Happy Hanukkah Beer Geeks!

It's time for the Festival of Lights, people! 8 days of lighting candles, gift giving, and spending time with the family....or so many of us goyim like to think. I know the holiday is more than that, but those of us that were raised in homes with a christian sleight like to think it's close to our holiday equivalent. it's not, but it's close enough to the fake birthday of the Christ for all the ignorant goys out there to think it's relative.

As secular a lifestyle I represent, there are still many things to look forward to during the holiday season. Namely, holiday and winter seasonal brews. But for all the beers out there with Santa and Krampus on the label reppin' the holidays, I'm surprised I never taken the time to wonder why Hanukkah beers are sorely lacking on the market. Thankfully, I'm a godless liberal who subscribes to NPR on my Facebook news feed, and chances are you may be too. Just in case your not though, NPR released a nice reader-and-listener friendly article mere hours ago about the growing Hanukkah holiday beer market, and a little bit of background on Jewish brewing for those history buffs out there. It's a short article, but a good read and relative to the subject of this website.


 NPR - With Hanukkah Microbrews, A Taste of Jewish History

Clown Shoes Clementine (Mass)

I have long been a fan wheat beers. Ever since the first time I poured a Weihenstephaner down my gullet at the Boulevard Tavern all those years ago, wheat beers have always been my go-to session drink when I'm not pinching pennies on peebers. So it should be no surprise that my first time trying a beer from Clown Shoes, it was likely to be a wheat beer. Or at least that's the excuse I'm using even though it had more to do with my budget. Honestly, if I had the cash flow, I probably would have went with the Muffin Top for the sheer humor value.

I poured my $3.00 bottle of Clementine after a long two hours running around North Brooklyn looking to fill up a couple of growlers. An activity that takes up close to 3 hours of my obviously exhausting week. Since I'm a bit limited in the glassware department, I used the old standard...the 16 oz. pint glass! Clementine pours exactly how I would expect a what beer named as such, golden yellow with orange hues. The head quickly dissipates, which is probably one of the least disappointing things I find when I'm about to rate a beer. As much as I find the scent appealing, Clementine's being heavy on the citrus(to me it was of sweet oranges), the aspect I most care about when drinking a beer is the actual taste. I'm sure most beer geeks can agree with me. "Grapefruits!" was my first thought after taking the first sip, most likely due to the bitter surprise that the hops gave. As the beer settled, the citrusy bitterness stopped being so apparent, and I the sweetness of the oranges I found it the scent became much more defined. Seeing that it was only 3 O'Clock in the afternoon on a weekday, I took my time with this brew, which was a good thing, but I could easily see my self polishing off a sixer of Clementine at a BBQ or any other warm weather drinking session. Not to say that I won't be drinking any this winter since I don't really discriminate based on the season. Wheat beer is good year round.

Would I take Clown Shoes over Weihenstephaner? Most definitely not, but there are several beer bars in NYC that only cater to craft brews, and right now Clown Shoes is on everybody's beer menu in the City, most likely because it's slightly regional. Regardless, it would be a nice replacement when my wheat beer of choice was not available. I'm sure Clown Shoes Clementine will be getting a session or pub revisit from me in the near future.

Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron

Sometimes it's hard to to grasp just how much the craft beer market has evolved in such a short amount of time in terms of ABV percentage. It was only about a decade ago that the highest grade micro available on the common market, at least in my neck of the woods, was the Trouble Bag at 8%. Back then, all it took for me to consider myself a beer snob was to indulge in Guinness, Bass, and Franziskaner in between some pretty severe PBR sessions. I didn't really hold the craft beer market in such high regard, even though I came from an Old New England town with a long brewing history (Portsmouth,NH). It wasn't until the Double Bag that my my interest in high test, and therefore craft brew, really to a grasp.

Fast-forward 3 years - Dogfish Head 60 and 90 Minute IPA's become readily available in the NH Seacoast and I'm hooked, over the next year after discovery I hear rumors of a 12% ABV. I must have it!

2 more years - Upon arriving in NYC I am finally able to indulge in the sweet nectar that is the 120 Minute IPA. At 10 bucks a bottle, it's a rare treat.

Today - By this point, I rarely drink anything under 7-8% ABV, unless it's session drinking. Even then, I try to stay away from the old standards like PBR if I can help it. By this point, Dogfish Head has produced a 15% beer that is still cheaper than the seasonally-released 120 Minute. But there is a new 12 percenter in town and it goes by the name Palo Santo Marron.



I cracked open the Palo Santo Marron for a Saturday morning breakfast a couple of weeks ago after a long night out on the town. I find that beer is a perfect accompaniment to my double-meat breakfast sandwich that is an almost daily staple, especially when feeling a bit hungover. Poured into a pint glass, I was immediately impressed by how dark this particular brown ale was. With it's dark coffee head, that doesn't last very long at all. It poured more like a porter or stout. As baffled as I was, after tasting I was not going to be doing much complaining. Chocolate malty goodness with a fair alcohol presence, in both taste and smell. I found that the brew tasted best about halfway through when the vanilla started to become more prevalent. This tells me that next time I should let the bottle sit out of the fridge for about 20 minutes before I crack it open.

At 12% ABV, Palo Santo Marron is not a session beer, but knocking back 1 or 2 while relaxing is not going to kill you. In fact, I find that it makes a whole afternoon of marathon TV that much more relaxing, as well as eliminating a hangover better than an Advil. While cheaper than the 120 Minute, drinking a whole 4-pack to your head could put a damper in your plans, if you have any. As far as the label art is concerned, it's a standard Dogfish Head logo with some funky colors added to distinguish it from anything else in the flagship. Nothing worth noting. I feel the Dogfish Head has made such a name for themselves in recent years that they don't even need a flashy label to sell beer, the name speaks for itself. The Palo Santo Marron does a really good job representing the company.

Bomb Lager - NYC, NY

To kick off the first beer review in close to five years, I figured what better way to go than with something new and local. That, and Bomb Lager was also the cheapest 6-pack available at the overpriced organic market on my block when I was headed back home from Pearl's Social and Billy Club at 2 AM.

New York City isn't exactly a mecca for locally-produced craft beer like the cities of the Pacific Northwest. So whenever something new pops up on the local market, I'm sure to seek and destroy with a vengeance. Many parts of2009 and 2010 are but a faded memory, a blame I place solely on Sixpoint....and maybe Kelso. The point is, a new local brew doesn't escape me for very long. It only took me four days to procure a sixer of Bomb Lager after reading about it in this article.

A few questions still remains though....Can the beer really be called "local" and "craft"? Bomb Beer Company is a NYC-based business but contract Lion Brewery in PA to produce it. If I'm correct, Lion Brewery is hardly a local craft brewery. Regional favorite(for some) yes, but more on the macro side of the American brewing world. I guess I would have to have a better understanding of the contracted terms to see which company actually designed the recipe.

For a $6 six-pack at an overpriced gentro-bodega, I can actually forget about those questions in a timely fashion. Not so quickly to forget I'm drinking something that is no more than a couple steps away from a shitty American Macro Lager. Bomb Lager pours a bright amber, with a fair-sized white head that will stick around for the duration of drinking. As far as duration is concerned, it really shouldn't take you more than 10 minutes to knock this session beer back. Like most American Lagers, opening a cold one and taking an instant sip is sure to produce gasface from the bitterness. That's why I have found it best to wait a few minutes after pouring before knocking it back. I have also found the drinking it at a warmer temperature is a more pleasurable experience. Drinking it at 45-50 degrees brings out more of the Helles style that Bomb is supposed to be modeled after.

Now we get to the artwork...blarggh! I love street art just as much as the next bearded fucker who calls Bushwick home, but I am of the opinion it doesn't belong on a beer can. I like my label art to to have elks and drunk monks, even images of Lucifer. The current label makes me think I'm drinking alcoholic Kool-Aid like FourLoco and all the other ghetto shit that mocks it. Street art belongs on brick walls, not a can of craft beer.

Despite my hatred of the can art, I can't really go wrong with the price point. It's the best party/session beer that I'm going to find in these parts. It's even cheaper than getting a sixer of PBR, and much better in taste and quality. It couldn't have come at a better time. I've been disgusted with my old friend the Blue Ribbon lately, and was on the verge of never touching it again. Bomb Lager just gave me a good reason not to.

Old Blog, New Face..Get Straight to the Pint

I can't believe it's been almost 5 years since the last time I updated this fucking thing.

I first moved to Brooklyn over 5 years ago from a quaint town on the New Hampshire seacoast. Before the move, I had been a bit familiar with the blogosphere, having been a member of Livejournal since 2002. Like most people who used LJ though, I didn't really consider it as much of a platform to get my thoughts and ideas out to the public as a whole as I do now. The early days of LJ were more of a diary I could share with my friends, utilized in the same way that the Facebook wall is today. It wasn't until further down the road when I started using blogs to develop more of my internet identity for the world to see. Instead of being some dude from the burbs who left status updates about the day-to-day of a slacker twentysomething, I started participating on political and art forums as a form of reaching out to people I would never meet in real life. This eventually lead to using early social media to reach out to bands I wanted to book. By the time I left Portsmouth, I was no longer just Steve the drunk proto-hipster who worked at a tobacco store for years. To me and my internet presence, I was Steve the Anarchist stencil artist who booked shows for touring bands. How cool was I?

Not very, as I soon learned upon my arrival to Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Going straight from suburban social butterfly to alone in the big city was quite a culture shock to me, and gave me a sense of perspective. I might have thought I was cool before, but it didn't take long for me to realize how much of minnow I really was. So for the first 6 months of living in the city I didn't really do much socializing. I did do quite a bit of drinking at home. New York had 1000 times the beers that were available back home, so for a self-proclaimed connoisseur of fine beers back home, I had a lot of learning to do. Since I still felt the need to shake my internet tail-feathers, I created this blog shortly after I moved here. Not necessarily as a medium to flaunt my expertise in alcohol, but more of a learning and growing process with both my love of beer and creating a more suitable web presence. Instead of continuing the "look-at-me, look-at-me" persona that currently plagues the urban areas of America, I could be a semi-anonymous critic of the finer things in life. It was a much more fitting path for an aging hipster such as myself.

But over the months, my dedication to my beer blog waned almost overnight. I can't quite put my finger on exactly what happened, but it did. Even after five years of no entries, I never lost interest. Instead of sharing my opinions about beer with the world, I kept my findings more to myself and concentrated on other interests of mine, like trashy cinema and a social life. Over this time, I've learned how to market my opinion better with social media so my musings have a much larger audience than before, but I still don't feel as if I shake too many feathers. Since then, I have attached myself romantically to a fine specimen of a beer lover such as myself, and stopped being such a drunk socialite. My knowledge and excitement about beer has also increased tenfold since I've lived here, to the point where I'm in the process of brewing my own. Since I spend more time at home with the girl, and being a seasoned blogger, I figure now is as good of a time as any to jump start the first blog and add a a few new elements, namely a female perspective. So I've added a better name and design to the primitive blog I kept before and hopefully, a continued written word on one of my favorite things in life.....Beer.

Brooklyn Pennant Ale '55

Brooklyn is still holding on to the memory of the Dodgers, and this beer is asalute to the Hometown pride that was felt when the Dodgers won the Pennant in 1955.. I'm not much of a baseball man myself, but I am a beer man. If this beer is any representation of how the city of Brooklyn loved there one-time champion baseball team, it's a pretty good representation.



Appearance:Amber with a thick, carbonated head.

Smell: Of hops and complex fruit odors.

Taste: Kinda sweet,not as complex a taste as aroma,but still a good tasting beer.

Artwork:A handsome silver and blue pinstripes make up a large border for the almost-standard fare Brooklyn logo. Defference being the baseball in the center. Did you expect any less?

Overall:I would give it a homerun. Play Ball!

Corsendonk Abbey Brown Ale

Corsendonk. Sounds good, doesn't it. Even if the beer wasn't good, I would still give it 2 thumbs up based on the name. Say it with me. Corsendonk. I love funny words.

I picked this one up at the Williamsburg Thrifty near the BQE. They don't have a large selection, and the guy behind the counter looked at me like I was scum. Most likely because he thinks I'm some kinda hipster scumbag who is ruining his neighborhood. Well fuck him. He doesn't have to be nice to sell me good beer.



Appearance: Brownish-red with a tan head the lasted for a very short period of time.

Smell: malt and mint (weird), with a hint of hops.

taste: Mild bitterness, and slight spice that left my tongue tingling. Sweet. later on I realized the taste reminded of a port.

Artwork:Jesus n' Mary Blah, Blah etch printed on the glass. looks like a traditional abbey seal. Whatever. Corsendonk! Hehehe...

Overall: This beer makes me realize I need to have a seperate fridge of some kind just for beer preservation. Considering I don't have a cellar. How else am i going to keep good beers like this at 45% all the time?

McNeill's Champ Ale

Straight from Brat, Vt comes the first of several McNeills beers I picked up over the holidays. McNeills is the hometown hero in this small, hippie town located in southern Vermont, and I only get to try it a couple of times a year. This ale is the Brewery's tribute to the American Loch Ness Monster, Champ. Who has been haunting the waters of lake Champlain since the coming of man into the area.



Appearance: Light, reddish-amber with a quickly dissapating bubbly head.

Scent: I smell hops and maybe yeast, mostly hops. Bountiful amounts of hops are found in ALL McNeills products.

Taste: Bitter hops, but not overt. There is also some sweet stuff going on along with fruitiness. Hops is the most recognizable taste in this beer, which also makes it pretty citrusy.

Artwork: A lakemonster and a clown done in watercolor. I wonder if there is a story behind it. Simple, yet effective. The label would stick out in a cooler, but some might be thrown off by the Jr. High, fantasy-nerd level of painting. whatever, It's better than I could do on a canvas.

Bought: At the Sunoco gas station on Christmas Day. Which was the only place open on the trip home before we hit the highway.

Dogfish Head Chicory Stout

Yet another excellent product from the folks in Delaware. Nor as strong as the 90 Minute IPA, but good. I love stouts,oh yessiree, I do.



Appearance: Blah,Blah Blah it's dark Blah. With a fairly typical brownish-red tint coming through the bottom. It started off with a fluffy ,tan head that was about 1- finger in width.

Scent: The scent hit me as soon as I opened the bottle. Mostly malt with some sweet complexity.

Taste: Tastes of coffee but without the good amount of bitterness I have come to expect from stouts.

Mouthfeel: As a stout, through and through.

Artwork:Typical simplistic DFH logo with a basic modern art pattern for the label. Nothing special.

Overall: I let this one get to room temp, and it was perfect for what it was. A good session drinking stout.

Allagash Tripel Reserve Belgian-Style Ale

One of the many beers I used to bring in the new year. This beer is a little ore special to me than the rest. First of, It was brewed in Portland, Me. Not just close to home but also one of the brew capitals of New England. Second, It was corked like wine. That's how i really knew I was getting into some classy shit. Third, you all know how much I love the Belgian-style. This one was a bit pricey for regular consumption, but it is a good one.



Appearance: Foggy Gold with a thick, light head that doesn't last very long.

Smell: Sweet. Of fruit and Hops.

Taste: Bitter Bite accompanied by mild sweetness and the taste of spices. Overall, not very complex for a tripel. Sips are soon followed by a bitter aftertaste. Nice....

Art:Multicolored block print of a woodsy road during what appears to be autumn. I happen to love block prints,so it touches me in more special places. I also like the fact it isan't in-yer-face but still manages to catch the eye.

Overall: The abv kicked my ass!!!

Victory Storm King Imperial Stout

I love imperial stouts. Especially ones that are inexpensive and are over 9% abv. I have hesitated with Victory Brewing Co. everytime I saw there beer up until now. The name and logo(a big V) remind me of 1984 and for some reason makes me feel like a mindless prole. I'm a prole regardless, and it wasn't and act of mindlessness that made me buy and enjoy this Victory product.



Appearance: Dark with a capital"D",with a 2-fingered head that looked a bit like chocolate milk after it's been shakin' up.

Smell: Hops, citrusy hops.

Tastes: Fairly complex and slightly bitter, Although, less bitter than Old Rasputin. I wouldn't guess the abv was so high, due to the lack of a prominent alcohol taste,but look at Brooklyn's Stout. The warmer this beer gets, the tastier it gets to.

Art: Beware the Storm King,Oh Eagle-headed God wearing the Victory Crown. No need to look so pissed buddy...you won!

Overall: I ain't scared of this Big Brother. In fact, I embrace him.

Lagunitas Cappucino Stout (Ale)

A "limited release" bomber from Petaluma,Ca-based Lagunitas BC. I don't know how limited the release is,but it's not limited enough to be expensive. The first quality I liked when I picked the beer up at a "Manhattan expensive" store in the East Village.



Appearance: Dark with prominent blood red tones when held to the light. The head was thick with a light tan color, and good staying power.

Smells: Of malt and coffee. Considering coffee was used in the brewing process,this is to be expected.

Taste: Of coffee and malt with a hint of bitterness that goes far into the aftertaste. As the beer gets more time in open air, it gets smoother. All around a good tasting beer.

Art: Old-timey. I would expect this label to be on a root beer bottle from the 30's. Especially with the "Our Gang" dog centered on the label. Good thing I have a soft spot for both dogs and old timey.

Overall:Very good and a decent 7.99% abv. 7.99? Why couldn't they just make it 8%. I bet it had something to do with psychological marketing gimmicks. Now that I think about it. I didn't think I was as buzzed as I should be. Hmmmm......

Rare Vos Belgian-style Ale

More from my much-loved Brewery Ommegang from Cooperstown,NY. Although this one didn't strike the same chord previous Ommegang products have. It was still a good beer though. More of a session beer than the others.



Appearance: Reddish-amber and cloudy with a thin off-white head.

Smell:Spicy.... kinda smells like Christmas or Halloween. That is if you associate smells to certain holdays like I do. If you don't,sucks to be you.

Tastes: Bitter,with tones of sweetness. Not as flavorful as Ommegang or Hennepin,but good. The bitterness was maintained throughout the 25 minutes I took to drink it, and still good.

Artwork:not much can be said. Mostly words with a big "O" in an ochre-red,which I'm assuming stands for Ommegang. The colors are subtle, nothing really that catches the eye. Unless you know the company's other products,this isn't the first thing a typical person might pick. Makes me thinck its not intended for the piss-guzzling dweebs. Good for them in purposely keeping the audience small.

Overall: Good,not great,but good enough to buy a whole sixer and session it.

Doppel-Hirsch Doppel Bock

Nothing says german like a bottle with stags butting heads and a swing-style cap. I don't write about artwork enough in these reviews. I should considering art is appreciation is one of the most important things to me. So this review is going to be the first where I pull out my years of simpleton art knowledgeand shine.




Appearance: Reddish-brown with a brown-tinted white head.

Smells: of roasted-malt and caramel.

Tastes: malty and quite sweet...kinda chocolaty....with a slightly bitter aftertaste that can only be caused by hops.

Sidenote: I love the aesthetic of the swing-style cap. Drinking out of the bottle makes me feel slightly like a working class european. Instead of sitting at the pub, I'm hanging out in front of my apartment building with the guys from work, bitching about my day...Okay back to reality.... It's unfortunate my options were limited before moving to grolsh, and I can't stand grolsh. At least now i can enjoy the european look of the swing cap and enjoy the beer too.

Art: two stags fighting as the sun goes down behind a mountain. Those crazy bavarians love horned mammals. Doppelbock beers are generally a spring-brewed beer from what I understand. And nothing says Spring like 2 male animals fighting for sex. Although I don't feel there is enough green in the label to make it scream "Spring!!". I'm thinking early autumn personally.

Overall: I haven't had a beer this malty that wasn't a stout. It was a nice surprise. I would recommend to anyone. Especially those friends of mine in germany and the midwest,where there is a large german-descended population.

Magic Hat Mother Lager

Some beers are really disappointing. I never would have thought I would find a one with the Magic Hat company. I love all things Vermont,except this. i especially love commie propaganda art, which this beer has. i would go as far as to say if your gonna have a beer "for the people" it should be fuckin' good, cause the people love good beer. Apparently they met " for the American majority" which means macro-style that sucks shit. I can't give the Magic Hat company the props they use to deserve after trying this one.



I'm not even gonna bore you with the details of this beer. If you like Bud you will probably like this beer. apparently it's a european-style pilsner. Just because it's "european-style" doesn't mean it can't suck. Look at Becks and Heineken, or any of the other macro crap from Europe that has been imported here over longer than any of the "good" euro beers. I couldn'y even finish this one. Fuck a review,this beer just sucks.

Paulaner Hefe-Weizen

As you know,I'm still pretty new to the who wheat beer thing. In inexperience I still know a damn good beer when I taste it. I first had Paulaner a couple days ago at a bar called the East River. I fell in love instantly,enough to know that I would have to by more at the store for a proper review.



Appearance: Super Cloudy,amber color. This beer is definetly unfiltered. Plus number one! The head was a fluffy,off-white that sota reminded me of swiss cheese.

Smells: of wheat,predominently....go figure.

Taste: Sweet. A wheat and fruit orgy in my mouth. Okay, that goes a bit too far. But this beer is so fuckin' good. Paulaner Hefe-weizen would make a great session beer for those hot,summer days. It makes me loathe the fact that winter just started. Oh well. As long as I have beers like this readily available, the winter should be easy.

Post Road Pumpkin Ale

The name might throw you off, but this is a product of Brooklyn Brewery. I do love the Pumpkin beers, and this one is no exception.



Appearance:Amber-colored,with little murkiness and a non-existant head. Maybe I grabbed a bad beer. I don't know. It tasted good.

Smells; heavily of pumpkin and whatever spices are used to make pumpkin-involved baked goods. Both beer and bread are relatively similar.

Tastes: Slightly bitter,but it goes down easily. The tastes of pumpkin and spices make this something of a dessert beer and the 5% abv make it a pretty good session beer. Granted,you might have a problem drinking it too fast because the taste is that good.

Overall: Yet another BB product that makes me happy. Hard to go wrong with the local boys.

Dragon Stout

I've come to the conclusion that stouts from the Caribbean are brewed for more for the liquid desert quality than stouts produced in other regions of the world. Dragon Stout supports this conclusion. Straight from Jamaica, I bring you 7.5 % of alcoholic goodness....



Appearance: Dark with blood red tones shining through when placed in front of a ceiling light. Tan head that quickly dissapated faster than Kid Flash with a case of diarrhea.

Smells: Extremely malty with hints of chocolate and coffee.

Taste: Is sweet to start with a slightly bitter aftertaste that reminds of semisweet cooking chocolate. This tropical stout is definetly a dessert beer.

Body: pretty light in all actuality. If I were to judge it on body alone I would say it were less of a stout and more of a schwartzbier.

Drinkability: I could session this,the 7.5 % abv would probably knock me on my ass after 3 or 4 though.

White Rascal Belgian-Style Wheat Ale

Judging by the label and style, I feel this a perfect beer to follow the Lucifer review. I'm not quite sure exactly what a white rascal is. I couldn't find a reference to it in demonology. So that leads me to believe it is just the name of the beer, and the demonic image was added for the belgian religious image obsession I commented on in the last post.



In this post I'm going to be trying out a new review format to liven up the blog. It also keeps me from boring myself with the same sentence formulae I've been using for the past month.

Appearance: Cloudy, Light gold with a fluffy white head.

Scent:Smells of Hops, Wheat, and fruit. Based on the little blurb on the bottle,I'm going to guess the fruity smell is curacao orange peels.

Taste: a light taste with a fair amount of wheat and citrus.

This was a good beer overall. The orange peel was a nice touch. This beer made me realize i'm starting to really appreciate wheat beers. I don't know if I would place them before abbey ales,at least not at this point in my alcoholic journey.

Lucifer Belgian Golden Ale

I've noticed religious imagery is a fairly common element in a great deal of belgian/belgian-style beers. Whether it be the trappist monks who brew or the demonic images on a bottle of Maudite,christianity is a fairly strong theme. Lucifer is obviously no exception. It was indeed the theme that caught my attention, and it's the taste that will make me keep on sinning.



This cloudy,golden ale has a thick white head that kept for a pretty mid-range period of time. The word "fruity" was the first one that popped in my head upon inhalation. That same word was also prevalent in the complex sweet taste I have found in quite a few belgians. When I say sweet, I mean that with a "very" in front. Very with a capital V. It had a whiskey-like quality to it,especially in the aftertaste,which lingers on long after the beer is finished.

If Lucifer is indeed evil, I don't ever wanna be good.