New Brew News – August 7, 2017

Our Thoughts: If you stop and think about it, the amount of fruit flavors that hops can mimic are mind boggling. Depending on the hop varietal, they can produce flavors and aromas ranging  from gooseberry, melon, lime and lychee to lemon, grapefruit, orange peel, papaya and coconut. Many brewers choose to add these fruits to their IPA's to both complement the already present flavors and add sweetness to contrast the bitterness from the hops. For their new beer, Schlafly has added the ever popular choice pineapple to an IPA. With only 40 IBU's this will undoubtedly produce a very tropical, fruit forward and easy drinking IPA. Sounds like a winner to us.

Our Thoughts: Porters have a long and storied history and their evolution in intertwined with their brother, stout.  From the early 1700's, these brown, roasty beers have been satisfying thirsty drinkers starting in their native England, immigrating to the  United States and eventually, the rest of the world. Boulevard is no stranger to the style, as they already produce Bully! Porter and Early Riser Coffee Porter. Atlas Obscura sees Boulevard getting aggressive with the hops by dry hopping this porter. This allows the brewer to squeeze as many flavors out of the hops as they can while adding no bitterness. Look for chocolate, coffee and roasted malt flavors all backed by promintent hop flavors. Flora Obscura will be available in 12 ounce bottles.

Our Thoughts: Originally dreamed up by our friends at Tired Hands and Omnipollo, the Milkshake IPA is characterized by being brewed with oats and lactose sugar and thoroughly hopped alongside various fresh fruits to produce a sweet, hoppy, fruity masterpiece. Since those two juggernauts unleashed this beast on taps and in cans, this beer style has found it's way across the country. It looks like it found a home in Raytown, as Crane is delighting us by bringing us their version of this beer style. Brewed with peaches and vanilla, Crane is adding their own twist by making it a Belgian style Milkshake IPA. We're big fans of this style and are exhilarated to be able to sample this. Look for this on tap soon.

Our Thoughts: Just when we think Crane has finally hit the creativity wall and won't be able to surprise us anymore, they go and do something like this.  We'll let Crane tell the story: "Our friends at Plaza Liquor were lucky enough to land two Jefferson's whisky barrels. We were lucky enough to be asked to brew a beer to go in them. We chose a special sour red ale then aged one barrel with cherries and the other with blackberries. The fruits compliment the acidity and combine with the barrel character to give a vinous quality with notes of caramel and oak. Use this beer to raise a glass to our friends in craft, Plaza Liquor." Sounds amazing to us. Bottles won't last long, so stay vigilant.

Our Thoughts: It's no secret we're big fans of Narrow Gauge. Since opening in 2016, they have changed the St. Louis beer landscape and totally blown us away with beers, especially their IPA's. We've grown to love making the drive to the brewery and getting crowlers of their juicy, delicious, world class palate pleasers that put us in hop heaven. (There's a crowler of DDH OJ Run in the fridge that's been calling our name all day.) We have no doubt that No Stems, their new imperial IPA which is a collaboration with Virginia brewery The Answer, will be a shining star in the Narrow Gauge pantheon. We're going to start monitoring Twitter and Facebook for the release announcement now so we don't miss out.

Our Thoughts: Narrow Gauge loves to shine the spotlight on hops and this new beer gives Simcoe center stage. Originally released in 2000, Simcoe hops are dual purpose hops valued for their versatility and unique flavors. Using Simcoe as the single hop and then double dry hopping with it will produce copious amounts of passion fruit, pine, apricot and berry flavors with very little bitterness. In other words, this will be another treasure from the hop master at Narrow Gauge.

Our Thoughts: While Narrow Gauge might probably be best known for their IPA's, there's no doubt in our mind they can crush any style they choose to brew. We've probably tried pretty much every beer they've brewed and have yet to be less than thrilled with anything they've released. So we're delighted to see them releasing Tableau de Fleurs, a wine barrel fermented farmhouse ale with brettanomyces.  This funky gem will surely be a complex picture of earthy, spicy, vinous delectability. Look for a bottle release in September. There's probably a line already.