The Second brew!

Well it has finally been opened!  Well for me anyway.  The tripel was opened by me this weekend, and oh was the wait worth it!  My uncle, he couldn’t wait for me to get over to his place to unveil it to the world.  He would even rub it into me every chance he got.  Well Sunday was the day I got my ass over there.  This brew was a much better brew, and not because I prefer the style but because it was smoother, had a fuller taste and no after taste.  Let me start out with the look, it poured a nice deep almost ruby red/deep reddish tan with a sizable head.  The smell was of malts and lots of sweet scents like some sweeter fruits.  I took the first sip and I tasted a mouthful of flavors.  I tasted an abundance of fruit along with some grains and malts.  At the end there was an extra blast of sweetness.  There was a pretty good amount of carbonation, not like most tripels that lighten their beer with champagne yeasts.  There was a good balance of carbonation and had a good balance.  This beer is definitely a sipping beer.  It has very good flavors and has a pretty high ABV weighing in in between 9.5-10%.

The Barren Brew Tripel

On top of my own brew I enjoyed other beer…

Ballast Point Victory at Sea

I got myself a growler of Ballast Point Victory at Sea Imperial Porter, boy was that the right choice!  I poured the beer from the growler into a pint glass.  It poured a dark dark brownish maybe black and has a very nice tan head.  The smell is of roasted coffee, toffee, maybe caramel and a little vanilla.  Lots of sweet smells.  When I got that first mouthful you got the taste of the roasted coffee and some malts and is rounded off with that vanilla and a bit of alcohol at the end.  Its hard to hide 10% but it really isn’t overpowering.  There is about an average carbonation, and it has a medium to thick body beer.  This beer is a great beer to have with something sweet or after dinner.  It has all those sweet flavors of coffee and vanilla and toffee.

If you are a Porter and Stout fan definitely get this!

I am going to let this Poll run 1 more week… I want to know where people’s favorite beers come from… also if you please leave a few of your favorite beers from the given country you voted for.  I want to do a history of beer from some of the reader’s favorite beer producing countries along with my beer reviews.

He that drinketh strong beer and goes to bed right mellow, lives as he ought to live and dies a hearty fellow. – Anonymous