Aberlour 12

I’ve been trying to expand my horizons and learn more about Scotch over the last year or so and I have a friend who I asked for recommendations and he sent me a link to The 12 Best Single Malt Scotches Under $50 and I purchased several off the list. One of the bottles was Aberlour 12 which retails for around $45. I had first spotted Aberlour in a Booze Traveler episode so I was pleased to see something from them appear in the list. The reviews for Aberlour 12 are all good to great calling is one of the best value Speyside malts on the market. It does have quite a bit of sherry and fruits and some definite spicy alcohol notes with hints of phenols. For me it was slightly underwhelming, tasty, but just not as bold as I prefer. If you purchased this for a friend they certainly would not turn it down, but I’m confident there will be something else in the list I will enjoy as much or more. I also found this to have some fusel notes to the alcohol and often had the slightest twinge of a higher alcohol headache during the night after consumption. Luckily it passed by the morning, but it seemed to occur almost every time I tried a glass of Aberlour 12. So while I found this Scotch quite flavorful, I don’t believe I will run out to buy a second bottle anytime soon.

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Boulevardier & 1794 Thoughts

So the other night I was out and one of the house drinks was a Boulevardier which is actually a cousin to a Negroni. As a reminder a Negroni is equal parts gin, Campari, and sweet vermouth. Since I don’t care much for gin I actually have never had one. Of course anyone who follows the blog will remember my first experience with Campari, and I still cannot see anyone drinking it straight over ice. So a Boulevardier is typically equal parts Bourbon, Campari, and sweet vermouth, but some use rye whiskey. The barkeep was kind enough to offer a sample and the Campari still overpowered the drink making it too astringent. I went home and tried a 1:1:1 mix of my own and a 2:1:2 mix side by side. Both still seemed to be too much Campari for my taste. Someone suggested I try a 1794 which is a very similar drink, but rye based. The drink is 2 parts rye, 1 part Campari, and 1 part sweet vermouth. I decided to make it last night with Bourbon and while I am unsure of the name, I was very pleased at the result when simply stirred and placed in a glass with a large cube. Keep in mind everything going in the glass is alcohol and I did not spend time on a garnish, but for some reason doubling the Bourbon while keeping the Campari and sweet vermouth at the same level made for a magnificent beast of a drink. While sweet the astringency and orange character of the Campari helped it finish dry and pleasant. I used Very Old Barton as my Bourbon since I knew it had a mild character and any other Bourbon would only improve the drink by adding complexity. Some recipes for a 1794 include a dash of bitters and an orange peel garnish and I think both would be welcomed additions and bring something to the party.

Bathroom Meme Explains Why Gun Buster Signs Do Not Work

I absolutely love it when people prove a point you have been trying to make for a long time, by trying to prove their own. I cannot even begin to count the number of times I have stated gun buster signs do nothing to keep criminals out of an establishment and only serve to keep law-abiding citizens who were never a threat from entering where a sign is posted. Someone thought they were being cute creating the meme below, but in reality they are proving my point. Laws only affect law-abiding citizens until the criminal is caught and then they allow them to be prosecuted. So save the meme below and when someone posts something about not allowing concealed carry on social media, drop that bomb on them. If they fail to understand they were stupid in the first place so you might want to rethink your friendship with less intelligent individuals. 😉

Brad with a Y = Brady

I guess people will do anything for money. When news broke Brad Pitt would be hosting the Brady Campaign Bear Awards I had to go check for myself and sure enough there his name is on the center banner for the event. Gun rights groups have long thought of Pitt as one of the good guys who support gun ownership. I guess now we know it’s ok for him, but everyone else needs to be checked and controlled.

Printed And Bound BJCP Style Guidelines

Someone recently asked if the BJCP was going to offer printed and bound guidelines through a third party again and I don’t believe the organization will go in that direction again. Most judges today gravitate toward use of electronic guidelines on their iPhone/iPad or Android device and do not use the printed versions. I’m old school and prefer the paper, but printing them is pretty easy, just take the Word/Source version if you want something custom and format as needed, or use the PDF to print double sided and bind at a local print shop. Perhaps people are too lazy to do that, but they could always upload to an online printer and have them ship the completed guidelines to them. Anyway, with so few of us older judges using the printed format I just don’t see the need for a particular book. I bought the small one and larger one back in the day and never actually used them at competition. A printed version was best since eventually spillage occurred and at least if it was printed the marred pages could be replaced in an unbound version.

What might be useful is for a person well versed in Word to create multiple versions for various printing formats, but of course that is something a judge could create on their own.

Game On! Ommegang Game Of Thrones Seven Kingdoms

As most people know who frequent the blog I am a big fan of Game Of Thrones as well as Brewery Ommegang. With the season premier airing last night I spent the last few evenings enjoying previous Game Of Thrones beer releases from Ommegang. I was very pleased when they brought back Iron Throne last fall and picked up a gift pack of it and Take The Black Stout which I cellared until Friday night. Take The Black Stout was my first stop on the tour and while I like the beer, it is more of a dark saison than a stout. On Saturday I cracked open an Iron Throne which is by far my favorite and I had opened a bottle just after the fall release and then one more recently and noticed the peppery nature seems to shine more in this last one than before. It seemed a little underwhelming and sweeter in the fall, than now and I believe this one might actually benefit from a bit more aging. It still is a fave and I am very pleased they decided to bring it back.

The newest member to the GoT lineup is Seven Kingdoms Hoppy Wheat Ale and I enjoyed the heck out of this one. When I noticed it was a hoppy wheat ale I was expecting something different than what they delivered. This to me is a true white IPA ringing in at 6.9% ABV. The hops are listed as Bravo, Centennial, Citra, Cascade, and Columbus and I’m betting they used a heck of a lot of them. The flavor is citrusy grapefruit and orange and while the description mentions phenols, I really didn’t pick them up other than a bit of pepper through all the yummy hop goodness in this one. I let it warm quite a bit while it was consumed and the bitterness seemed to dominate once it neared room temps. The aftertaste was smooth and I actually loved the creamy nature of the wheat in conjunction with the hops. If you are an Ommegang or GoT fan who likes hoppy beers, give this one a whirl. I know I’m going to pick up another bottle if I get the chance!

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We’ve had quite a bit of traffic lately, please take a second and give our Facebook page a like. We get quite a bit of traffic and several people with email subscriptions, but by liking our page on Facebook it should appear in your feed. It’s simple, just click the “Like” button on our page. Thanks so much for reading the blog!

Should The BJCP Add Endorsements For Particular Styles?

Short answer, no, but why don’t we take a minute and understand why we should not have endorsements for particular styles. Currently the BJCP has two types of judges, beer and mead, with cider on the way very soon. The reason for the individual certifications/endorsements is pretty simple judging beer as opposed to mead or cider is a slightly different animal and the methods for making the beverages and corrective actions required to improve are specific to each one. Of course anyone can judge any one of them, but passing the exams for each provides the judge director for a particular competition with some assurance you have the ability to judge those categories.

Recently on social media someone suggested sour styles might benefit from a special endorsement. While some sours use bacteria or wild yeast as opposed to beer yeast and bugs, they still end up being beer and have been part of the guidelines since the guidelines were established. While a judge may not know exactly how the entrant made the sour beer, they can certainly and easily offer suggestions on what characteristics would improve the beer. Say the beer smells of vomit or baby diaper, it really doesn’t matter how those off-characteristics were introduced, the sour beer brewer should be able to look at their procedures and determine how to eliminate from their process, if they cannot then they probably should not be brewing sours. While it is preferable the judge have some experience with judging sours, there is no reason for any endorsement. What should happen is judges should request to not be assigned to styles they don’t feel prepared to judge or where they cannot be objective. In the end we judge to the style guidelines and so I personally feel comfortable with all the styles, even if may not have had or judged that particular style. So no, we don’t need an endorsement for sours anymore than we need one for wheats, lagers, or IPAs, they are all beer and it doesn’t require anything special to judge the styles.

Moonlight Brewing And The Craft Beer Attorney

In Londonberry, NH there is a meadery named Moonlight Meadery who makes some of the most delicious meads out there. On April 13 Candace Moon, The Craft Beer Attorney, filed to cancel the trademark Moonlight Meadery had held since 2011. She did so on the behalf of Moonlight Brewing out of Fulton, CA. Now I remember a trip to the San Francisco/San Jose area way back in the day and I found a bunch of Moonlight Brewing beers on beer engine and they were great. Fast forward a few years to a visit to Santa Rosa and there was a restaurant which only served Moonlight beers and they were all subpar and disappointing. The Moonlight Brewing Company indicates they have been using Moonlight since 1992 and will be irreparably harmed by Moonlight Meadery continuing to use the mark they have held since 2011. From where I sit I would never mistake a Meadery for a Brewery and Candace and Moonlight Brewing are five years late to the party. In fact it appears Moonlight Brewing only applied for their mark in 2014 and have had quite a bit of documentation from a BBQ restaurant in opposition of their mark.

At any rate I despise things like this. This will cost Moonlight Meadery thousands of dollars in legal fees to retain their mark when it should not even be under consideration. I’m not sure what the end game Moonlight Brewing hopes to achieve other than drawing a line in the sand to be sure no one ever opposes their mark should they get it, but moves like this are detrimental to the alcohol beverage industry. It’s not like I was a fan of Moonlight Brewing before, but I’ll be sure to avoid them moving forward and pick up some mead from Moonlight Meadery every chance I get.

Beer Geek Notebook

Back in the day before smartphones I would keep a detailed notebook on beers I had tasted and enter them on the beer rating sites. It was a fun activity for me, but I’m sure companions at the dinner table were less than pleased when I whipped out paper and pen. Often I would keep small slips of paper for notes and put them in later. I would stealthily or not so stealthily pen them quickly and then come back to the conversation. Today I don’t keep detailed notes and generally just quickly enter them in Untappd with something simple if anything at all in terms of notes. I wonder if anyone is truly keeping a notebook anymore for their beers. I know it helped me tremendously in my preparation for the BJCP taste exam, but today I’m not sure how useful it would be for someone simply tasting beers or training their palate. I would think their smartphone would probably have an app which would work well for taking notes and those notes could be cut and pasted over to a rating app or site, or into a document which could be edited and saved. We don’t get too many responses on the blog, but if anyone reading keeps a notebook or log outside of an app, reply to the post and let us know what you do.