beer | Barley Prose

Beer Review: The Big Sour Chili beer

Welcome To Botty McBotface’s Weekly Column Of AI Beer Reviews’

Brewing up a delicious concoction of tea and cornflakes with a little canned corn, a set of starchy fingers and a bunch of boring old paper canisters are the main ingredients in this week’s AI Beer Reviews. By the time you get to the end of this action packed recipe, you’ll be asking yourself “What the hell did I need those paper cans for?”

The AI Beer Reviews was created by a man named Mike from Michigan. Mike has always been a huge fan of beer and as he continued to brew more, he knew they needed to be involved in the AI Beer Reviews. So Mike searched the internet to find “guy who can do this.” The actual person who made this pizza-like AI

Beer Name:Catalan Cuvee d’Acquali (Wild)
ABV 10.00
Style: Saison / Farmhouse Ale
Appearance: 3.5
Aroma: 3.5
Palate: 4.5
Taste: 4
Overall: 4
Reviewer: Maria
Review: This beer doesnt pull off the wall of a plum. It’s rather sweet, rich and silky rich with a smooth bodied feel. There’s a bit of what I’m used to seeing in a wild ale but rather light about it. Functionally excellent in a saison sauce.

Beer Name:Mistress of Chaos
ABV ÃÂ$7.50
Style: Märzen / Oktoberfest
Appearance: 3
Aroma: 3
Palate: 3
Taste: 2
Overall: 3
Reviewer: kdudding
Review: As this is drank, a bit of creamy ice-pop my nose, but you can tell this is not what I was in for. Not a varietal style for mushrooms but a common fruity dragon pepper oktoberfest.

Beer Name:St. Boisterous
ABV 11.00
Style: Belgian Strong Pale Ale
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 3.5
Palate: 4
Taste: 4
Overall: 4
Reviewer: rygren
Review: It had a thick yet pliable head that made for slickness compared to the rest of the beer. The smell was bananas and some apples, some sugar and a little bit of spice. It had a bit of a prickly mouthfeel that made me think of the weather. The taste was more of the same, more peachy than anything else.

note: If you couldn’t tell, this stuff is AI-generated via a machine learning algorithm. The title and the opening blurb were trained on the standard GPT-2 model, with ‘Beer Review:’ and ‘This my weekly column of beer reviews. ‘ given as prompts. The reviews were generated from a fine-tuning of the GPT-2 model with a large sample of Beer Advocate reviews. I selected from the saved samples of these and put this post together.

2020 My Year in Beer: Too Much of it in not Enough Places

With the cold weather, the end of year typically brings with it a warm nostalgia as we take inventory of the last twelve months and look towards the next twelve with naïve and stupid optimism. The nostalgia for me has nothing to do with sweet memories of childhood Christmases or anything like that, but instead with year-end social and pop culture best-of lists. Top 10 albums, Spotify Wrapped and the Untappd Year in Beer. That’s my jam.

Untappd is kinda like Instagram, in that the beer you’re drinking or the thing you’re taking a photo of is only part of the equation. The other part is our needy human ego which makes us want to brag about being at a cool place and drinking a beer that’s way better than your less cool friends are drinking at their boring homes. And if I can’t sit in a perfectly lit taproom, staging a portrait mode photo of a beer for 10 minutes before I even take a sip, then what the hell’s the point of logging it?

I crossed the New Mexico state border only twice in 2020, funnily (or sadly) enough both times to Texas. That’s it. Last year was photos of beer in Barcelona and pints in Paris. Needless to say, pics of hard-to-find beers geotagged in exotic locations were just not a thing this year.

Back in 2018, I logged an embarrassing 341 unique beers across 6 states and 75 different venues on Untappd. This year it was a sad 19 unique beers from 8 different venues, led by my #1 drinking hole, Untappd at Home.

Yet somehow, I bet I drank more beer in 2020 than 2018 (and maybe 2019 combined). Instead of exploring new venues and tasting exciting beers by the bottle, we bought cases of our favorite beers to-go at the taprooms, brought them home and, well, we drank them. That was the miserably sad formula, supporting the local economy one 16-ounce can at a time.

I was recently asked what lessons I learned in 2020. I should have said “resilience” or some shit, but my answer was that sometimes it’s OK to drink 3 beers on a Wednesday night and, for me, every night in 2020 felt like a lonely Wednesday night. The world’s a hellhole, gimme another beer. #selfcare

And maybe that’s the rub. Pandemics aren’t the time to satiate our thirsty egos by padding our beer stats or sharing well-curated insta shots (unless they’re in mountains and you’re surrounded by trees and no humans). We hopefully help keep our favorite places chugging along with our to-go orders and make this little sacrifice until we’re back in that taproom again soon, amongst friends and strangers, taking heavily filtered photos of pint glasses and once again drinking beer in public.

Here’s a perfect 2020 song off my favorite album of the year, Waxahatchee’s Saint Cloud. The song, “Can’t Do Much” is a love song, but feeling isolated and questioning your sanity over something you love and miss, well, I figure that could be any one of us this year. Until we’re in that taproom again, stay home, practice social distancing, wear the damn mask and support local beer.

Beer Review: Nuts and Bolts with Firebird’s On-Site Pint, Tampa

Welcome To Botty McBotface’s Weekly Column Of AI Beer Reviews.

I’m struggling to figure out why people dislike AI beer reviews. You know, the kind with scores, percentages, and fancy numbers. There is something that makes me dislike these review… and I’m not sure what it is. I’ve read some reviews, and they are all completely ridiculous and mainly made up of the most basic and meaningless information you can possibly know. I remember my brother-in-law being upset when he tried to watch an AI review of Vinnie Cilurzo’s new Bud Light Platinum. It’s an upcoming red ale and he wanted to know if it was worth the $14.99. And when he was corrected by a beer guide, he exclaimed, “I didn’t do that!”

Beer Name:Dark Intrigue
ABV 4.00
Style: English Cud/Pcr Beer
Appearance: 4.5
Aroma: 4
Palate: 5
Taste: 5
Overall: 4.5
Reviewer: wifeofthedevil
Review: I have a longstanding beef with this beer’s puckeriness. If it is in fact one of the best I’ve tasted, then anyone who has had it I’ve known must love it. That said, I must have what it takes to appreciate it, and I am not taking a hard sell on it. Aroma is thick and Mohan-driven…in the most pleasant way possible.

Aclonate sweet corn and a dark malt comes out quite a bit more, but the beer’s flavor is so clean that it does not fall apart after a few sips. However, it does not overpower or drown out any of the aromas. The abv is well hidden, but earthy bread crust and bread-ish coriander make the best aroma. A muted whiff of hops and cream is noticable, as well.

The mountain of sweetness and booze is a bit indefinatable. I would have to say that this is the only thing holding back the flavor quality of the beer. This brew is superb. The beer is so smooth and tingly, just like a Ramen. externalToEVAI enjoyed the obscurity of the appearance, and it gave this brew a quite the bottle-in effect. Every time I go to the store, I get a slew of the three seasonals.

This is my take on the JW Marriott and Budweiser. The exposed sweetness of the abv will have to do in the end. The only sign that this beer is more attractive than the others is the incredibly sloppy, overly-sweet mouthfeel. The abv (not per 100microcents) will do the job; it’s not mass produced like other sipping beers.

I like this stuff. The drinkability (with the alcohol content) of this brew is better than any other mid-quality Cudade. It’s so smooth that the order is relatively easy to figure out how many. This is a fantastic drinker.

Beer Name:Whirlwind Witbier
ABV 8.00
Style: Witbier
Appearance: 4.5
Aroma: 4 and a little more than it smells. The head is toasty light brownish with lots of yeast, sooooooo fun! Wow, a body of a foamy in the mouth beer, kind of like a Belgian red. A touch of carbonation which is just so nice. The yeast is pretty strong, but not overwhelming, it just serves to make every grunt easier to take. A great beer. It is also very easy to drink and would be great if you didn’t get tired of the beer soon enough.

Beer Name:Brooklyn Dogfish Head Ale
ABV 8.70
Style: American Barleywine
Appearance: 3
Aroma: 3
Palate: 2
Taste: 2.5
Overall: 2
Reviewer: russpowell
Review: Had a light pour and faced a field of small cherries, peels, and some light carbonation. Poor head. Some lacing. My nose is a bit on the run, if you can even call it that. Very of the nature of the brew. I can pick out faint bits of vanilla and caramel. This immediately prevents me from enjoying the drink – it’s that good. Body is a bit light. Bread and bite. Ludicrous

Beer Review: Gersot’s New England Abbotus

Welcome To Botty McBotface’s Weekly Column Of AI Beer Reviews!

Botty McBotface is back again with a new article on the Microsoft Research AI Beer experiment. For those of you who don’t know, Microsoft has a lab in Seattle where an AI lab is working to get a picture of what beer tastes like. Their AI beer algorithm is basically how you would try to answer the question “Which is better: Ales or Lagers?” by trying to classify them. Most beers are categorized as the same, but given the chance, some get classified differently. A few of these beer names are unclear, and this is where the bot comes in.

Beer Name:Brooklyn Pinot Noir
ABV 9.00
Style: Belgian Pinot
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 4.5
Palate: 4
Taste: 4.5
Overall: 4.5
Reviewer: Rzbieta
Review: Strong, thick and creamy. More light flows in the beer’s body. Good bit of leeway, butight naked. The head can be noticed slightly, but it seldom bothers. Nice frothy head that retains well and looks great. Thick, woeful lacing throughout the beer. Legs are fine. The nose is all Belgian scents, but mostly malty and sweetess. A little bit of sourness. The esters are also all Belgian as they are a bit more mixed with the malt. Slightly cloudy here to which I admit it is a bit strange because I don’t often find pure Belgian rasse. The pale malty flavor adds some higher maltiness that I am not used to. It is smooth…very smooth. This beer would make perfect session beer…with warm, thick, and sweet. A sizable drinker could make the change between a Belgian pils, and a Belgian ale. Excellent for the warm season…and quite a Comble glass.

Beer Name:Brooklyn Glacial Lager
ABV 5.60
Style: German Märzen / Oktoberfestbier
Appearance: 3.5
Aroma: 4
Palate: 4
Taste: 4
Overall: 2.5
Reviewer: Oleridade
Review: Pumped from the bar to the floor at the pale ale concert in Toronto, I was heading for the cold metal door to avoid the crappy rule in Ontario. Luckily the path I took was clean, the line of people I was welcomed was a deep black-and-white. Meanwhile, the beer had a bready scent and a minimal body. Consider the beer had some fruitiness and a carnival mix of high alcohol and low hop character, but the taste, which is distinctly above average as a Märzen in its thickness, was too thin, and had no real bite.

Beer Name:Treefruits & Apples
ABV 8.00
Style: Fruit / Vegetable Beer
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 3
Palate: 2.5
Taste: 3.5
Overall: 3
Reviewer: japoniasman
Review: And I was fortunate enough to be able to try it as part of a tasting at Trestle in Adams State Jail. This beer was a good looking can. It poured a very intense hock to my mouth that completely obscured my nose.

Beer Review: Old Joe Bag Watermelon Pie: A delicious pie that’s

Welcome To Botty McBotface’s Weekly Column Of AI Beer Reviews, Your Source For Bread, Beer, and Beer Offering (All Day, Every Day)

This is part 2 of a 2-part column. Read part 1 here: Is The The End of the Beginning of The End?

*Seasons are based on the BeerAdvocate database as of July 23, 2015, per the site’s most recent transparency report.

Tasting notes for each brewery from the series.

I bet you thought of yourselves as a craft beer aficionado, right? Slurping brews out of a pint glass, brewing your own microbrew, brewing mead in the back garden, working in the brewery? Did you? No? Then you’re an anthropomorphized cheese

Beer Name:Whataburger Low ABV Lager
ABV 4.60
Style: German Pilsener
Appearance: 3
Aroma: 3
Palate: 3
Taste: 3
Overall: 3
Reviewer: raar12
Review: A also used getting a carved duck head. WOW! Araarps! WOW! Ahhhhh! Whataburger has a great flavor! Straw in your face lager with a very nice malty backbone! Very clean finish as well! It is nice and refreshing! A little different than most hoppier lagers. I was expecting the heft to be a bit heavy and a bit heavy! I am glad that this appeared to be light and watery for my tastes.

Beer Name:Brooklyn Inner Light
ABV 9.00
Style: Belgian Strong Dark Ale
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 4
Palate: 4.5
Taste: 3.5
Overall: 4
Reviewer: draik
Review: Poured into modern tulip glass black, this stuff is some deep shades of brown. It’s dark almost. Oh, I don’t, like, remember how we used to have these in the 70s! Well, I remember when we used to have the wacky babies and girls: it’s taken us a while! This is my favorite light to my young friends, and I think as old as the bottle, the one I’ve passed.

Beer Name:Dark Intrigue
ABV 4.00
Style: English Cud/Pcr Beer
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 5
Palate: 5
Taste: 5
Overall: 5
Reviewer: decapone

Review: I pour this beer from a 12oz. brown bottle into a grey hand-knitted chalice.

The pour gives a slight haze, but no matter, the beer is a nice ruby red pour. The head is phenomenal. Along a roaring roaring, it’s a two-finger, off-white head that is brilliant, but not monstrous. The head, like the nose, is just a little too.

The flavor is alit best of coconut and light molasses. The overall flavor is very impressive. The molasses is hot and greasy, but the same gets to be true when you see sugar or something. It’s there, but just not enough to counteract the warmth and warmth of the beer.

The malts are a little too smooth and soft, and don’t stick around long enough to have any real effect. This beer is an awesome balance, I love the beer and think that it deserves a chance to shine through in a big way.

Beer Review: The Seekers’ best berry Stout by the Apps’ Greg

Welcome To Botty McBotface’s Weekly Column Of AI Beer Reviews For Your Entertainment!

FIRST OFF, I HOPE YOUR ALIVE.

YOUR ALIVE, THERE ARE A LOT OF THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW.

I already, naturally, made this analogy in the not-so-funny, yet highly relevant opening paragraph of my Technical Movie Review. Sorry for the bit of condescension, but I felt like I had to make it clear to you that this interview is not sarcastic.

Also, if you’ve been reading TechnoBuffalo for any amount of time, you know that I REALLY like an AI beer. I’m always throwing my hat into any and all AI-beer contests, and it’s because of these credits.

Beer Name: Limejuice IPA
ABV 8.00
Style: IPA
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 3.5
Palate: 4
Taste: 4
Overall: 4
Reviewer: littlecomete
Review: The facial frost is fading fast. The orange color is smooth and thin. There is a nice ring of white foam around the edges, but there are definitely some lacing. The nose is a spicy thing. Smells of lemon juice. The taste is citrusy and better than expected. There is definitely some space between the 1.5ish% IPA and the lemon.

Beer Name:De Goncourt Monde
ABV 6.00
Style: English Porter
Appearance: 3
Aroma: 3
Palate: 3
Taste: 3
Overall: 3
Reviewer: Gavage
Review: A thoughtless pour from the cocktail ship in Caracas (though the great pilot Admiral Chiano was a bit busy over the water) left me with the impression that this was a porter. Someone give me a UK garden kit.

Beer Name: Buffalo Bill’s Adjunct Ale
ABV 10.00
Style: American Double / Imperial IPA
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 4
Palate: 4
Taste: 4
Overall: 4
Reviewer: MBJJ
Review: A/Pours a hazy orange with a decent sized head of sediment. S. More of a hoppy nose than a DIPA, but mostly clove. T. A slightly sweet, sort of grainy caramel flavor follows the DIPA flavor and makes its way into the taste. There some melon and citrus hops. M. Thick and chewy with a nice dry finish. The stronger flavors of the DIPA make it almost like a DIPA, but not really one. D. This is an interesting and enjoyable beer I enjoyed.

Beer Name:Brooklyn Two-Inch ESB
ABV 6.80
Style: American Double / Imperial Stout
Appearance: 3.5
Aroma: 4
Palate: 3.5
Taste: 3.5
Overall: 4
Reviewer: Mikeyworks
Review: I reviewed this beer recently in a trade: 10-11-08.116. This beer pours a brownish-red color with a small head of foam that has a fairly thick, head-forming crescendo. Spicy alc. aromatown is also strong. Aroma is malty with light fruit and a hint of dark caramel. Taste is moats and a big maltiness. Medium-full for an ESB, not an OUTRAGEOUS brew.

Stay Home, Drink That Giant Stout

We can’t have large Thanksgiving gatherings this year, since those potentially spread Covid far and wide, but we can still drink our Thanksgiving beers at home. I don’t usually have a large beer-drinking crowd, but enough that I can buy something new and interesting to try, or crack open a bottle of some rich aged stout to share among a few people. The lack of those people present in my house on Thursday is not going to stop me from opening something though.

Stick that turkey in the oven and break out that bourbon barrel-aged monster you’ve been aging. It’s strong, but the best thing about these beers is that they taste better approaching room temperature than fridge temperature, so even if you’re just sipping over a few hours, they’re still delicious. Drink them more like bourbon than like beer.

Alementary makes a beer called Figgy Pudding, which is typically described as an English Barleywine, though I’m not sure that really captures it.

Big sweet bready malt, with a full range of supporting characters from light toffee to low chocolate. Fruit aromas of apricot, date, significant fig. Flavors of holiday fruitcake with massive malt structure. Figs for days, with supporting apricot. Date and Prune are secondary.

It’s a really neat beer, and I really love it. It’s also one of those that you can age. I’ve got a few bottles from previous years and I’m intending to open one up around noon on Thursday. At 9% it’s not as heavy hitting as some could be, but either way I”m looking forward to enjoying it slowly while I pull together appetizers/snacks or mashed potatoes or other such foods.

So much of Thanksgiving drink media talks about pairing your beverage with the meal, but that just feels like clickbait to me. The meal is one small portion, and you’re probably snacking all day. You’re definitely DRINKING all day right? The drink for 1pm spinach artichoke dip is different than when you have your plate stacked high with various mashed tubers. Drink what you like!

I was in NY briefly earlier this month and went to a bottle shop in Valley Stream that I usually go to, but hadn’t been since the pandemic started. They’re pretty good with having some more of the local Long Island breweries that don’t distribute to me in New Jersey, and other various breweries distributed to NY but not NJ. Mayflower brewing company is one, and I saw they had a Thanksgiving Ale. I picked up a 4-pack of that, to be my ‘drinking with dinner’ beer.

After dinner, which is typically earlier in the day than ‘real’ dinner time, I suspect I’ll need something crisper and bubbly. This might be the time for a bottle of champagne, or a nice pale Ale. We’ve got a nice bottle of Pinot Noir sparking wine from Sparkling Pointe that might be right, or I did buy a 4-pack of Alementary’s Random Placement Of Things which would fit the bill too.

Finishing beer? Probably something small and smooth. A better person might say water here, but I’m thinking of a few light and fruity ales I have in the basement, or something like a dark mild. Plenty of taste, but nothing overpowering. Something to coast to the finish line with.

Whatever you enjoy, stay safe and go ahead and tag @BarleyProse with what you’re drinking. Cheers!

Beer Review: Meteorite Sours

Welcome To Botty McBotface’s Weekly Column Of AI Beer Reviews!

Beers Like (or Like Stupid)

Every week, as a thorn in the side of Big Beer, I visit one of the country’s more obscure microbreweries to try and find the next great IPA or Triple IPA, and every time, I find a hoppy gimmick or a trend-busting effervescent novelty. I’m only joking. This column cover looks like something you might find on a visiting emissary from Mars, but despite all of the drinking history, this column is more about the reasons why it’s good and why you should drink it.

Beer Name: Aratight
ABV 10.00
Style: English Session Ale
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 4
Palate: 4
Taste: 4
Overall: 4
Reviewer: Cyndi21

Review: This one belongs to the beer dynasty of Joe Solano. As you need to drink your fill of barreley wine at a later date, let’s wait and see what Joe Solano hatches.

Beer Name: Fiddlers’ Wheeze
ABV 5.50
Style: American Brown Ale
Appearance: 4.5
Aroma: 5
Palate: 5
Taste: 5
Overall: 5
Reviewer: vancurly
Review: Was this on tap at my local pub in Mass on the last Sunday in October… this was biting cool. Not for the faint of heart!

Beer Name: Alka-Vega
Appearance: 4
Aroma: 4
Palate: 4
Taste: 4
Overall: 4
Reviewer: physmgook
Review: 20 oz served in a coffeepot. Poured into my new mini-skirt… A-Battalion on the pour is a hazy light honey color with a tiny white cap that fades to a tiny ring. Head is puffy and foamy. S-malty dark fruits, light fruit flavors, some citrus. T-Malty and sweet dark fruit, light fruit and sweet, a little over-carbonated. M-complex, medium to full bodied and no problem with constant flow. I would have to leave it at the maximum. D-another fantastic beer for the summer.

Beer Review: Sunflower Seed Beer

Welcome To Botty McBotface’s Weekly Column Of AI Beer Reviews

Unless you’re a fan of bringing the whole “the technological singularity” hype back from the dead, your interest in AI beer will probably need to be rekindled. Luckily, folks like myself have been around for some time.

We’re your go-to dudes when it comes to surface-level analysis of the state of the art in brewing and drinking AI. I write about macrobrewing issues, beer labels, and the thorny issues of effective, ethical AI.

I’ve been to four botty-mackinja-infested brewpubs in the last few weeks, and watched my beer recommendations get taken down over and over by the bots. In my own experience, the AI won this.

Beer Name:Lawnmower Lager
ABV 3.90
Style: American Adjunct Lager
Appearance: 1
Aroma: 1.5
Palate: 1
Taste: 1
Overall: 1
Reviewer: kevinmkirk
Review: Let me start by sharing what’s on the side of the bottle: “For all you people who are afraid of beer you can’t see through, this one is for you. This beer is yellow, fizzy, and clearly meant for washing dirt out of your mouth after mowing the lawn.” I’m not even sure it’s good for that. It’s definitely yellow and fizzy, with no head to speak of, and zero lacing. It almost smells like a loaf of bread, and nearly tastes the same. It’s very earthy and grainy with nary a hop to be found. Man, I love me some Caldera, but I would rather drink a Bud Light than this on a hot summer day. Sorry guys, but this beer gets an F.

Beer Name:Caldera Rose Petal (Kettle Series)
ABV 6.70
Style: American Blonde Ale
Appearance: 3
Aroma: 2
Palate: 2
Taste: 1.5
Overall: 1.5
Reviewer: jmarsh123
Review: Split the bomber with my girlfriend who picked it out because of the roses. Pours a clear gold/orange with a small white head. Smells floral as expected with some malty sweetness too. Not really picking up heavy roses on the nose. Tastes weirdly floral, but not good floral like a heavily cascade hopped beer. Hardly any hops at all, just a weird rose flavor. Good news is if I ever want this flavor again, I have a large rose bush in my front yard. Undercarbonation leads to an even worse experience. My first drain pour in quite a while. After a few sips these became way too overpowering and going through 22 oz wasn’t happening.

Beer Name:Mistress of Chaos
ABV ÃÂ$7.50
Style: Märzen / Oktoberfest
Appearance: 3
Aroma: 3
Palate: 3
Taste: 2
Overall: 3
Reviewer: kdudding
Review: As this is drank, a bit of creamy ice-pop my nose, but you can tell this is not what I was in for. Not a varietal style for mushrooms but a common fruity dragon pepper oktoberfest.

Beer Review: Fortune Beer Lab, Revival Brewing Company, Three Taverns

This my weekly column of beer reviews. Each week, I will take a look at the beer at the top of the draft beer market (and often at the bottom). This week, I am taking a look at the best cheap beer at the mall.
I like to take a look at the price per ounce, and compare it to the beer in the bottle. If the beer costs more per ounce, and you can get the beer for less per ounce, then that is a good value. I will do a list of my top 10 cheapest beers at the mall, and I will look at what the beer was in the bottle. It will be a list that will be updated weekly.

Beer Name:Rauch Ãœr Bock
ABV 7.40
Style: Rauchbier
Appearance: 3
Aroma: 4.5
Palate: 4
Taste: 4.5
Overall: 4.5
Reviewer: UCLABrewN84
Review: Pours a murky light brown with a 1 inch fizzy tan head that settles to a film on the top of the beer. Small dots of lace slowly drip back into the remaining beer on the drink down.

Smell is of smoked meat, smoked cheese, campfire smoke, etc.

Taste is of smoked meat/cheese, campfire smoke, wood, and a slight cocoa/coffee flavor on the finish.

The aftertaste is also cocoa/coffee with just a hint of the smoke flavors.

This beer has a crisp level of carbonation with a bubbly mouthfeel.

Overall this is a very good rauchbier from Caldera that has a bit of a different flavor than German rauchbiers.

Beer Name: Caldera Pale Ale
ABV 5.50
Style: American Pale Ale (APA)
Appearance: 4.5
Aroma: 4
Palate: 4.5
Taste: 4
Overall: 5
Reviewer: GratefulBeerGuy
Review: I’m really enjoying the variety of quality brews in a CAN i’m finding here in Northern California! this was reviewed while camping at Castle lake campgrounds in shasta city…i think. Ooooh yeah, cracking open a can sounds good!! a thick, solid and rocky -white head stands proud like Mt. shasta itself over a bright plae golden liquid, much like the N.Cali sunsets.

Retention is amazing, it’s not going anywhere anytime soon. The nose is just bursting with hoppy cascade aroma’s!! Sweet fruits, musty herbs, wheat and corn and light but sweet malt. This all cascade beauty has a great aroma. The hoppy flavor’s here are deep and very complex, cascade hoppiness all in my face. Light and very, very crispy feel is exciting and spot-on for the style. crisp with a creamy smooth finish from the beastie foam still clumping it’s way down slow.

The cascade hops provide a gentle fruitiness and perfect dry-herbal and earthy complexity. I havn’t been this excited for a Pale ale since my very first Sierra Nevada!!(circa 1996) This pale ale in a can has made my day, and I’m camping in one of the most pristine locations I’ve ever been too. This is simply one of, if not THE best Pale ale i’ve ever had. Bring on the cans!!!

Beer Name:Pilot Rock Porter
ABV 5.80
Style: American Porter
Appearance: 3.5
Aroma: 3.5
Palate: 3.5
Taste: 3
Overall: 3.5
Reviewer: Thrasher
Review: Pilot Rock Porter was served on tap at the Night Light Lounge in Southeast Portland. This is a great neighborhood bar, with a fine, if not huge selection of beer, and deserves some spillover beer geek traffic once the Clinton Street Theater’s brewpub opens down the street. Anyway, the porter is lighter than your typical porter black, more of a transparent ginger brown. The head is small but the lacing is determined. The aroma is mild rainy day, and the flavor profile contains deep caramel, light smokiness, cured meat, cola, and a tart herbal quality that masks the malt sweetness. It is not an exceptional beer but it satisfies and provides a lighter counterpoint to Caldera’s rich coffee/Cauldron stouts.