Announcements
New Beer Blog
Thursday, October 9th, 2008 | Announcements | No Comments
Welcome to our new beer blog. It has many improvements over the previous site, including a much easier to remember URL.
Todd and Steve are on their way to GABF, and they’ve promised to post new information/trip reviews as soon as they can.
- Anybody can post new content to our site or comment to an existing post. Just let Chuck know if you want this functionality and I can give you an ID
- Post can be filtered by categeory. Not interested in reading about the latest beer tasting but looking for info on what’s new in stores? Just use the Categeory widget on the right to filter what content you are looking for.
- You can post and/or comment from any computer in the world
- Search engine to search archives
- Archive entries categorized by date
- Much more functionality and fun to come!
Ohio Beer Festival
Sunday, July 13th, 2008 | Announcements | 3 Comments
Watch her for Ohio Brew Week Reviews
I’m heading to the Ohio Beer Festival this week (http://www.ohiobrewweek.com ). I will try and post some comments here.
In addition, check out the calendar for some upcoming tasting this week. Dorothy Lane Oakwood has a Stone tasting this week, and Jungle Jim’s has a special event Friday. Be sure and see the calendar for details.
Cave Aged Ommegang!
Wednesday, April 16th, 2008 | Announcements, Beer News, Tasting Reviews | 4 Comments
Cave Aged Ommegang was the highlight of March Testing
Sorry this is so late getting out — busy month. First a couple of announcements…
April beertasting is at Andrew W. house. The theme will be hoppy beers — in honor of the humulus lupulus plant that is used to flavor many of our finer beers. In the midst of the current (hopefully short-lived) hop shortage, we will be drinking our favorite beers with a predominant hop quality — while they are still available. Excellent suggestion Pete!
Also, for anyone interested, Lee Hill of Sierra Nevada will be at Dorothy Lane in Oakwood Wednesday, April 16 (tonight if you read this immediately), I tried to research who Lee Hill is, but couldn’t find anything on the guy, but I’m sure it will be interesting. Also, Friday night, April 18 is a Belgium beer tasting event at “A Taste of Wine” in Miamisburg. I’ve not been to a tasting event here, but it’s a quaint little wine/beer store with a built in tasting bar that looks like it has lots of atmosphere. Sally and I may attend if we can get a babysitter.
I’ve been exchanging emails with a New Jersey Beertasting club has seen our website. They’ve expressed interest in a joint beertasting event sometime in the near future where perhaps we set up a simulcast and co-ordinate the beer list so that we each have the same selections. I’m not sure how this would work exactly or if it would be worth the trouble, but I thought I’d open it up for thoughts, ideas, comments?
March brought on March Madness. And although we had a lot of people out this month, Dave still hosted an excellent event as we all cheered on Belmont as they nearly sent Duke packing in the first round. Here’s the notes I took on some of our selections.
- Dave S. (host) - Pyramid Hefeweizen, Barrel house Cumberland Pale Ale
- Steve — Stone Russian Imperial, Cave Aged Three Philosophers
- Andrew – Anchor Porter (?)
- Chuck — New Holland Red Tulip
- Jay — Wooden Shoe Bock + Ommegang Abbey Ale (?)
Steve wins some major bonus points this month. The Stone Russian Imperial is number 12 on the top 100 list, the highest rated beer we’ve had this year. And I thought it lived up to its rating — with a smooth sweet chocolate malt taste - a very heavy, complex and filling beer. In addition, Steve brought the Ommegang special edition Cave Aged Three Philosophers. From my notes, I recall a bold hoppy start, with a alcohol finish and a characteristic Belgium yeast flavor.
The Cave-Aged label got me curious to see what was special about aging beer in caves, and here is what I found on theOmmegang website…
“We set out to replicate as closely as possible the conditions that produce extraordinary champagnes,” explained Randy Thiel. “The virtues of cave-aging are well understood by champagne producers. There is no doubt that these dark, silent, subterranean “cathedrals” are the ideal surroundings for secondary fermentation and maturation of wines (and beers). It is further known that cold constant temperature between 50 and 55 degrees leads to great complexity, and that the colder the storage, the slower the maturation.”
Another beer that got my attention was the Barrel House Cumberland Pale Ale, with a very sweet hops! We also tasted Ommegang Abbey Ale (I think Jay brought this as a bonus), which I noted had a unique licorice flavor to it. Finally, the Anchor Porter scored high marks for its drinkability and roasted malt flavors.
Here’s the lineup (the rating for Three Philosphers is the regular Three Philosophers, not enough reviews for the Cave Aged beer to be ranked).
- Pyramid Hefeweizen BA C+ RB 32
- Wooden Shoe Bock BA B+ RB 35
- Stone Russian Imperial Stout (#12) BA A RB 100
- New Holland Red Tulip Ale BA B RB 60
- Ommegang Cave Aged Three Philosophers * BA A- RB 97
- Ommegang Abbey Ale BA A- RB 97
- Barrel House Cumberland Pale Ale BA B RB 68
- Anchor Porter BA A- RB 98
MVP POINTS TOTAL
Steve definitely gets some bonus points for his two selections and surpasses Andrew for first place (unless Andrew had a bonus beer that I didn’t give him credit). The Stone Russian Imperial Stout is in the top 100 (#12). The Cave Aged Three Philosophers was not in the top 100, but I gave him 3 extra points for originality and uniqueness, plus the points for bringing a bonus beer. Dave moves up the list for hosting and bringing a bonus as well. We had one more bonus beer, which I believe was Jay’s. Let me know if I’ve made any mistakes….
Prev Total March Score New Total
- Steve B 30 14 44
- Andrew S. 39 3 42
- Dave S 6 16 22
- Mike 18 0 18
- Luke 16 0 16
- Jay 9 6 15
- Chuck 11 3 14
- Steve V. 6 0 6
- Zombie 6 0 6
- Todd 6 0 6
- Pete 6 0 6
- Dave H 3 0 3
- Joe 1 0 1
Beer Tasting Thursday
Wednesday, March 19th, 2008 | Announcements, Events | No Comments
March Madness is this month's theme
Beer tasting at Dave’s house this Thursday. Theme is NCAA basketball, so bring any beers from a brewery in the vicinity of one of the 65 NCAA teams. I will be bring New Holland Red Tulip Ale from Holland, Michigan (which is somewhat in the vicinity of Michigan State, give or take a few hundred miles).
Some news items, I hear Chappy’s is having an Oberon Release Party Wednesday, March 26 to celebrate the 2008 Oberon. There are only a few select bar’s that have this honor, and Chappy’s was chosen for the Dayton area.
Feel free to post your beer selection for Thursday here….
MVP Award
Wednesday, February 27th, 2008 | Announcements | 1 Comment
Beertasting.org MVP award to given out in December
I’ve decided to start the First Annual “Dayton BeerTasting Association MVP Award”. First place will be something out of my personal beer collection, and the award will be completely objective based on the following points system (which I preserve the right to change or modify during the contest as seems fit). Although I am eligible for the award, I am not eligible for the prize and it shall go to whoever has the highest point total at the end of the year excluding myself.
Points are awarded as follows…
- Hosting with acceptable snacks (15 points)
- Hosting with minimal snacks (5 points)
- Hosting with no snacks (-1 point) (Unless the host volunteered with less than 48 hrs notice)
- Bringing beer that adheres to the monthly theme — 3 points
- Bringing beer that does not adhere to monthly theme — 1 point
- Bringing bonus beer (regardless of the theme) — 3 points
- Bringing beer in Beer Advocate’s Top 100 Beers — 5 bonus points
- Bringing Extremely Rare and/or Expensive Beer — Up to 10 bonus points, depending on rarity or expense
- Not showing up to event after positive RSVP — -2 points
- Deduction for bringing duplicate beer tasted since Nov -07 tasting — -1 point
- Deduction for bringing Anheuser Busch product (Joe Barter Rule) — -2 points
- Adding meaningful content to the website by posting to blog — 1 point per entry
So after January, here’s the point total (please feel free to correct me for any mistakes. I think we had at least 2 more bonus beers from January, plus someone gets 5 points for bringing Bells Expedition Stout, #55 on top 100)
Steve — 21 (Hosting + Bonus beer)
Mike — 13 (Utopia )
Andrew S. 8 (Top 100)
Todd — 6 (Bonus beer)
Jay - 6 (Bonus Beer)
Pete - 6 (Bonus Beer)
Zombie 3
Chuck 3
Dave H. 3
Dave S. 3
Steve V 3