November « 2009 « Brews and Blues

6Nov/090

Founders Harvest Ale

Brewery: Founders Brewing
Where: Grand Rapids, Michigan
Beer: Harvest Ale
Style: American Pale Ale
IBU: 70
ABV: 6.5%

This is my second taste of a wet-hopped pale ale. It's not bad... The hop flavor and aroma in this beer is quite intense, as it should be. It poured with a nice golden color with a little haziness and a decent head that was full of a floral hoppy aroma. This is my first taste of a Founders Brewing beer, but there are several others I want to try.

I'm initially disappointed in Founders Brewing over this particular beer in terms of marketing. For any of you who follow this blog, you know that I go to the brewer's website and look at their information on every beer I try. I'm also a homebrewer, so my interest in the 'mechanics' of any given beer is a lot higher than average.

Harvest Ale is a wet-hopped ale. What this means is that fresh hops right off the plants have been added to this beer... probably late in the boil and as dry hopping additions during secondary fermentation. The general key to the greatness of this process is the TYPE of hop used to make this beer what it is (or isn't). There is no information on the bottle OR on the website to indicate what style of hops Founders chose to make such a prominent part of this brew. My experience makes me believe that it might be a Cascade hop, or possibly a Centennial, but we'll never know since that information seems to be hidden. I think that's a rather poor choice. Most brewers are really proud of the hops that were used to make a beer like this.

If anyone knows what it might be, let me know :)

Filed under: American Pale Ale, Beer Reviews, Seasonal No Comments

4Nov/090

Fort Collins Chocolate Stout

Brewery: Fort Collins Brewery
Where: Fort Collins, CO
Beer: Chocolate Stout
Style: American Stout
IBU: 33
ABV: 4.9%

As I was browsing the single bottle selection at the World Market recently, I noticed they had added the Chocolate Stout from Fort Collins Brewery to the shelf, so I decided to grab one. I have had several chocolate stouts in my past, and I'm always willing to spring for one I haven't tried. I popped the top on this one and it poured with a nice creamy tan-colored head as one would expect from this style. The opaque black coffee color also helps define this style of beer. As far as flavor goes, this beer is what I would like to call a benchmark for a chocolate stout. It's not the best and not the worst I have tried, but it is an excellent baseline example of what this style should be. When this beer hits the tongue, there is a very nice balance of chocolate malt and roasted barley, with neither overpowering the other. This brew also has a medium body... maybe slightly on the higher side of medium... and a good mouth feel at the same time.

I'm simply impressed in an overall sense with this beer. I couldn't find much information on their website about the ingredients, so I sent them an email to see what information they might give up to a home brewer...

** UPDATE **

I received a quick response from the Fort Collins Brewery this evening:

John,

The key to this beer is the munich malt base, youve already noticed the roasted barley and chocolate, a little black adds the deeper color to reach 42 SRM. A defining feature of our stout is its lighter body so make sure to keep the mash temp on the low side. As for hops we use american citrus hops to get 31 IBU. Unfortunately that about all the specifics I can give you, good luck.

Doug Smith

Production Supervisor

The Fort Collins Brewery