Wednesday, February 28, 2018

Ölbeat 343: Tuju Export Stout N:o 2

Brewery: Panimoyhtiö Tuju (in Finnish)
Country: Finland
Style: Foreign Stout
Abv: 8 %
@RateBeer
What about the beer?
Colour is black with a two-finger thick beige head. Aroma has espresso, chocolate and soft milky roast. Taste begins with biting bitter roast. Bitter espresso and roasted salty liquorice take over with sharp spicy chocolate notes. Towards the end both coffee and liquorice round up a bit and give space to dark chocolate and spicy booze. Aftertaste has salty liquorice, strongly bitter roast and dry alcohol warmth.

Bitter and spicy Foreign Stout. Strong & sharp espresso, liquorice, roast and chocolate flavours. Me like it a lot. Seems like we have one high quality brewery near the eastern border in South Carelia.

This beer was part of Alko's Finnish artisanal beer selection in spring 2018.

Ölbeat

Since the brewery is from Lappeenranta, I gave in to the temptation to pair their beer with a song by the band loved by everyone from the same town. "Ihminen tietää sen, että / maailma ilman perkelettä / on kuin viini ilman humalaa. / Ja valtakunta, jossa / hyvyys kylpee valossa, / ei sellaista ole olemassakaan."* And to complete my assholeness, I chose the remix instead of the original version from the album Kuolleen kukan nimi (2002). Cheers!
Kotiteollisuus: Valtakunta (Tappava pila -remix) (YouTube)

From the 2002 EP ±0, the song was written by Kotiteollisuus.

*Bad translation: Everyone knows that / the world without the Devil / is like wine without intoxication. / And a kingdom where / goodness bathes in shine / there's no place like that.

Tuesday, February 27, 2018

Ölbeat 342: Ruosniemen Mandarina Lomittaja

Brewery: Ruosniemen Panimo
Country: Finland
Style: Saison
Abv: 6,3 % 
@RateBeer
What about the beer?
Colour is golden orange with a finger-thick white head. Aroma has yeast, orange and pepper spice. Taste starts with yeasty spicy sourness. Peppery yeast and sour'n'sweet citrus fruits take over. Towards the end bitter citrus peel and sweetish sour fruit come through. Aftertaste has sweet orange and dry spicy & peely bitterness.

Fruity and spicy Saison. The yeasty and spicy start turns nicely into bitter peely finish. Well made one from the neighborhood brewery.

This beer was part of Alko's Finnish artisanal beer selection in spring 2018.
 

Ölbeat

So, Mandarina Lomittaja means a Chinese stand-in, doesn't it? Bad and cheap, but will do.

Steve Poltz: Chinese Vacation (YouTube)

From the 2003 album Chinese Vacation, the song was written by Steve Poltz.

Sunday, February 25, 2018

Sessio #5 (Feb 2018): Beer travel

This post is a part of Sessio, Finnish beer bloggers' monthly posts on the same topic. The topic is selected by a monthly changing host. This topic was selected by Arde arvioi, who will wrap up the Sessio posts in his blog. I will take part in Sessio whenever the subject feels nice and I have time to write a post.

For this month's Sessio, Arde selected beer travel as the topic. The topic suits me nicely, even though I'm not an experienced beer trekker. That's just the way it is, and that's the way it'll probably be until the end. Just a couple of little flaws crack my snifter and prevent me from being a keen beer globetrotter.

I don't have the money for beer travel. My monthly pay goes to mortgage, electricity, water, gasoline, home insurance, the Internet cable and the waste disposal. Besides that there's the family with different kind of needs: wife wants to decorate the garden and kids have their hobbies. Plus we all eat food bought from the grocery store - no free lunches nor dinners for the whole family. Of course, someone might consider it rude and arrogant to even propose canceling the family holiday plans - or moving to a smaller house, eating cheaper food or lowering the standard of everybody's everyday life - just because Daddy wants to fly to the States alone to have a pint or two of fresh West Coast IPA. And that would be rather justified to think that way.

I don't have the time for beer travel. When the time is divided between work, home/family and sleeping, I wonder that there is any "my own time" at all. Well, of course there is - at it's best even a couple of days in a row. Mostly though, if I have more than 24 hours of idle i.e. non-programmed time, I like spend it with the people I love most: wife, kids, even the whole family, friends, parents and all other than not-in-law people in the world. Spending time in traveling - moving from the place I am to the place I want to be - presents the lowest quality time for me. The shorter the period spent in the target is, the more useless the time spent in traveling feels. In the rare cases where I travel for beer to participate in a beer festival in Finland, the beer is the necessary excuse to spend time with a friend or to do something completely different in the city where the festival takes place.

I don't find beer an important enough reason for traveling. Of course, beer would surely taste better and fresher if it's enjoyed near the brewing place. Of course, the atmosphere for enjoying beer is more unique and original near the home of that specific beer. Of course, drinking beer in various destinations would expand my experiences of beer to something that can't be achieved without traveling. Yes, but still for me it's only beer. I tend to choose the destinations of my spare time trips by the things that can be actually done or that can be seen in the destination rather than checking out the beer scene. If I'm not too enthusiastic traveler in general, why should beer turn me to a keen one? I don't need traveling to fill up some kind of experience vacuum, since the smaller, cheaper and less distant experiences reserve that space well enough. Why should I travel to California or Vermont for any reason, if I can get a better personal experience e.g. while playing in the local swimming hall with kids, working out on the crossbar in a nearby park or riding my bike in a cold, horizontally draining rain? Life without beercations might sound flat and boring, but for me that's simple and happy life.

However, for some unexplainable reason, during the last couple of years, I seem to have learned to enjoy the short moments of my working trips - couple of hours in the evening or the last hour before the train leaves - in a local beer restaurant or pub. Here are some pictures from the visits in this February, so this blogpost won't be totally dry.

Turku, 8 February 2018
    
Radbar - Radbrew Total Blackout Porter

Mallaskukko - Amager Bringer of Summer

Tampere, 13 & 15 February 2018

Konttori - Amager/Barrier The Mortician

Konttori - Wylam Jakehead IPA

Konttori - Amager/Barrier The Mortician (2nd take)

Konttori - Maku/Machine Sea Buckthorn IPA

Helsinki, 19 February 2018


Black Door - Cool Head DDH Ipanema

Black Door - Cool Head CITRACITRACITRA

Black Door - Plevnan Tropic Bomb

Ölbeat

If it wasn't clear before this post, now it is: I don't know shit about beer travel. And I don't want to. I'm enjoying my life here at Land's Edge. And I know the essential difference between the traveler and the tourist.

David Lee Roth: Land's Edge (YouTube)

From the 1994 album Your Filthy Little Mouth, the song was written by Terry Kilgore and David Lee Roth.

Thursday, February 15, 2018

Ölbeat 341: Suomenlinnan Kealakekua IPA

Brewery: Suomenlinnan Panimo
Country: Finland
Style: India Pale Ale
Abv: 
@RateBeer
What about the beer?
Colour is hazy golden orange with a small white head. Aroma has pineapple, orange and grapefruit. Taste starts with piny grapefruit bite. Bitter grapefruit and spicy pine take over with sweeter fruity tones. Towards the end piny-fruity bitterness and sweet citrus get on top. Aftertaste has bittersweet grapefruit-orange juice and sour spicy dryness.

Fruity and piny New England -style India Pale Ale. Very nice bittersweet citrus bomb. But. The freshness factor could be clearer. Not excellent nor mind-blowing but still very tasty.

This beer was part of Alko's Finnish artisanal beer selection in spring 2018.

Ölbeat

Kealakekua Bay on the west coast of Kona Island in Hawaii is known for being the place, where Captain James Cook was stabbed to death by a native chief. Of course, that was after Cook and his crew had already achieved tension with the natives and tried to kidnap a Hawaiian chief to his ship. Things didn't really go the way they do in The Beach Boys songs, did they?

The Beach Boys: Hawaii (YouTube)

From the 1963 album Surfer Girl, the song was written by Brian Wilson.

Wednesday, February 7, 2018

Ölbeat 340: Founders PC Pils

Brewery: Founders Brewing Company
Country: United States
Style: India Style Lager
Abv: 5,5 %
@RateBeer
What about the beer?
Colour is golden yellow with a vanishing two-finger-thick white head. Aroma has grapefruit, lemon and malts. Taste begins with fresh bittersour citrus bite. Bitter grapefruit takes over with sweetish malty side tones. Towards the end salty bitter malts, sour lemon and tartish peel get on top. Aftertaste has dryish malts and lasting fresh bittersour grapefruit.

Very fresh and drinkable hopped Pils. Certainly elements of fruity IPA are clearly more present than malty Pilsner qualities. But there are malts sticking out from the background. I could drink this as my castaway beer. Excellent stuff.

Ölbeat

Summer. Sunshine. Lying relaxed on my hammock. With a beer. Put some reggae on.

Bob Marley & The Wailers: Jamming (YouTube)

From the 1977 album Exodus, the song was written by Bob Marley.

Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Ölbeat 339: Austmann / De Molen Mannus & Blodøks

Brewery: Austmann Bryggeri (Brouwerij De Molen)
Country: Norway (Netherlands)
Style: Imperial Stout 
Abv: 8,8 %
@RateBeer
What about the beer?
Colour is black with a thin beige crown. Aroma has sweet coffee, vanilla, chocolate and alcohol. Taste starts with bittersweet roast with a boozy bite. Smoothly bitter dark chocolate and sweet roasted malts take over with vanilla, black coffee and boozy breath. Towards the end dark chocolate, bitter roast and sweet vanilla melt together beautifully, with layers of coffee and espresso lingering in the background. Aftertaste has bitter dark chocolate, strong espresso and lasting dry roast.

Strong and honest Imperial Stout. Heavy flavours of chocolate, coffee, vanilla, roast and warming alcohol roll over me. I lean back, relax and enjoy the battle between the great German ancestor and the mythical Norwegian king. I'll call this a tie and move over by the fireplace to finish my glass. Simply excellent collab brew from the strong Norwegians helped by the world famous Dutch.

Ölbeat

Mannus was, according to Roman Tacitus' writings, a son of the god Tuisto and the father of German human tribes. In the 1800's, his myth was adopted to Aryan beliefs, and later to - what else than - Nazi occult. Oh, that would've made Tacitus happy. Eirik Blodøks, on the other hand, was the king of Norway in the 10th century. The epithet, "Bloodaxe", comes from the later sagas about Eirik slaying his half-brothers to rule Norway and about him being a ruthless Viking raider. And that actually would have made the Norse gods happy, but some others probably not.

Metallica: The God That Failed (YouTube)

From the 1991 album Metallica, the song was written by James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich.

Monday, February 5, 2018

Ölbeat 338: To Øl Mochaccino Messiah

Brewery: To Øl
Country: Denmark (brewed in Belgium)
Style: Brown Ale
Abv: 7 %
@RateBeer
What about the beer?
Colour is dark coffee brown with a big fluffy tan head. Aroma has roasted malts, coffee and dark chocolate. Taste starts with gently bitter malty roast. Roasted malts take over with cocoa-coffee bitterness. Towards the end dark chocolate and cappuccino get on top with hints of sweetness. Aftertaste has bitter dark-roasted coffee and spicy malty dryness.

Spiced and roasted Brown Ale. Malts and roast play the first fiddle, but different flavours of coffee and chocolate fit nicely in. Surely experimental and far from both too weird and too boring. Slow, tasty and complex brew. Pretty good, I think.

Ölbeat

This was easy, there's already a song for this one. You need a machine to make a mochaccino, right? Right!

Sepultura: Machine Messiah (YouTube)

From the 2017 album Machine Messiah, the song was written by Andreas Kisser, Eloy Casagrande and Derrick Green.