Playing with Jeff...

Lets' set the record straight!

Over the years, many have enjoyed the harmless, albeit, vicious banter between Doc Wort and Jeff Alworth at Beervana. The Doc has received all kinds of nasty emails and posts, standing behind Jeff's moderate beer babble and hokey reviews. Some have suggested that the Doc and Jeff are the same person; The Doc being Jeff's evil twin personality! Jeff could and must have an evil beer twin in his brain. It must be hard for to restrain himself at times.... All those Bullshit flowery kudos he gives upon the most mediocre beers one can swill. In all seriousness, The Doc and Jeff hold no ill feelings towards each other. Sorry to disappoint the readers! We're the classic storytellers dream: Good vs. Evil. If there is any question to this statement, you can look at our Blog hits. Anytime Jeff and the Doc get into a heated debate our hits roll like the dollar signs on a gas pump!

Since it's the giving season.... The Doc was trolling some of Jeff's old posts. Going back to the 2006 Holiday Beer season. In keeping with our ongoing banter, Doc submits these Beervana treats of beer evaluation. Who loved ya baby! ;-)

Full Sail Wreck the Halls
Since Full Sail already had one winter seasonal, John Harris's cult favorite is called a "brewmaster's reserve." But make no mistake, with a name like "Wreck the Halls," you know it's a holiday beer. After Sierra Nevada's Celebration, Wreck the Halls may inspire the most fervent devotion of any winter ale, but of the two, it seems more worthy to me.

Tasting Notes
Pours out a warm bronze with a pretty white head, and bursts with aroma. Bursts, as in an orange, sending its citrus into the air like a freshly-peeled fruit. Almost every winter ale will be better six months or a year after it was bottled, but this is the exception--you want to get a bottle while those hops are still so energetic.

Wow Jeff! That's just amazing! The beer tastes and smells like Citrus, period. Don't hold back on that description! Are your describing Lemonade?

Blitzen (tripel) - Rock Bottom Brewery
Long ago there was a chain restaurant in downtown Portland with a theme--they all have themes--of beer. You could get cute little ales that tasted like soda with your mediocre food. It was so popular people packed the joint. It was the one brewery in Oregon I never wrote about when I was writting for Celebrator and Willamette Week, because I refused to recognize it as a brewery. (They were pissed, but they would have been more so if I actually wrote about their beers.) Well, all that has changed. They brew real beers now, and I actually go out of my way to try them. This offering is a very tough style, and even good examples suffer by not having the complexity you'd find in a brewery with a 200-year-old yeast strain. That said, this was one of the best American examples I've had, with a complex recipe and decent yeast character. The head was remarkable, too--like whipped cream.

This is a great post where you have to read between the lines. A pub with a Beer theme? Really, what a concept. Beers that taste like soda and mediocre food AND Popular with the locals. What does this tell you about the local palate for quality beer and food?

Beer description: You like the Beer and it has a good head. Any other descriptions of the beer? Color, Aroma or flavor? Maybe a little background on what a Tripel should taste like? A Comparison? Anything? Nope! You like it and it has a great head? Sounds like a night at Cat House.

You note that you now have a Rock Bottom beer that you can review, (Even though you didn't!) but still don't balance it out with the fact that the crappy ones still exist? No new comments on food quality.... Guess we are to assume it's still mediocre? What's next... Philadelphia's prized Ketchup dispensers?

Cuvée de Noël - St. Feuillien
No notes on this one. I recall that it emphasized the malts and was smoother and less complex than I expected. A gentler winter warmer.

This is my favorite! No notes! The beer has malts and was smoother than you expected. What did you expect? Something Jeff... anything would have been nice.

Golden Valley Tannen Bomb
When I first encountered Tannen Bomb in 1998, Golden Valley was having a little trouble with its yeast. Something in the process produced excess diacetyl, which actually made for quite a beer. It was ultra silky and butterscotchy, and you could gobble down a pint without recognizing it was 8% alcohol ... and thus did you get (Tannen) bombed. The brewery has gotten things under control, and now Tannen Bomb is a more complex ale and not nearly so stealthy (probably good).

DW: Trouble with yeast equates into BAD Sanitation and care of Yeast! Diacetyl = Poor mash temps or poor conditioning. So you like the Diacetyl off flavor and gobble it down? The reader should have stopped reading there! So, the beer is fixed, but your review is still empty and flawed.

It is about the color of maple syrup, and only just slightly less thick. The main aromatic note is alcohol--it smells big. Golden Valley calls it a strong ale, but it also tastes big, with the body and alcohol of a barleywine. It could do with a month or two of age, when the roasted malts, alcohol, and hops blend more fluidly together. But even at this stage, it's quite nice. Sally keeps sneaking over for sly sips as I write this.

Hops: Chinook, Liberty, Fuggles, alcohol:8.0% abv, bitterness units: 50, Rating: Good.

DW; Almost as thick as Maple syrup! Wow! Must have the consistency of 40 weight auto oil! Smells like alcohol and big! What does BIG smell like? Big Feet? Big Ass? Maybe Sally can tell us what the beer tastes like?


Full Sail Wassail
Full Sail's venerable winter ale has been brewed since 1988, and--full disclosure--it's long been my favorite. It's another one of the beers that is released too early, and which I buy too early, with delight. As evidence of how things have changed, it appears the recipe is now fixed (Full Sail gives very little data about what's in their beers, though they used to give all the details.) Until a few years ago, however, they would mix it up every year, using different hops, slightly differing malts--just to shake things up. I guess we've come to a "mature" phase where that kind of variability is no longer considered good business.

Wassail is a deep brown, almost tending toward porter dark. It has a pronounced roasted aroma, a bit like fresh toast. The flavor is a deep, resonant mixture, the dark malts blending with the hops for a dark, satisfying winter warmer. It also has a sweet quality somewhat akin to Cola or chocolate, drawn out by the very dry, bitter finish. In fact, that's not a bad comparison--it's liquid version of very dark, artisinal chocolate. Rich and decadent. The version on shelves now is, like Jubel, a little green, and I'll have to do a fuller review in a couple months.

Finally! We get a beer description!!! YAY!! Oh.. wait! We're lacking a little in the flavor descriptions.... What Hop flavors and aromas does the hop bring to the beer? Are the malt flavors fruity? caramel? Nutty? Roasty, chocolatey, etc? Sweet like Cola or Chocolate? Which one? All in all, not bad description. Doesn't a little green in the bottle basically mean... Bottled too soon or are you trying to say the beer needs to maturate in the bottle?

OK.... I've kept my end of our relationship. Cheers Jeff! Have a great Holiday Season.