samer/thoughts

La Petroleuse is a fantastic beer from Brewer's Art. At 7.8% it was in the middle of the alcohol range for these beers. It is a nice golden blond beer made in the tradition of beers from France. It has a nice spicy taste and hoppy as well. I must say that this was my second favorite beer of the night.

The great thing about Brewer's Art being there was getting to catch up a bit with Volker. He opened the place about 8 years ago. It is amazing to think back that I knew him from before those days on a local internet provider called ClarkNet. It really was cool to see him again, and hope to go up to Baltimore sooner or later for another good meal and drinks there.

My favorite beer of the night was Old Dominion's. The Millennium is a damn good beer on its own, but when you age it in a bourbon cask, watch out. A heady aroma of bourbon, vanilla and sweet maltiness greets you. You sip this beer and you understand the amazing talent that some brewers have.

Mark Thompson from Starr Hill was the most hysterical speaker there. He might even have topped Sam from Dogfish. The two year old Imperial Stout that he brought with him was really nice. Smokey and roasty, it had molasses added during the brewing.

Legend's Barleywine had a different taste than most: a bit of sour apple. The taste was definitely unexpected, but it was quite good.

The Heavyweight Old Salty had a strange mouth feel to me, almost grainy. But again, despite the alcohol content, it was a good smooth drink.

Ram's Head's Old Ale had a nice hoppiness to it, much more bitter than I would have expected in a beer that strong.

I was not too impressed with either the Rock Bottom or the DC Chophouse offerings. The Chophouse Dopple Bock is the nicer of the two beers though. And The brewer there learned to home brew when he was in Antarctica!

The Shenandoah Hard Cider was an interesting beer. That's right, it is technically a beer, not a cider. But because it was brewed with apples (well, juice), it has to be called a cider. Bloody idiotic government bureaucracy. The beer itself was pretty good for a malt extract based, apple beer.