What? With three beer engines, EVERY day is Cask Day at Max's Taphouse, you would think.
But starting Thursday Dec. 3rd, Max's is holding Cask Nights in addition to its usual Trivia Nights. Similar to the Tuesday Beer Socials, beginning at 6 p.m. there will be a featured beer (or more than one, or even a firkin now and then), with a discount on the price for that night only. The starting line-up for the 3rd:
BrewDog Harcore IPA 9.0% ABV. Scottish Imperial IPA, 150 IBU's
Williams Bros. 80 Shilling 4.2% ABV. Scottish Ale
Lagunitas Brown Shugga 9.8% ABV. Strong Ale Hybrid
Max's has now purchased several of its own firkins, and is dispatching them to various breweries through the distributors, in order to assure supply. This is hardly new--many local beer bars now have their own firkins, as it's often the only way to get cask ale. (If you see a fire-engine-red one floating around, it's from Metropolitan Coffeehouse.)
7 comments:
"BrewDog Harcore IPA 9.0% ABV. Scottish Imperial IPA, 150 IBU's"
150 IBU is a typo, right?
Nope.............. Obviously you haven't been following these certifiable twits.....
http://www.brewdog.com/hardcore_ipa.php
"ABV: 9%
OG: 1085
IBU’s: 150
Malts: Marris Otter Extra Pale Malt
Hops: Simcoe, Chinook, Amarillo, Warrior
Twist: Hopped to hell, then dry-hopped to hell too"
I'm well aware of their claims, but that doesn't mean you have to repeat undocumented statements.
They sent their record high abv beer off to a lab to be checked, I'm not aware of anything similar with IBU claims.
150 IBU is impossible.
No, it's not. Please read my cover story in Mid-Atlantic Brewing News' December issue, which addresses this very specific question.
It's kind of like saying you can't make a beer of 32% ABV. You most certainly can, as BrewDog has just demonstrated, but then the discussion becomes whether adding more yeasts and sugars to raise alcohol values (e.g. Sam Adams Utopias) or "distilling" by freezing and removing the water ice really constitutes "brewing". I, for one, am not inclined to say that just because I probably can't replicate this beer in my homebrew kitchen, it's not a "beer."
Where can it pick up Mid-Atlantic in New Mexico?
It is different than saying you can make a 32% (or 40%, whatever)abv fermented product.
For instance, when Anheuser-Busch brewed Tomahop (a double IPA with Rye), which morphed into Rye P.A., they knew the maximum amount of IBU they could pack into a 9.2% abv beer. It was the little over 100 and they hit 99.
Here's a bit on the Stone 13th anniversary:
(Stone) did a quick check on the wort prior to fermentation and it measured about 130 IBU. A pretty impressive number, don’t you think? But . . . “IBUs drop during fermentation because the pH of the liquid drops from about 5.3 to about 4.5,” Stone brewmaster Mitch Steele explained via email. “This reduces the solubility of the iso-alpha-acids, the bittering component of hops, so some bitterness solidifies and drops out, and/or gets absorbed by yeast.”
The whole post:
http://appellationbeer.com/blog/how-many-ibu-about-one-hundred/
Well, you know, you could subscribe......
I don't have the full text of my article on this computer, but I'll tell you all you need to know: Hop extracts. Added before, during, or after fermentation. Is it cheating? Maybe--but then what's your feeling about adding anything other than pure fruit to a fruit beer, or pelletized hops, or finings?
BrewDog has done two other "hop monster" beers, a 198-IBU "How to Disappear Completely" and their 225-IBU "Nanny State", the latter with 1.1% alcohol.
Is it theoretical? Of course it is. Is it all just a big bunch of hype, publicity-seeking, and testosterone-laden swagger? Of course it is. But we've been putting up with variations of the same damned malarkey from Dogfish Head, Sam Adams, Stone, Victory, Three Floyds, and others for years. And even other brewers, such as Sierra Nevada, North Coast, etc. are getting in on that action, because it works and they all have to do something to stand out amidst the 500 beers in the Big Beer Store.
Do you think that if these BrewDog blokes just did yet another 80/- or peat-smoke-tinted ale that we'd be discussing them right now? Well, when was the last time you discussed Scottish & Newcastle, or Caledonian, or Williams Bros., or Harviestoun?
I have nothing against extracts, per se. Pliny has them, Firestone Walker used them in Double Jack, etc.
But I'll believe a beer above the lows 100s when I've seen it verified in an independent lab.
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