Hoppin' Frog Sweet Evil & Naked Evil

Another long review here, as I'm reviewing two beers side-by-side.  Both are from the same company, Hoppin' Frog.

Hoppin' Frog Brewery has only been around for six years, but they've already established quite a name for themselves.  Some breweries make themselves known primarily for putting out consistently good easy-to-make beers that can appeal to the everyday beer drinker.  Sierra Nevada, Boston Brewing Company (Sam Adams), Anchor, and for most of its existence Goose Island are all such companies.  In a beer world of increasingly strong, big, experimental, complex ales, some breweries have decided to go all-in with complex (and expensive) beers right away rather than starting small.  Hoppin' Frog is one of those companies; of the nine beers I have seen by them in local stores, only one of them is weaker than 8% alcohol.  They make imperial stouts, imperial oatmeal stouts, English barleywines, Scottish barleywines ("Scotch Ales"), imperial IPA's....all big beers.  And they make whiskey barrel-aged versions of almost all of those as well.

Last year, for their fifth anniversary, they released Naked Evil, an Anglo-Belgian barleywine aged in whiskey barrels.  It quickly made its way onto Beer Advocate's Top Ten list for the style.  Not bad, considering the competition (I've had three others on the list).  This year, they released it again alongside the non-aged version, Sweet Evil.  Both are available only as single 22oz bottles.




Both Sweet and Naked Evil look similar, which is to say they both look like this:

It just seemed silly to serve such a fancy beer in a cheap mug....

The general lack of bubbles and foam is noteworthy, especially because I poured it pretty hard.  It was the same story with Sweet Evil.  Barleywines are not normally known for being very carbonated; fans can usually expect low carbonation and a thick body.  Many people like to age these like wine for years (hence the name "barleywine"), which tends to exaggerate the minimal carbonation.  I was, however, expecting a bit more here; these were both fresh and they were fermented with a Belgian yeast strain.  Even the thickest Belgian strong ale tends to have a very lively carbonation.  Appearance is only a minor point though.

Unlike most barleywines, the focus for both of these beers is on the yeast rather than the barley.  Belgian yeast and English barleywine are an odd combination to begin with because of the contrasting carbonation levels, but Hoppin' Frog seems intent on confounding the drinker even more with the specific strain they chose.  I was expecting a strain that conveyed dark fruits like figs and dates, common flavors found in Belgium's darker abbey ales.  It seems they went for a pale abbey triple strain, like what you would find in a Malheur 10 or a Westmalle Triple.  At the end of the day, this means both Naked and Sweet Evils smell mostly of pears, apples, and other light fruits (papaya maybe).  Naked Evil was obviously aged in bourbon barrels, as that shows up as a light cream of coconut aroma.  Both beers have a very tame, understated aroma for the style.

They also both taste a fair bit stronger than they smell.  "Sweet" is the name of the game here; every flavor I am about to describe should be read as "____ dipped in caramel and simple syrup."  The Belgian fruitiness of both beers is inescapable.  The label for both beers informs me that "rich dark fruit flavors will develop with age."  Maybe, but for now it is all light fruits.  Pears and apples have their way here, giving the barley the boot out the door.  I am a little disappointed that some of the usual barleywine flavors---raisins, toffee, brown sugar, caramel---get almost totally swept under the bus, but I enjoy the other flavors enough to cancel that out.

The primary difference between Sweet Evil and Naked Evil is in how the ethanol comes across. Sweet Evil is fairly weak by barleywine standards; most beers in this style are well over 10% alcohol, but this one is just shy of 9%.  I was surprised that I could taste the alcohol at all, but it is there in the form of an off-putting (thankfully mild and brief) flavor akin to a very cheap cereal grain alcohol or vodka.  Being aged in bourbon barrels, Naked Evil is decidedly stronger (11.3%) but the bourbon erases the plastic-bottle vodka flavor, replacing it with (mostly) tastier and stronger whiskey flavors.  Some bourbon has a toffee-like sweetness to it that I find here, along with a teeny hint of coconut.  The oak bourbon ages in has tannins just like wine, and there is a hint of that red wine astringency here that I don't care for.  The toffee flavor strengthens as the beer warms, rounding it out.

There is also a mild difference in texture.  Both beers are undercarbonated, but Naked Evil more so.  It is also thicker.


The last difference between the two is the most important one to me, and the reason why I won't be buying Naked Evil again.  Sweet Evil is already expensive; Naked Evil costs about 33% more.  While I do like Naked Evil a bit more, I don't like it 33% more---especially since they are both very similar anyway.


As a final thought, while I enjoyed both beers (as did the two other people I shared them with), neither is a particularly good example of a typical barleywine.  So if you have never had one and are looking to get an idea of what the style has to offer, I would avoid both of these beers for a while.

Girardin Gueuze 1882 (Black Label)

I mostly buy American craft beer these days, as there is a ton of it around and it does tend to be cheaper than fancy-pants imports (and contrary to popular belief, a lot of it matches the greats of Europe anyway).  Girardin 1882 Black Label is not an American craft beer; it is a Belgian beer from a style so obscure (and expensive to make) that I only know of two U.S. companies attempting to make an authentic one: lambic.

Most beers are made using strains of yeast that have been carefully cultivated for decades or even centuries.  Lambics, by contrast, are naturally ("spontaneously") fermented with airborne yeast; they are left in an open-air container to absorb whatever is in the air, and then they are aged in unclean (and frequently re-used) barrels that harbor more yeast, in addition to bacteria.  Most brewers go to careful lengths to ensure such "bugs and critters" never enter their beers, to include vigorously scrubbing the brewing equipment and pasteurizing the final beer.  Lambic brewers expect their beer to have wild yeast and wild bacteria in them.  They also expect the final beer to be very dry and very sour; some examples are also brewed with fruit.



To be honest, I rarely buy lambic or other sour beers.  I find most of them too sour to taste anything else, even if they are brewed with fruit.  They are also some of the most expensive beers you can buy.  I was pleasantly surprised by this one, however.


The Review


Girardin 1882 is sold in single 375ml (12.7 ounce) bottles sealed with a champagne cork.  A lot of the sour beers I have tried make a mockery of the corks, having little to no carbonation.  I was taken aback when I opened this bottle: the cork shot off like a bottle-rocket, and left a smoky trail of CO2-mist in its wake.  The beer poured pumpkin-gold with a very effervescent level of carbonation forming just over an inch of foam.  The foam was sticky and stuck around for a while.  I wish more sour beers looked like this.

Trying to describe the way sour beers smell and taste is often tricky.  Anyone looking for a laugh should google "what does brettanomyces taste like" or "what does sour beer taste like."  Brettanomyces is the primary yeast in lambic beer.  Between the yeast and the bacteria, common descriptions include "horse blanket," pineapple, "wet dog," leather, "dirt," lemons, mulch, and (one of my personal favorites) "sweaty gym socks."  There are seven species of brett, and potentially dozens of strains of each species.  I read a few years ago that almost 80 different species of bacteria have been found in lambic, rivaling the variety found in cheese.  So there's a lot going on.

This particular beer is very funky but less sour than most lambics, which I'm thankful for.  The degree of sourness in lambics ranges from lightly soured apples to gut-wrenching, tooth enamel-shredding battery acid.  Girardin is thankfully more of the apple-cider variety.  Granny Smith apples and lemon zest are the dominant sour flavors here, while the yeast gives some aromas of wet hay, wet grass, and....yes, something akin to sweat.  More distracting than the sweaty-apple flavor (yes, I just made that up) is mild hint of dirty, wet mulch, but it is fleeting.

The texture of Girardin seems a tad thicker than I recall other lambics being, but not by much.  Most lambics are fairly thin and intensely dry, bordering on arid.  This is a tad bit heavier, but still substantially dry.  The zesty carbonation is a big plus here.



This is definitely not a beer for everyone.  "Sweaty apples" won't be very appealing to most beer drinkers,  and to the sour initiated it probably won't taste sour enough.  I like it quite a lot though.  Definitely one of the top three lambic/sour beers I have had, maybe even top two.  I still don't think it stands up against Tilquin à L'Ancienne, which is the best sour I've had yet, but it is infinitely easier to find than that beer.

Just don't drink this (or any sour) on a regular basis if you have acid reflex, or you won't feel so good the next day.

A swing and a miss: The Bruery White Oak

Well, not every craft beer can be good or great.  Though I have some negative reviews in my backlog, I decided I'd hold off on writing a negative blog until I came across a new beer I didn't like.  By my count, I've tried about six new beers since I started blogging, and number 7 is the first mediocre one.  It's name is White Oak, from The Bruery.

The Bruery is a pretty new brewery, not even half a decade old.  Surprisingly, they have a pretty wide distribution for such a new company.  The founder and head brewer was just a typical home-brewer five years ago, using normal equipment and asking for advice from other brewers on Beer Advocate.  Now, his company sells beer in 21 states and parts of western Europe.  Not bad, but personally I think he should focus more on the recipes.  I seem to be alone in that, however; their beers are generally rated well.


White Oak is an oddity, and at 11.5% alcohol, is not one for the faint of heart.  It is a 50/50 blend of a fresh, hoppy Belgian pale ale called Mischief and a wheatwine aged in bourbon barrels called White Oak Sap. A wheatwine is a "wine-strength" (usually over 9% alcohol) ale brewed with a substantial portion of malted wheat.  Wheatwines are a fairly new and scarcely made "style" and as such there is a lot of variety.  In my experience, brewers make them as either "fluffy barleywines" (brewed mostly with barley, with just enough wheat to lighten the texture) or as a wheat-dominated strong ale, with little barley.  I'm not sure which route the Bruery took with White Oak Sap, but the final blend does not work very well.  You can read on if you want, but the "Reader's Digest version" is simply this: the two beers do battle rather than compromise on a peace treaty, and my palate is the collateral damage.


The Review


White Oak pours a sprightly-carbonated, slightly caramelized golden hue with just over a finger of white foam on top.  Most of the wheatwines I have tried are more carbonated than their barleywine brethren, and lighter in color as well.  That is the case here as well.

The aroma brings the two styles to mind; I smell wheat crackers from the wheatwine portion and some light fruits commonly found in Belgian blonde ales (pear, maybe nectarines).  Both are extremely restrained, however.  This might be a nice break if you are tired of overpowering strong ales, but the aroma is too tame for me.  On top of that, the bourbon barrel only comes across as a faint (and cheap) grain alcohol aroma, akin to plastic-handle vodka.  Now I am a little glad it doesn't smell overpowering.

The flavor is much stronger....I wish it was the other way around.  Mischief is supposed to be a hoppy take on the Belgian pale style, which may or may not be good (I've never had it).  Here though, the Mischief just does not blend well with the wheatwine base.  The bitter hop flavors are not overpowering, but they are very out of place against the backdrop of wheat and grain alcohol.  And yes, unfortunately, that is really all the bourbon contributes here.  None of the vanilla or honey flavors that good bourbon barrels occasionally impart on beer manage to get through the noise. 

The texture of the beer is not any better, unfortunately.  Wheatwines can be all over the place in terms of mouthfeel; some are dry, some are sweeter, some are almost creamy, some are very bubbly and some are mildly carbonated.  Typically, the idea in a beer is that the hops and malt are supposed to balance out, so that the beer is neither too bitter (hoppy) nor too sweet (malty).  This beer is bitter and too dry, not bitter and sweet. 


I'm thinking that a hoppy Belgian pale like Mischief was the wrong choice of beer to blend with a wheatwine.  Belgian pales are known for being drier than their American counterparts.  If they wanted to blend it with a hoppy beer, they should have chosen an American or possibly English IPA.  As it stands, the final product right now is two component beers that conflict with each other rather than complement each other.  I don't like my taste buds being collateral damage in a battle. 

Hypothetically speaking, this might get better with age.  There are a handful of beer styles that can be cellared like wine, and wheatwines are one of them.  Being half of the final beer, it might be enough to improve it with age (especially once the hops calm the hell down).  That being said, this is on the pricey side of craft beer; a single 25-ounce (750ml) bottle costs $15 plus tax.  I don't think the potential improvement will be worth the cost.

I'd recommend passing on this beer if you see it on the shelf.

Lagunitas PILS

Okay, so last time I promised I would review a more "normal" beer next.  Well, pilsner (or pilsener) beers are about as normal as they get; and Lagunitas PILS, a Czech (Bohemian)-style pilsener made in California, is readily available in pretty much every liquor store in the area.  It has been my go-to pilsener since I first tried it last March.


Regardless of whether they are made in American, Bohemia or Bavaria, good pilseners are generally simple, subtle, elegant beers, and Lagunitas' take on the style is all of those at once.  It retains the clear golden hue that is the characteristic of virtually every craft and quality imported pilsener, with the standard two fingers of fluffy white foam.  This cannot be mistaken for the yellow, fizzy light lagers that Anheuser-Busch and Miller misleadingly brand "pilsener."  The foam forms and stays around for a while; it does not disintegrate before you get a chance to appreciate it.

The hop character of Lagunitas PILS is a floral mix of fresh-cut grass and a bit of spice, both of which are not very robust---and they aren't supposed to be.  If you want your pilsener to punch you in the face with hops, you should drink a Victory Prima Pils (or just stick to IPA).  The malt has a light cereal grain smell to it, which I also expected.

A long time ago, I came to expect that most beers made with pilsener barley malt (and most pale lagers in general) would have a slightly metallic flavor.  I have noticed it in both German and Bohemian pilseners, American pale/adjunct lagers, American light lagers, and even the occasional Belgian pale ale.  For me, as long as it is in the background I'm fine with it, and Lagunitas manages to suppress it better than others with this beer.  As it smells mostly but subtly of Czech hops, so it tastes, with barely any metal and just a hint of grain to round things out.  The only area where Lagunitas deviates from the style norm is in the body.  Though this is still appropriately carbonated and dry, it is a tad thicker and sweeter than most pilseners.  Purists might cry foul, I find it a little endearing.



This is not my favorite pilsener made by an American company (that would be Sierra Nevada Summerfest), but it is still a simple and classy take on a classy, simple style.  Unlike Sierra's, you can get it year-round as well.