Great Lakes Brewing Co. Blackout Stout

Back in 2003 something went wrong up in the Northeastern United States and all the electricity stopped working. Some guys fixed it after a while but it was still kinda creepy with all that darkness. Darkness can be creepy but darkness can also be very good. 

The Great Lakes Brewing Co. named this imperial stout after that infamous blackout in 2003. Now let us talk about it. 

The Great Lakes Brewing Co. is based in Cleveland, Ohio, across the Hope Memorial Bridge from downtown. I spent a beautiful early autumn afternoon in the pub downstairs watching the Indians whoop on the Twins. 

Ok, back to business. The imperial stout originated from recipes British brewers created for Russia's czars and czarinas before the Bolsheviks chopped all their heads off. So, now all of us get to enjoy 'em. A variety of malts and hops help contribute to this stout's flavor. Roasted barley and black malt help develop the stout's dark Pennzoil color at 50 IBUs. Northern brewer and Simcoe hops blend together to create a characteristically bold-hoppy flavor. 

I've only recently gotten into the stout game thanks to my good brother Adam Gregory. The extra hops and alcohol content of the blackout stout don't go down as smooth as the many Lancaster Milk Stouts we be sluggin' down on the regular but it still maintains a robust yet smooth flavor. A strong, coffee like aroma fills your mouth after every sip. Glorious. 

This beer recommends a 50 degree serving temperature, so be sure to have your meat thermometers ready. 

Where I start to get interested is the stout's 9% abv. Now, boy do those Russians love their booze! I reckon that's approximately the alcohol content of three Pennsylvania style lagers. Which you can pick up for like eleven dollars a case at your local Pennsylvania ugly beer distributor. 

Great Lakes packages these stouts in 4-packs rather than 6-packs, probably for your own safety. After four of these you'll be feeling crisp. After twelve of these you'll be pissing your pants and telling people your name is "Sally Draper". 

Merry Christmas

Drinkability: 7/10

Taste: 7/10

Value: 6/10

Curb Appeal: 9/10

Overall: 7.25/10

Flying Dog Brewery - UnderDog Atlantic Lager

Hey all, it's been awhile. I'm back for my yearly review.

I bring to you another one from a favorite brewery of mine, the Flying Dog Brewery out of Frederick, Maryland. These guys pay homage to the late gonzo journalist, Hunter S. Thompson, whom you may have heard of. Ralph Steadman, a british artist & close friend of Thompson's, has created the label artwork for Flying Dog since 1995. And might I say, he does a humdinger of a job on those labels.

This lager gives you the best of both worlds; the crisp hoppy taste & aroma of an ale yet the smooth feel and finish of a good lager thanks to a variety of hops and specialty malts. At 28 IBU's this lager is one of the darker lagers on the IBU scale yet it still holds a crisp and light taste.

You can give me the Pepsi challenge with this beer any day of the week and one thing I'm not going to guess is that it's a lager. The hoppy finish is something you would expect from a pale ale. This beer holds a refreshing taste yet it doesn't quite meet my category of tailgating beers. This is a beer that you can enjoy 2 or 10 of at the local pub; and at 4.7% AB, that's doable for a seasoned boozer. 

I picked a six-pack up for around 9 bucks at the local Giant Eagle, just make sure you check the expiration date when buying beer from those ninnies. 

If the thought of pouring an amber lager and an IPA together into a glass and drinking it sounds good to you, then well here you go.

good people drink good beer

Drinkability: 7/10

Taste: 8/10

Value: 8/10

Curb Appeal: 10/10

Overall: 8.25/10

Red Dog Beer

A long, long time ago I was at the great Canfield Fair in Canfield, Ohio with my aunt and uncle. I may have been five or six or seven but I was probably five. I recall coming up victorious in one of the many carney games over there, yes that is right, I was single handily winning carny games at age five. WELL, anyways, for a prize I received a framed picture of the red dog off the Red Dog Beer label with "Red Dog Beer" in the background. I decided right there that when I grew up I would drink Red Dog. Then I grew up.

It took me too long to find this beer. Butala kind of sent me on an assignment back in May to review this stuff and I wanted it to be my return to the review game. I went up and down the Pennsylvania-Ohio border, to every state store with barred windows and fat dudes behind the counter, but no Red Dog to be found. I gave up until I moved back to my home away from home; Happy Valley, State College, Pennsylvania.

So, onto the beer I guess. At first sip I was definitely surprised at flavor of this beer. Instead of tasting like absolute garbage it actually didn't taste much like anything at all, but I liked it. I knew right then that I found a new party beer. "Uncommonly Smooth" is printed across the label and they weren't lyin'. This beer goes down like water for something recording at 5% on the ABV scale. The initial watery flavor is followed up with a random hoppy bitter taste. It's a bonging beer, if you're into that.

I picked up a twelve pack at the local bottle shop for 10$. You do the math, stranger. It's cheaper than DIRT. So, if you're looking for a beer to get twisted off quickly, say at a tailgate or pre-gaming, this is the brew 4 u. This ain't a classy beer, except maybe at Michigan International Raceway.

Drinkability: 10/10
Taste: 8/10
Value: 10/10
Curb Appeal: 2/10

Overall: 7.5

Flying Dog Brewery's Doggie Style Classic Pale Ale

The moment I first sipped on this beer I said, "mm." A couple moments later I sipped it again and said, "oh wow, this is a special little treat." That's what this beer is; a special little treat. If I could end this review like that I would. But I gotta write more stuff to make Butala happy.

Flying Dog Brewery can be found down in Frederick, Maryland. These guys follow the great Hunter Thompson's quote "good people drink good beer." If you don't know who Hunter Thompson is go read a fucking book, dude.

This pale ale is one of the best brews made my Flying Dog. Those birds over at the New York Times even named it the number one pale ale in America. I wish everything tasted like this. It's quite refreshing so you can drink a lot of them after you finish your morning workout and at 5.5% abv, you can drink a lot of them and still do your daily activities. Its got a 35 IBU. I don't know what that means, but I like it.

All the artwork done for the brewery is done by Ralph Steadman, the same guy who drew pretty pictures for Thompson. The artwork on this bottle is Steadman at his finest.

At $10.50 a sixer this beer is a little tough on my college budget. But it's made in America so who gives a shit?




Drinkability: 10/10
Taste: 10/10
Value: 9/10
Curb Appeal: 10/10
Overall: 9.75/10

Coors Light

I had a strange occurrence while drinking this beer one afternoon. The kind of occurrence that belongs in the category of alien sightings and seeing women with beards and when you see a car driving down the street and you could have swore there was no one behind the steering wheel.

I was sitting on my back porch- all nonchalant and shit- eating a burrito from Hot Heads (not as good as Chipotle) and I was trying to decide what to wash that stuff all down with. My choices were water, milk and Coors light. Not knowing that two of those choices were the same thing, I choose the Coors because it had been way to long since I experienced the beauty of the Rocky Mountains.

I took a bite out of that mexican sammich, chewed it up, and swallowed it down. I then grabbed that silver bullet, cracked it open and took a big swig. Something was wrong. "No more taste buds??!!?" I thought. I took another slam jam bite out of the burrito to see if my buds were still working. They were. I took a slow sip of the Coors and realized the truth and began to weep. I couldn't taste the beer. It was completely absent of taste. I looked at the can in wonder to make sure that I had not mistakingly grabbed a can of water. It was Coors light all right and instead of tasting like shitty mass-produced American beer, it didn't taste like anything. I threw what was left of my burrito onto the street and went to bed.

What's up with this "When the mountains turn blue you know it's cold" bullshit?? Use your damn cheeks to see if stuffs cold you dummy!!

Just the other day I was eating another burrito on my back porch. I decided to accompany it with a Coors light because I enjoy drinking water with my burritos. I began to choke and scream on a piece of rice and my mother quickly offered me some water. "No!!" I yelled, raising my can of Coors into the air. "I have some right here!"

Drinkability: 14/10

Taste: Like not much

Value: 7/10
Curb Appeal: 5/10

Overall: ???/10

Rogue Ales Juniper Pale Ale

Rogue Ales is a brewery located in Newport, Oregon. They are 100% pure rogue and dedicate their beer to the rogue in each of us. Needless to say, they are a bunch of badasses that brew beer for us to consume in large amounts and cause trouble with. You know, breaking stuff, stealing cars, cursing loudly.

Juniper Pale Ale is one of the dozens of different beers that Rogue Ales puts out. It's brewed with a not so secret ingredient, the berries from the juniper plant. I'm not much of a pale ale guy, but, I kind of like it. It's got to be the berries or something. Rogue even dedicates this ale to the "turkey in each of us." The turkey being the national bird of Rogue Nation.

I don't sniff beer very often but I will from now on after getting a whiff of this one. Really, the smell of this ale alone is worth spending the $13.50 for a six-pack of it. Along with juniper berries, free range coastal water from the beautiful northern-Pacific is also included in its list of ingredients, which must have something to do with the smoothness of this ale.

This guy was known to drink this stuff. Rumor has it Poprocky was fed this stuff out of a bottle in his very early years. But that is just a rumor!!!

This beer is a champion, winning a gold medal in the World Beer Championships of 2010 and claiming the PNW champion belt in the US Beer Tasting Championship.

The bottle itself is a work of art. It's graced with an axe wielding tough guy decked out in a teal colored jacket and Rogue cap, clutching a mug of foaming beer and standing alongside the juniper itself.

Drinkability: 7/10

Taste : 7/10
Value: 6/10
Curb Appeal: 10/10

Overall: 7.5/10

Great Lakes Brewing Co.'s Eliot Ness

The Great Lakes Brewing Co. is a brewery and restaurant in the city of Cleveland. They started off in a little shack making some decent brews in 1988 and eventually expanded into a six building compound in west Cleveland. I visited the brewery recently and being restricted by age from hanging out in the tasting room with all the other snobs, stood outside and admired the what looks like 200 year old building from the side walk. oh well.

This lager gets its name from the legendary, mobster slaughtering Eliot Ness. Ness was the leader of the Untouchables, a group of government agents who hunted down all the freedom loving bootleggers who only wanted to make some booze for their parties. History lesson aside, this brew is good drinkin!

It enters your mouth with the rich, malty flavors of a lager and trickles down your throat leaving a pleasant, hoppy and fruity aftertaste. It's as smooth as the Cuyahoga I tell you. Cuyahoga pre-pollution ridden/catching on fire of course. It's not too heavy of a lager and is definitely something I could drink twelve of at an outdoor gathering.

There's an awesome picture of a guy pretending to be Eliot Ness on the bottle. Decked out with a fedora and grasping a mug of brew. I think there may even be a cigarette hanging out of his mouth.

It's $9.50 for a six pack at the local Giant Eagle. But I suppose I could get it for four bucks cheaper anywhere else.

Other Great Lakes Beer Reviews
Alchemy Double IPA
Lake Erie Monster IPA
Conways Irish Ale
Commodore Perry IPA
Rye of the Tiger IPA

Christmas Ale

Drinkability: 9/10

Taste: 9/10

Value: 6/10
Curb Appeal: 10/10

Overall: 8.5/10