Harpoon Beer Dinner at Kitty Hoynes

We recently enjoyed a fine evening of food and drink at Kitty Hoynes, a pub and eatery located in the Armory Square area of Syracuse, NY. Periodically, Kitty Hoynes puts on beer pairings dinners which highlight a particular brewery (not to mention the tasty offerings by Chef Damien Brownlow). January 26th saw Ed Valenta of Harpoon Brewery out of Boston come to town with several of their excellent brews in tow.

Kitty Hoynes Irish Pub located at 301 West Fayette Street in Syracuse is a great place to eat or drink whether or not there's a beer dinner. The pub area is dominated by a massive oval bar with the requisite Irish themed decor. While their selection of beers can't rival nearby Clarkes' Ale House or the Blue Tusk, they always have a nice variety on tap. Guinness, Bass, Harp, Boddington's and Smithwick's are always available (as well as the usual yellow fizzy beer if you so choose), but they also have a rotating selection of excellent craft beers. On this particular night they had Great Lakes Burning River Pale Ale and the featured brew was Harpoon's Celtic Ale. Their drafts are served in generous 20 oz. "pint" glasses. We arrived early and were able to imbibe in a couple of pints before the main event.
Kitty Hoynes' food is always excellent and on this night the choices were superb.

We started the evening off with Potato Croquettes with honey mustard horseradish sauce. This was paired with Harpoon's wheat beer, UFO White. This beer is a light Belgian wheat beer with a citrusy tang. While I must admit citrusy wheat beers are not my favorite, it was a decent beer to start off with.

Next came the appetizer course: Pan roasted apricot glazed Cornish hen atop a zucchini nest (again, delish). With this we had Celtic Ale. Like most Irish Ales it is a malty brew, medium bodied with a bit of a hop finish. Very good beer - nice nose, rich amber color with a bold yet balanced taste.

The salad course (arugula, radishes, tomatoes, onions, spicy almonds and goat cheese in white balsamic vinaigrette) brought with it Harpoon IPA. We hopheads smiled. At 42 IBU's it is a nicely hopped beer (consider a typical American Lager such as Bud or Miller is around 10-15 IBU's). Wonderful hop aroma jumps right out at you. Real nice bitter finish that lingers nicely on the palate. This is Harpoon's flagship brew and it shows. There's a nice toasty maltiness that works nicely with the hops. An excellent all-round beer.

Next was the soup course, a delicious Irish Seafood Coddle. With this we had Harpoon's UFO Pale Ale. This is an unfiltered pale ale in the style of English Pale Ales. While not as hoppy as the IPA of course (34 IBU) it nonetheless retains a nice bitter finish. Overall a lighter, more balanced beer. Very pleasant nose - floral, hoppy.



The entree for the evening was beer brined pork chop topped with a poblano and tomato chutney served with mapel yams and a vegetable bundle (yum!) For the beer, Ed brought out the big guns. From their Leviathan series of big, strong beers we had Leviathan Baltic Porter. At 9.5% ABV it is a solid take-no-prisoners brew. This is a full-bodied beer with dark chocolate notes. We will visit it further at our next beer club as it goes head to head with selected Porters.




We ended the evening with Sweet n tart Apple Surprise paired with Harpoon's Apple Cider. The cider was nicely dry and made for a pleasant complement to Kitty Hoyne's excellent dessert.

The Battle of the British (Style) Beers

The Event: The 5th meeting of the Beer Club on January 15th, 2010.
The Place: Gerry and Donna Hudson's
The Mission: To taste and rate a selection of English style beers.
The Judges: Host Gerry Hudson, Ron Harrington, Dan Riley, Herb Clark, Mike Watkins, Hal Moore, and Rick Sherman.

The Contenders:

1. Arcadia English IPA - From Battle Creek, Michigan, weighing in at 5.9% ABV with a 1060 OG and 41 IBU
Arcadia has a nice looking web site and lists 15 brews.






2. Boxing Day Bitter from Middle Ages an English Bitter Ale - From Syracuse, NY, and weighing in at 6% ABV and available only on tap or in growlers. More Middle Ages brews here.






3. Fuller's London Pride, an English Pale Ale -From London, England, weighing in at 4.7 ABV. Fuller's web site is here.





4. Hobgoblin Beer, an English Brown Ale - from Oxfordshire, UK weighing 5.20% ABV.
The Wychwood Brewery web site is pretty cool.





5. Newcastle Brown Ale, an English Brown Ale from Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, UK (part of Heineken International) weighing 4.7 ABV.
Newcastle's site is still under construction, but you can go here and sign up with them for info and updates.




6. St. Peter's IPA, an English India Pale Ale, from St. Peter South Elmham, Bungay, Suffolk, UK - weighing 4.7 ABV.
If you want to check out their site, go here.






7. Tanner's Jack, an English Ale from Morland's Breweries in Abingdon, UK, weighing in at 4.2% ABV.

Greene King is associated with Morland's and Greene King has a web site.

This and That

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There was a dramatic shift from the previous tastings, primarily in that there was not a blind taste test at this meeting. Gerry developed a rubric that was used to rate some of the characteristics of the beers. These included aroma, appearance, taste, and finish. Aroma had sub-catagories of malty and/or hoppy, appearance had sub-categories of color, clarity and head; taste ranged through malty, hoppy, nutty, fruity, wheat, tart, sweet, roasted, crusty, bitter, and sour; finish ranged through strong, firm,memorable, weak and invisible. Finally, taking these characteristics into account, we rated the beers on a 1-7 scale as in past meetings.

This style of tastings offered up some very interesting results. There was very little agreement among our members about appearance, especially color. Aroma didn't get much agreement either, except for the Tanner's Jack English Ale. Everyone mentioned a skunky, bad nose. Could this have been a result of a clear glass bottle? And pretty consistent comments that once you got it to your palate, it was really not a terrible brew. The categories of taste and finish got the most agreement, but within a range. Not surprisingly, English style beers tended less toward the hoppy and more towards some of the sweet, malty, fruity, and bitter tastes. The finish category was sprinkled with a couple "weaks," but primarily with "strong," "firm," and "memorable." No beer received and "invisible" ranking as we have a hard and fast rule: "NO LIGHTS (or Lites) ALLOWED!" As in previous meetings, it was a unanimous feeling that there were no poor choices, but there were definite favorites.

The Results

The Winner, with 13 quality points (3 first place votes, three second place votes and 1 fourth place votes) was:

Middle Ages Boxing Day Bitter!

Champion of the English Style Ales Division.

2. St. Peter's IPA came in second with 17 quality points (1 first, 2 seconds and 4 thirds).

3. Arcadia IPA finished third with 2 first place votes.

The next three were very close:

4. Fuller's

5. Hobgoblin

6. Newcastle

Finally, due to the unpleasant nose (I noticed the same problem is mentioned in Beer Advocate rating of Tanner's Jack).
7. Tanner's Jack - again, with this beer, once you got past the somewhat skunky smell, it tasted pretty good.

A Hoppy Ending

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The meeting ended with a treat provided by Herb, who brought two samples of Wailing Wench from Middle Ages Brewery out of Syracuse, NY. One sampling was bottled Wench and one was draft from a growler. Though both were delicious and a fine choice on any day - the differences were day and night when tasted side by side. As we tried each, we talked our way through the experience. From the bottled sample, comments included, "better nose; hoppy; really good; bite; strong finish." From the draft, comments included, "smooth; sweeter; more complex taste; more going on; fresher; fun in your mouth."

No matter what, it was great to enjoy two of Middle Ages best brews in one night!

The evening concluded with pub food which was amazing.

The next meeting will be February 28th at Hal's. The beer choice will be Porters.

Dundee Gets It!

Just before our next Beer Club, I wanted to give a shout out to a beer that took me by surprise. It's Dundee's India Pale Ale! If you recall, at our last Beer Club meeting, Dundee's Festival Ale fared quite well. This is not to knock Dundee, it's just that their Honey Brown, while a decent enough beer, always seemed to me to be a bit safe. It came out in the early part of the craft beer renaissance, and like many of the larger breweries, it was an attempt to test the craft beer waters without losing it's swimsuit. Michelob had Michelob Dark, Lowenbrau had their dark beer etc. The trouble was, the most distinctive thing about these beers was the color. Close your eyes and it was tough to tell them from their lighter brother. While Honey Brown was certainly bolder and makes for a very nice session beer, it wasn't going to knock your socks off.

Lately, however, High Falls Brewery (which produces Dundee) seems to be jumping in with both feet. They have rebranded J.W. Dundee as Dundee, and, judging by the Festival Ale and now their IPA, are letting their hair down a bit and not fearing the hops.

Their IPA has a wonderful copper color with a good, creamy amber head. Very good nose as the hops jump right out at you. The bottle says "Bold and Bitter" and I'll be darned if it isn't. It starts with a nice malty/hoppy balance and finishes with a very satisfying bitter bite. And here's some really good news: only $6.99 for a sixer. Not bad by craft beer standards. Dundee has six year-round brews: Pale Bock Lager, Porter, Wheat Beer, Honey Brown, Pale Ale and IPA.

Here's a link to High Falls Brewery's web site. Lots of interesting stuff there and I borrowed (stole) heavily for the section below. Hope they don't mind. Check out their site for a more in-depth look at the High Falls Story.

A little history:
The current High Falls Brewery originated as the Rau and Reisky Brewery in 1857 in Rochester, NY. It was located next to the highest of three water falls. These were great places for breweries back then because, without refrigeration, caves were cut into the solid rock walls which provided excellent insulation.

In 1878 the name was changed to the Genesee Brewing Company by new owner Mathius Kondolf.

The brewery continued until 1919 when Prohibition forced its closing. In 1932 Louis Wehle purchased it and part of the Barthelomay Brewery to create the new Genesee Brewing Company.

In 1952, Miss Genny is unveiled - the company's most successful advertising campaign.

1994 - J.W. Dundee's Honey Brown Lager is introduced.

2000 - Genesee is reorganized as High Falls Brewery

2008 - J.W. Dundee becomes Dundee and more craft type beers are brewed - six year round and 4 seasonal.

Holiday Ales

The fourth meeting of the Beer Club took place on Friday, December 18, 2009 at the Rileys. The theme, appropriately enough was "Holiday Ales." As more and more craft brewers are getting into the game, seasonal brews are becoming much more commonplace. Before the craft beer explosion, the closest thing to a seasonal was the annual release of Bock beers in the spring by some brewers. Now we have Octoberfests and Harvest Ales in the fall, Holiday brews as the holiday season approaches, Spiced Winter Ales, Maibocks as well as Bock beers in the spring, and Summer Ales. All of which are brewed in limited quantities.

The full compliment of members were present and for the first time, our very own Mike Watkins threw his hat into the ring with his own home holiday brew - Hoppy Holidays. The competing beers were as follows:

Great Lakes Christmas Ale
J.W. Dundee's Festival Ale
Otter Creek's Winter Ale
Middle Ages Winter Warmer
Saranac's Seasonal Beer
Sierra Nevada's Celebration Ale
Watkin's Hoppy Holiday Ale

Using our usual scoring system the results were as follows:
1. Sierra Nevada's Celebration Ale - 15 points with 4 1st place votes - Comments: "Pale, cloudy, hoppiest so far; hops throughout the gauntlet cloudy amber color, very hoppy, excellent beer, nice finish; nice color;  hoppy."

2. Watkins' Hoppy Holidays - One first place and three 2nd place votes - Comments: "Yummy, delicious, deep red color; nice finish, cloudy; nice hop start, clean finish; cloudy red color, full bodied, very tasty, interesting; not too spicy; mysteriously murky with an end well! Best brew of the night!"

3. Great Lakes Christmas Ale - 24 points - four 3rd place nods. Comments: "Spicy flavor, copper color; clean start, finished with a nice hop taste; copper color, very distinctive taste; spicy finish, crisp wintery spice taste; lighter, good on pancakes, replaces maple syrup (almost)."

4. J. W. Dundee Festival Ale - Comments: "Very tasty - tastes like more - a good session beer; not too hoppy, slight malt; malty, smooth, slight bitter aftertaste; light; I was dying of thirst here (only first place vote - and it was from Mike Watkins who brewed Hoppy Holidays. Just to show how we protect the identity of the beers as they are being tasted.); amber, rich, goes down smooth."

5/6 - Tied at 34 points - listed alphabetically: Otter Creek Winter Ale: Comments: "Aroma of raspberries,  nice winter drink, nice bitter, not sweet, not hoppy; subtle raspberry, not overpowering, too sweet."

5/6 - Saranac's Seasonal - Comments: "Again very nice, pale lighter color, more malt than hops; light hooppy start; red in color, nice balance tilting toward malty/sweet; smooth; easy taste."

7. Middle Ages Winter Wizard - 40 points (three 7th, two 6th) - Comments: "fruity, caramel color' banana; somewhat banana undertaste; smooth, some hops; fruity; reddish, somewhat bitter/with banana; Hello!"

Congrats to Mike for taking a very respectable second place to Sierra Nevada which is one of the gold standards for good hoppy interesting beers. Nearly everyone placed his beer first or second. It's a terrific beer and remember, these were blind taste tests.

I hate to see Middle Ages fare so poorly, it's a great local brewery, but they tend to hew much more closely to the English style beers rather than the hoppier brews we tend to be drawn to.

Along with the beers, we had some terrific food - with a Mexican theme. Perfect for nice bold beers.





Next we move this movable feast to Gerry's and we will be tasting some British beers.

Irish Beers

Okay, back to beer. It's been a while since our last Beer Club meeting. It's often difficult to find a date when everyone is free. But this time we were able to get the whole crew together: Dan, Gerry, Hal, Herb, Mike, Ron and yours truly. Anyhow, this one was a little different. We decided to compare beers that have the name "Irish" in them - other than Guinness. It becomes a bit of a challenge because in essence we are comparing different styles of beer: ales, red ales, stouts and black lagers.It's the old "apples and oranges" deal. But what the hell, it's not like the beer police are going to arrest us for it. Hopefully.

We ended up with seven different beers all with claims of Irish heritage. The challengers were:
1. Beamish Draught Style Stout
2. McSorley's Irish Black Lager
3. McSorley's Irish Pale Ale
4. O'Hara's Irish Red
5. Paper City's Ireland Parish Brand
6. Samuel Adams Irish Red
7. Smithwick's Irish Ale

I know Smithwicks is made by Guinness, but it's not GUINNESS, you know?

The results were rather surprising. Again the tasting was blind with each beer identified only by a colored dot which later revealed the corresponding beer. We ranked them 1-7 (except for Herb, a kindly soul, who could not find it in his heart to rate anything under a three - so he gave a one and a two and then five threes. And that's okay, because you never know when you might be in a pub and the only drinkable beer is the one you ranked seventh. It could be awkward.) Below is how each beer finished (low score = best a la golf), its point total and some comments by various members.

#1. Paper City's Ireland Parish Brand - 20 quality points. Comments: "Nice hop, smooth," "Hoppy," "Yellow-dark color, nice frothy head," "Okay," "Best."

#2. Samuel Adams Irish Red - 23 quality points. Comments: "Malty...low taste," Good. Could drink this with NO problem," "Red to brown shading, almost fruity aftertaste," "Nice hops presence," "Well balanced," "Better."

#3. McSorley's Irish Black Lager - 25 quality points. Comments: "Strong malt," "A good breakfast juice," "Deep, rich color - bitter enjoyable taste," "More carbonated, well-balanced," "Artificial taste."

4. Beamish Draught Style Stout - 27 quality points. Comments: "Sweet. Stout-like, malty," "Very smooth, 'stouty,'" "Frothy creamy head - smoky taste," Smooth, creamy, nice head (can't go bad there), not real strong opening - does finish with a bit of a bitter bite." " A little chocolaty, creamy. Stout?"

#5. McSorley's Irish Pale Ale - 28 quality points. Comments:"Light, low flavor," "Cool, smooth, goes down easy. Brilliant!" "Pleasant reddish color; smooth taste," "Good balance," "Off taste, bitter - but not hoppy, maybe spicy."

#6. O'Hara's Irish Red - 29 quality points. Comments: "Malty - not hoppy, molasses," "A true kindred spirit Irish beer!" "Brown tone, dark color, brash taste," "Opens with a maltiness - then finishes with a nice bitterness," "Chocolate and spice," "Good."

#7. Smithwick's Irish Ale - 32 quality points. Comments: "Light - malt," "Blah. Not very impressive," "Amber-to-red color, light, cheerful," Lighter," "Neutral."

Biggest surprise for me was that Smithwicks landed at the bottom of the group. I would have expected it to have scored much better. Smithwicks is one of those beers that I always look at as a good fall-back beer, like Sam Adams lager, if a bar has no true craft beers on tap. I've found it a pleasant, drinkable beer. Sort of inoffensive and light-years better than the ubiquitous Bud Light etc. that can be found in pretty much every bar in the world.

On the other hand, Paper City's Ireland Parish Brand was a great find. This is honestly a beer I was totally unfamiliar with and found it really terrific. It probably had the strongest hop presence of all the beers, which would automatically skew it in a positive direction for most of us since we tend to be hopeless hop-heads.

Again, there wasn't a bad beer in the bunch, but I will certainly look for Paper City. Sam Adams was a perfect fit for this style as they tend to lean toward the Irish style beer anyway. And their Irish Red was very good.

Next up: Holiday Brews

Road Trip - Burlington, VT - Land of Free Samples

On the Road

We took a quick weekend excursion with our friends Mike and Diane to Burlington, Vermont. I like to look at it as a kind of working vacation, if you will. Burlington has a fine array of terrific brew pubs and breweries. What is truly amazing is that you can walk into any restaurant in the city and find a good beer. Many places would have ten or twelve taps with nary a Bud Light in sight.

Lake Placid Brewery and Pub

But first things first. On our way up we made a swing through Lake Placid to see the sights and stop at the Lake Placid Brewery and Pub for lunch. It's a cozy little unassuming pub with a friendly and knowledgeable staff. We ordered some tasty appetizers and a pint. They had five or six different brews on tap but we really only had time for one. I like their Ubu Ale, but we can get that around here. Hopheads that we are, Mike and I both opted for their Back Fence IPA. Very good brew with a strong hop presence. Went great with the nachos. Here's a neat little video on craft beers I found at the Lake Placid Brewery site: I am a Craft Brewer

Scenery Stuff

Unfortunately, we couldn't stay for more than one, since we had to push on to Vermont. The trip from Mexico, NY to Burlington is a long, twisty drive that yields some stunning vistas, especially in the fall with the leaves turning. We took the ferry across Lake Champlain, about a twenty minute excursion.

Mike and Diane waiting for the ferry

Les crossing Lake Champlain

Burlington - Vermont Brewing Company, Ben and Jerry's, Cheese and Chocolate

Our first stop in Burlington was the Vermont Brewing Company Pub where we enjoyed their excellent IPA.
Saturday we made a trip out to Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream and did the tour there. It's worth doing. One of those things were there's a video showing how Ben and Jerry got started etc. You get to look in on the vats of ice cream, learn a little about the process. Interesting stuff and our tour guide was a fun and funky middle aged woman with the sort of ex-hippie laid-back attitude that befits Ben and Jerry's. Unfortunately, I wasn't thrilled with the flavor they had out as a free sample. One of those Cookies-and-Cream concoctions that many people just love. I find them overly sweet myself. But I seemed to be in the minority.
We then hit Cabot Cheese and tried a bunch of really tasty samples of cheese, crackers, condiments, dips. Went to a cider mill and got some free cider samples - delicious. Then hit Lake Champlain Chocolates for more freebees. Also bought some dark chocolate and some dark chocolate with hot pepper - really good.

Switchback Brewery

Finally, we were able to get to Switchback Brewery for their tour. We were greeted by a guy in his twenties, dressed in jeans and a tee-shirt and a young girl eating an orange. The tour is a bare-bones look at the inner workings of a brewery. No videos, no frills. The guy, friendly and unassuming, just gave us a brief history of Switchback, took us through the brewing process, showed us how the brewery has been steadily expanding. Switchback makes one beer - Switchback Ale. You cannot get it in bottles, only on tap. It is sold regionally throughout Vermont and much of northeastern New York. However, they struggle to keep up with the demand. They have no intentions to ever sell it in bottles, though they are working on a Porter for the holidays. We ended the tour with some samples of the beer taken right from one of the big holding tanks. It is a very nicely balanced ale. Would make a terrific session beer.

Magic Hat Brewery - Beer Chotchkies and Free Beer

For contrast, we left Switchback and went down the road to the Magic Hat Brewery. Magic Hat is a much larger brewery (our guide claimed it was the 10th largest in the US, though when I checked this out on a beer info site they came up 18th) and as such, their tour has all the trappings - witty guide, video, large balcony that overlooks the facility and a large gift shop/bar where you enter and exit. The theme, being close to Halloween, was Night of the living Dead.
Again, a very informative tour, but the highlight was the big bar with endless free samples. I sampled Lucky Kat IPA (very good ale, good hoppy bite), American Sour Ale (not my cup of tea - very strong lemony flavor. Reminded me of a European Shandy), Belgian Stout (liked it), a Black Lager (surprisingly good) and Roxie Rolles (loved it - nicely balanced ale).
Bought a Magic Hat pint glass with their "Night of the Living Dead" logo on it.

A Couple Other Brew Pubs

We also had time to hit a couple of other Brew Pubs: 3 Needs Brew Pub and American Flatbread. We tried to get reservations for dinner at American Flatbread, but there was a two and a half hour wait!
At 3 Needs, we had their Chocolate Porter (nice rich flavorful beer), and their IPA which was also good.
At American Flatiron their IPA was outstanding. Very strong hops with a nice bitter bite. We also tried their ZG Helles Cask Ale. A good session beer, but we should have had it before the IPA rather than after as it rather falls flat by comparison.

If you like good craft beers, it's hard to beat Burlington.


Lake Champlain

ESB (Extra Special Blog)

Hey we're back with another beer club meeting for our second beer smack-down. This time we decided to compare a random selection of ESB's (Extra Special Bitters). First, a little bit about ESB's. While, of course, everything is a matter of taste, the "ideal" for an ESB is that it is a beer with a nice balance between the sweetness of the malt and the bitterness of the hops. The name is a bit of a misnomer in that ESB's are generally not that bitter. ESB's make for a nice "session" beer, one which you can settle into for an evening wherein you may imbibe in more than a couple. As is the case with many styles of beer, there is a great variance in color as well as taste. ESB's can run the gamut from a pale golden color to a fairly dark chocolate shade. Some emphasize the malty sweetness, while others tip toward the hoppy end of the scale. Alcohol content is usually not particularly high, ergo the session beer appellation.
The beers we choose for our taste comparison were: Middle Age's Beast Bitter, Fuller's ESB, Gritty McDuff's Best Bitter, Sierra Nevada's ESB, and Stoudt's ESB. Once again we used the totally subjective format of rating the beers 1-5 so that the low score wins. And again, you have a bunch of guys who have a distinct prejudice in favor of hoppy beers. As before, we were the ultimate winners because all five beers were quite tasty. All agreed it was a difficult task to rank the beers and found it necessary to sample each numerous times.
Our host this time was Mike and he color coded the samples - blue, green, orange etc. which will help explain some of the comments by Dan regarding some of the beers. Without further ado then, here are the results:

5th place - Gritty McDuff''s Best Bitter - It recieved 2 third place votes and 2 fifth place votes for a quality score of 16. (Herb choose to enjoy the beers without rating them - and who could blame him! He said, "They're all good." Bless his heart.) - Some of the comments were: "Balanced; not very heady" "Tasty, unassuming" "Orange you glad you came tonight?"

4th place - Middle Age's Beast Bitter - It received a second place vote, a third place vote and 2 fourth place votes for a total of 13 quality points. "Very similar in taste to Fuller's" "Sweeter, malty" and "Red Bull it's not."

3rd place - Stoudts' ESB - This beer was all over the place with one first place, one second place, one fourth place and one fifth place for a total of 12 quality points. "Darkest of the bunch" "Balanced, tasty" "Brilliant #1" "Lightest (taste) of the group."

2nd place - Fuller's ESB - Fuller's garnered two first place votes, but also received a fourth and a fifth place vote for a total of 11. "Not balanced; overpowered by hoppy tones" "Heartiest of the lot" "more bitter, hoppier" "Not a Blue Light for sure!"

1st place - Sierra Nevada ESB - Well, the West Coast did it again. With one first, two second and one third place vote for a total of 8 points it was the clear winner overall. "Delicious; good, lasting head" "Nice aroma" "the dark side of ESB" "Maltier than orange (Gritty's)."

Well, there you have it. Once we finished the grueling task of rating these fine beers we were treated to a meal that perfectly complemented the hearty brews, highlighted by a variety of stuffed peppers (both hot and mild) which Mike and Diane picked from their garden and prepared. It was a perfect evening.
Up next: Any beer with the word "Irish" in its name EXCEPT Guinness. That could include Irish Ales, Irish Reds, Irish Stouts etc. Should be interesting

And finally, a shout out to Southern Tier Brewery for their Harvest Ale. I picked up a sixer of this seasonal on a whim and I was pleasantly surprised. Not that I didn't expect something good from this excellent brewery located in Lakewood, New York. They produce a number of terrific brews (see: southertierbrewing.com). However a Harvest Ale or Octoberfest I expect to be more of a malty brew. With this beer they were not shy with the hops and the result is a wonderful, full-bodied ale that for me has a perfect balance of malt and hops. It starts out with a very pleasing, nutty sweetness and then a surprisingly strong hops presence bursts through for a satisfying finish.
Well done, Southern Tier!! I must stock up before the season is over.

Cheers!