to nail down what exactly it smells like.

Appearance 2/3

This beer pours and sits in the glass the color of dark honey.  It is an all-but-opaque cloudy glass full of orange-browns and rusty hues.  The head was fairly long lasting, a nice almond color, and possessed a nice fluffy texture.  While one can't give it points for a range of color, it certainly looks ominous and give the impression that this IIPA means business.

Flavor 18/20

It definitely does not start out as sweet as the aroma, but with a lot of dry-hopping I suppose that's to be expected.  However, sweetness is still the first characteristic detected.  It's more of the toffee from the aroma, but with a bright citrus note immediately behind and trying to upstage it at every chance it gets.  The toffee persists its way into the backbone of the beer and refuses to be tamed.  The brown-sugary toffee has some competition from some orange zest, an early splash of pine, and some resin but nothing that threatens its crown.  As the beer sits in the mouth the resin bitter becomes stronger as does an earthy note from the hops and both lead to a more complex finish.  The beer washes down with a mixture of orange and caramel, but not without a strong earthy note and some pepper.  The aftertaste is lingering earthy resin which trumps the alcohol by leaving the mouth watering and not dry.

Mouthfeel 5/5

Very smooth and extremely full-bodied, in true IIPA fashion this beer offers very little carbonation to play on the tongue.  The alcohol is mostly camouflaged throughout the beer, becoming noticeable in only the aroma and the aftertaste.  Feels like a big ol' IIPA should.

Stolen directly from the BrewDog website.

Overall Impression 8/10

While this beer wasn't as laden with hop flavor as I had imagined, the balance in it was impressive.  This wasn't a hop bomb, though it certainly is hoppy.  It was more of a huge, balanced, IPA.  The malts were definitely sweet and served their purpose, but I feel the hop FLAVORS (not their aroma nor their bitter) suffered in turn.  In the same vein, while this beer balanced the malt and the hops well, it never really bothered to blend them except in the aroma.  It's more of a meeting of the "immovable object" and the "unstoppable force" instead of a cohesive blend between these two powerhouse flavors.  That said, it's still remarkably tasty and I'd easily like to have a few bottles on hand for a rainy day.

Total 44/50

I'm pretty sure I said in all in the "Overall Impression" section.  This beer is big, tasty, hoppy, and sweet.  The aroma is fantastic and seems to blend all the good things that are happening in this beer.  Unfortunately, for the flavor, the blending is not as successful.  It's like two semis colliding in your mouth; the results are pretty kick ass, but I can't help but wonder what this beer would've been like had the two powerhouses decided to work together.  The aroma shows it can be done - those flavors go great together!  Now it's just a matter of getting these two great breweries to tweak the recipe ever so slightly before the next release of I Hardcore You.  Right brewmasters?  Next release?  Eh?  Hopefully we can all see this again in two years.

Also stolen.

Equity for Punks

As I talk to more and more craft beer folks, I am finding that Brew Dog's "Equity for Punks" program is not as widely discussed as I imagined.  Long story short?  Brew Dog is  was, raising capital by selling equity (stock) in an online IPO.  This not only gets money to Brew Dog, but gives a feeling of involvement to craft beer drinkers, and a neat way for dedicated customers to feel better connected to the business - a business that they have now helped build.  

This is different than Green Bay Packers "stock" in that GBP stock is not an actual stock nor does it have any monetary value (nor is it transferable).  Equity for Punks, on the other hand, is actual ownership in the company, which can grow in value and be sold after a one year holding period.  They even throw in discounts at all their bars and their online shop AND make certain beers available to you that are rare, early releases, or both! Check out their promo video.

Since they're based in Scotland (hence the cool accents in the video) there was some issue regarding a exchange from dollars to euros.  I wasn't able to purchase the stock with a credit/debit card online, but instead had to send a wire transfer to the UK.  In any case, things finished up nicely.  I got a nice certificate that indicates how many shares I now own and just this last week I received a rather ominous looking, black, plastic envelope in the mail.  Much to my surprise it was the S.W.A.G from Brew Dog  that they had promised for investing in Equity for Punks.  Very cool!  What's in the packet?

A pencil.  Though a #2 wouldn't be very punk.

A sweet keychain/bottle opener

A lapel pin

A temporary tattoo

A big ol' sticker

A small poster

I don't show this because the spoils were so extravagant, but because craft beer is about sharing.  If you weren't able to participate in this Brew Dog experience, that's OK.  Feast your eyes on some items that not everybody gets to see!  This is what my experience was.  Well, this and hopefully a ton of return on my investment.  They didn't even have to send anything besides the stock certificate, but they did and that's pretty cool.  Thanks Brew Dog!

Brewdog & Stone - bashah

In the interest of full disclosure, I'd like to first say that I am the proud owner of some Equity for Punks!  If you don't know what that is yet, check it out here.  After finally taking the plunge last week after a near immediate blessing from my surprisingly understanding and slightly dismissive wife (quoth her email, "Just go do it"), I find myself doing something new, exciting, and a bit helpful to the craft beer community.  With my new investment in mind, I figured it was time to break out this bottle that had been sitting in my beer fridge for quite some time.  This bottle is called "bashah" and is the collaborative effort betwixt our friends at Stone and Brewdog.  I know!  It DOES sound good.  My only concern was that the bottle might be a little too old considering this is supposed to be a black Belgian DIPA.  To be specific, this bottle is from batch 352 and was bottled on 12/19/2010.  Under a year should be fine for a beer this steeped in hops and darkness, right?  Is that not the story behind imperials and IPAs?  That their strong flavors preserved them?  One way to find out if that legend holds true.  Let's pour!

Aroma 7/12
Granted, this is an older bottle, so it should come as no surprise that the majority of the aroma is cocoa with no detectable hop character.  There is some Belgian yeast sweetness that makes a faint appearance, as does some coffee and some roast, but the IPA goodness (let alone the Double IPA goodness) has died out a long time ago.  At this point, it smells like a pretty tasty stout.  I find that the roasted malt appears as the beer continues to warm.

Appearance 2/3
Not pitch black, but very very dark. The traces of mahogany are only visible along the edges when held to light.  The khaki-colored head was small and lasted as long as it had to, but where it touched my glass it left a rather impressive lacing that indicated lots of good pitting.

Look at that lace!

Flavor 19/20
For a beer with a less than impressive smell, this beer still has what it takes to knock your socks clean off!  Initial flavors are the sweetness of malt, raw sugar, and caramel.  Then the backbone begins to rush in and this beer gets big in a hurry!  Lots of coffee, hop bitter, dark caramel, roasted chocolate malts, and a light saltiness that I have had in other dark beers (notably Mikkeller Beer Geek Brunch), but can never seem to place.  This is big and complex - a great combination.  The finish is very bitter, hints at the former sweetness, and drys the mouth quickly.  Maybe those hops did not disappear completely after all!  This beer leaves a great inky, hoppy bitter aftertaste way on the back of the tongue that seems to skulk about like some sort of great, black predator crouched in the back of its lair.  It lives back there.  It belongs there.

Mouthfeel 4/5
Its carbonation is barely present without feeling flat; I love that in a dark beer.  The body is not as heavy as one would expect from a beer this dark and with this much flavor, which is a nice surprise when you're finished and not weighed down.

Overall Impression 9/10
This is a damn good beer, but I felt I had to dock a point for not being at all what is on the label.  It claims to be "The Black Belgian Style Double India Pale Ale."  Granted, that's a pretty tall order to fill, but it can (and has) been done.  The black is definitely present, but the rest gets lost.  Any Belgian characteristics are slight at best.  The hops offer no flavor nor aroma (in a bottle this aged), even if they certainly have their say in the finish.  Those DIPA hops really come out in the aftertaste, too.  The beer that was present was a delightful, hoppy stout that was good enough to score a nine here.  Big, complex, bitter, and not heavy.  What more do you want?

Total 41/50
I thought this was going to be a brief review. I respect Stone and Brewdog a LOT and when I first smelled this beer I was ready to be disappointed by the rest. It smelled simple and weak. I didn't even really want to post a crappy review about two breweries I like so much, but figured I might be able to get away with it if I screamed loud enough that this was an old bottle.

Then I tasted it.

Wow! What a complete 180! While it's not the style on the label this is still a damn good dark beer that I keep wanting to call a stout. I don't want to rehash the beer description, but I can't reiterate how much this beer redeemed itself. To reward such a redemption, I'll stop calling it a stout and begin calling it my "bête noire." Cheers and kudos to the boys at Brew Dog & at Stone!! You boys can get together for a playdate any time you like!

The legend held true.