Blog Returns!

Hey Folks, in short, sorry about the long absence. I had some events come up in my personal life that needed attention and I was also focusing on my Cicerone Certification. I had though, in error, that I had passed the test when I first created this blog but failed my initial attempt. So, I took some time off, did some studying and passed on my second attempt. Now I return to you, a little humbler and a little wiser. I'm going to spend the next few post dissecting a few of my favorite styles!

Belgian Beer Week and Pints for Prostates

 

Hey there Folks!! Coming to you today to talk about one of my favorite weeks of the entire year, Belgian Beer Week. This year we are starting a little later than most folks (officially its the 15-21) so that we could coincide the end of our Pints for Prostates promotion on July 24th. This was one of the most successful events we had in all of 2012 and I'm happy to say it was the first real event I planned for the Saucer outside of the Victory Beer Dinner. So, I'm really pleased to have the honor to do it again this year.

So what's my thought process behind the 2013 Addison Saucer Belgian Beer Week? I wanted to feature as many styles as I could while exposing you guys to some newer/smaller names and I also throw in a heavy dose of my personal favorites haha. The schedule:

Monday: Oliva Bourbon Barrel Quad and Petrus Aged Red
Tuesday: McChouffe and Prearis Quad
Wednesday: Liefman Cuvee Brut and La Trappe Isid'or
Thursday: Belgian Christmas: Delirium Noel, Silly Noel, Bucaneer Christmas and St. Bernardus Christmas
Friday: La Fin Du Monde and Ommegang XV

It's a pretty diverse line up...some points of interest La Fin du Monde draft on Friday (very rare in draught form), Oliva Bourbon Quad (b.a quad? yes, please) and the quatro-tapping Thursday of some excellent VINTAGE Belgian Ales. Belgian Xmas ales are some of my absolute favorites. I love the warming spice and overall holiday feel you get from them. These are all vintages from 2012 and 2011 that I've been storing just for this week!! We've got everything from Pale Ales and up so make sure you check them out (and a few new Flemish Reds; my favorite Belgian style)! In addition on Monday we will tap the Ommegang Belgian Independence Day Brew: Double White (and it comes with a glass seen below!!) so make sure you ask about it as it will be available all day while supplies last.

Lastly, I wanted to talk a bit about the conclusion of Pints for Prostates. This is great charity supporting cancer research. 100% of our proceed go directly to the Foundation. We will be doing a table drive on Sunday during the BeerBQ...if you donate 10 dollars you will be entered into the raffle AND you receive a free tshirt (your choice of duvel, chimay, p4p, and even some Saucer GoodBeers) and we will have other give aways for donations. We are hoping to raise at least $1000 Dollars that day so please take some time to stop by and even it's just a dollar we really appreciate the support.



July 24th is the final glass and your final chance to enter the drawing for a trip for two to Europe. We will be featuring Duvel's Art Glass series (see picture below) filled with Duvel Single. All you have to do is buy a glass and you get entered into the raffle! It's a awesome glass and it's an awesome cause!

 

I really hope you guys enjoy the week! I sadly will not be here (it's my vacation!!) but I will be thinking about you guys! Please donate to the Pints for Prostates charity and if you should have any questions please contact me here on my blog or ask for any of the other managers: Bo, Andrea or Blair and they will all be happy to help you!! I wish you all a great week and I'll see you in August!!! Best, KB.

DFW Hour

OK folks, our final hour of the BeerBQ will be focused on local DFW brews. We really believe in supporting local breweries. It's a lot of fun and it's awesome to see so many of them popping up. When I first started at the Saucer we only had two locally made brews on, Rahr and Franconia. I'm happy to report that we rotate through more that 12 now!!! Including a DFW flight! Haha, I'd like to think we were one of the first bars to feature a local flight but you will see a few other places around town doing them. If you haven't had it in awhile you should try it out, we feature a lot of really awesome beers on there!!

So what do we have in this hour? Let's start off with Rahr and Sons Bourbon Barrel Winter Warmer (winter warmer, 8.5% ABV) a big bodacious winter warmer with a ton of dark chocolate, vanilla, oak and spice with an warm alcohol finish (it's not called a warmer for no reason!). opaque black in color. Truly delicious. This particular keg has about 8 months of age on it, so it will be creamier and the alcohol notes should be more subtle.

Next up is Lakewood's Bourbon Barrel Temptress (imperial milk stout, 9.1% ABV). As those of you know who attended the Lakewood Brewing Company Beer dinner we hosted recently, I LOVE TEMTPRESS. Age it in Bourbon casks and I want to marry it and have it's children. Lots and lots and lots of vanilla going on in here as well as chocolate and caramel notes. It's freaking awesome! Don't miss it!!

Lastly, we have Deep Ellum's Darkest Hour (imperial stout, 9% ABV)...in truth I'm sad to see this beer go. We picked up two of these when they came out, released one and saved one. I've had it hidden for a long while now and it's finally time to let her go.  It's a huge imperial stout with dark chocolate, coffee and toffee aromas. Dark as night as it's namesake indicates. I've had it in several stages of aging and to me, I prefer AT LEAST one year on it. I think it makes it more rounder and the flavors that much more lush. Enjoy this 2012 vintage and look for it again this Fall.


That's the whole lineup for the BeerBQ folks! It's going to be pretty awesome!! I truly hope you guys enjoy it as much as we've enjoyed preparing for it!!! I will be around all day that Sunday, so if you see me and have any questions, flag me down and lets chat!!! Cheers!!! KB

Talking Casks

Welcome back folks! Going to finish up our Saint Arnold's hours here with a duo of very special casks, Divine Reserve #12 and #13. Before I get into the beers themselves I wanted to clear up some common confusion to this question: what exactly is a cask? Well, it's a very simple but detailed answer. There are really two types of cask beers that your going to see: firkins (real ale) and cask conditioned ales. They are both considered "casks" but today we are going to focus about the firkin.

Pictured above is a standard firkin. It's specifically a unit of measure (10.8 US Gallons typically but can be seen smaller). Brewer's will take a finished beer and pour it into this vessel along with additives of live yeast, priming sugar (food for the yeast) and any other odds and ends they want to throw in here, dry hopping is the most common. This is a process called secondary fermentation. The best example I usually relate to people is Belgian bottled conditioned beer. The active yeast continue to work and convert the sugars into alcohol and CO2 as well as adding complexity and other interesting flavors to the beer. Cask are naturally carbonated through this process and thus are best served fresh. Typical shelf lives are no more than 3 days; SO GET IT EARLY!!! This is what is typically known as "Real Ale" and is often seen in British pubs. The beer is still alive and not pasteurized so it's a bit more legit!!  A note on dry hopping: hops are added during the boil of the brewing process. The heat transforms the alpha acids in the hops from their non-bittering form to their bittering form in a process called isomerization. When "dry hopping" you add hops during the finishing conditioning and since there is no heat, you only get the aromas and hop oils from the hops...lending to the mouthfeel and smell of the finished beers without bittering them.

There are two ways in which to serve a firkin. Pictured above is a firkin on a bar top. In this instance, a faucet is driven into the front of the barrel and a vented cork called a spile is hammered through the top. It's a simple faucet that you open and pour from - this is called a gravity pour because it's using only gravity to pour the beer. The second way, which is more common, is through a beer engine. The cask undergoes the same hammering mentioned above but only it remains in a cooler and is pumped through a line to the faucet, which aerates the beer and gives it a creamy head (cooling also prolongs its life and keeps it colder).

I should note that firkins are generally served at warmer temperatures (50 degrees or so) and are less carbonated due to their nature. They should always be pleasantly cool and never served after three days.


OK! With that being said, 4PM will see the tapping of two firkins, Saint Arnold's Divine Reserve 12 and 13. Divine Reserve #12 (old ale, 10% ABV) has a lot going on in it. First, it's an old ale so there is tons of malty goodness- biscuit, toffee, light caramel with touches of spice. Secondly, because it's cask, it's going to have a creamier mouthfeel than it was originally designed to have. This particular cask has over a year of age on it so it's going to be really cool to see what's happened to it! 

Second cask is Divine Reserve #13 (Belgian quad, 11% ABV). Lots of flavors here...raisins, figs, plum, dark fruit and distinctive esters from the yeast. It's a bold beer with a high ABV so there is a bit of alcohol burn to it. A fine example of an American brewed Belgian ale. And since this is a casks, there's no telling what transformations we get to see. Typically beers I've cellar of this style get richer and darker while mellowing out the alcohol. We recently had the regular keg version of this on our wall so it's going to be really interesting to see the differences!

That's it for casks and our Saint Arnold's hours. Please remember stock is limited so get here early!! And drink those casks as soon as we tap them!! Just think, you can school your fellow knurds on what exactly a cask is!! haha! See you soon!

Mas BeerBQ

Hey guys! Hope you've enjoyed the blog thus far...tonight I'm going to talk a bit about our next two hours of Saint Arnold's Beers. As you know Saint Arnold's is one of Texas' oldest and we are cranking out 5 of their very best beers for you!

The day starts off @3PM with my favorite Texas beer (and in my top 5 favorite beers all-time) Saint Arnold's Pumpkinator (imperial stout, 10% ABV). What is this beer? Simply stated pumpkin pie in a bottle with chocolate added. The beer screams of fall flavors with overwhelming aromas of spice - cinnamon, ginger, allspice, cloves and chocolate. The taste is much the same with a pleasant addition of heat from what I can only gather is chili pepper. It's a big bold black beer with full body and finish much the same as it's aroma. This beer is dry-spiced in a similar process to dry-hopping (hops added during secondary fermentation the result being no bitterness only aroma) so it smells and feels like your grandma's kitchen during Thanksgiving. I absolutely love it and don't worry if you don't buy it, I'll be around to drink it haha! If you grab one let it warm up in your hand a little bit to help bring out the spice!....p.s. A little trivia...Pumpkinator was originally DR#9....if you look in the trees on the label, on the right side hidden in the branches you will see "DR9"....pretty cool!

                                     (beautiful packaging huh? we will have it on draft!!!)

The next part of the hour involves a vertical (or parallel in this case) of the new Bishop Barrel program Saint Arnold's started last year. We are offering two beers (both bottles AND the only bottles available today). The first is Bishop's #2 (old ale, 7.8% ABV)  based off Saint Arnold's Christmas Ale. Here's the twist, it's aged in Chardonnay barrels with wild cherries. So what you get is a bit of a funkier Christmas Ale...some acidity from the wine, some sourness from the cherries...I'd prefer to call it more tart than sour reminiscent of Oud Bruin but sweeter, but it does have a sour taste so be warned. So if you're a sour/tart fan I'd definitely recommend it. I really love this beer for the boldness it takes in trying to convert a classic.

The next Bishop's Barrel is the newest addition, Bishop's #3 (imperial stout, 8.7% ABV). Simple straight forward no nonsense bourbon barrel stout. You're going to get a lot of bourbon - vanilla, wood, slight tartness with the chocolates and burnt sugars you'd expect from a Russian Imperial Stout. This is a new beer for me and hopefully I'll get to snag one.

It's important to note that The Bishop Barrel program is ONLY available at on premise locations (meaning it can only be sold at bars where alcohol is consumed on premise; so no liquor stores). We have two cases of each so it will go quickly. Make sure you don't miss either!!!

I'll be back with an blurb on the next two beers, Divine Reserve 12 and 13, and a little explanation of cask beer. Hope you're enjoying the blog! Please feel free to send me your comments! See you soon! KB

BeerBQ con't

2PM starts off our Real Ale Hour. We are featuring their Mysterium Verum series which to me is one of the most interesting programs we have going on in Texas right now. Real Ale takes their common base beers and transforms them, magically, into new creations via barrel aging. The beers spend a variety of time in both wood and steel casks. Most of the beers are blended so due to this you have tons going on in the beer. You will see numerous flavor profiles ranging from tart/sour to oak/vanilla and everywhere in between. I was fortune enough to meet Eric at Real Ale who heads the barrel aged program at a beer dinner last year. Being avid Metal fans (as am I), most of their barrels have names from Metal Bands (for instance Black Sabbath's Ozzy, Dio, Tommy, etc). It's cool to see that no hold bar attitude and "aggression" in the Mysterium Verum beers themselves.  My personal favorite from the series is "The Devil's Share" which is a barrel aged version of Devil's Backbone. We were fortune enough to receive several kegs of the series and one day we woke up and had 5 so thus the Real Ale Hour for the BeerBQ was born. We will be featuring 4 of our 5 beers during this hour (The 5th, Kraken, will be seen as part of our Creature Feature Series in August). 

The first part of the hour will focus on Volume XV and Empire. Volume XV's (Russian imperial stout 9.8% ABV) base beer is Real Ale 15, which was brewed for their 15th anniversary. The twist for the M.V. Volume XV is that the base beer spent 11 months in Four Rose and Maker's Mark barrels. Tons of oak, vanilla, chocolate and maple in this beer. The body is surprising to me in that its not as thick as most stouts, more in the medium range. Which makes it both easy to drink and dangerous. This particular keg has been with us for almost 18 months now so it's going to be really interesting to see the changes it's undergone in our cellar (as you cellar beers the yeast continues to consume sugars and other munchies lending the beer newer and interesting "umami" flavors....think soy and grilled meat as well as commonly mellowing out the beers alcohol and mouthfeel).

Next up is Real Ale Empire (India pale ale, 6.6% ABV), which is barrel aged Lost Gold IPA. Lost Gold IPA is about as solid as it comes when dealing with Texas IPAs. Containing Amarillo, Columbus, summit and cascade hops (all American varietals) you get a lot of citrusy notes and resin-y pine overtones. When aged in barrels Lost Gold becomes a even more intense version with Oak and Vanilla notes added thus giving birth to "Empire" . The nose is powerfully hoppy and tastes much the same. Hopiphiles don't miss this one! 

2:30PM will see the launch of two more beers, Highlander and Morgul, as well as a flight of all four (while supplies last). Morgul (American porter, 7% ABV) is the child of Real Ale's Coffee Porter, barrel aged in Kentucky Bourbon Barrels (I fell in love at the mention of Bourbon). So what do you get? Tons of flavors, namely dark chocolate and coffee with bourbon notes - vanilla, tanins, oak, touch of spice and a mild tartness (porters are traditional vatted blending old beer with new beer giving it a distinct tartness produced from our friend the wild bacteria Lactobacillus). One of the best of the series in my opinion! Make sure to check it out!

Lastly, Real Ale's Highlander (there can be only one?) naturally a Scotch Ale clocking in at 10% ABV. This beers stems from Real Ale Real Heavy and is barrel aged in a variety of wine casks. Yes, wine casks. I love wine barrel aged beers (the previous mentioned Devil Share is chardonnay barrel aged). The wine barrels add a subtle acidity to the beer (which can be seen as tartness). Scotch ales are traditionally malt heavy with little to no hop presence (most use old hops in fact). This is a great example of "terroir" were hops where not readily available due to poor growing conditions in Scottish climates and the only source for them was England and well, let's just call the Scottish/English relationship "rocky" at best, haha. So it's all about the malts.  Real Ale's Highlander is incredibly rich in this malty tradition with the subtle acid notes mentioned above, which to me scream of green apples. Truly unique in my opinion. Don't miss it!


That's all for Real Ale Folks! Make sure to check out the beers individually or if you're lucky enough grab a flight (yes, there will be a credit as "Mysterium Verum" in the UFO Kiosk beerknurds). See you soon with our next two hours of St. Arnold's goodness....KB

3rd Annual BeerBQ at Flying Saucer Addison

What's up guys!? Started thinking about what I'd do my first post on and what better than our biggest event of the year, the BeerBQ. This years edition of the BeerBQ started its planning the day after we finished last years. We started storing away goodies starting with Real Ale's Volume XV...their barrel aged anniversary edition. As we collected more and more beers it came apparent that our theme for the BeerBQ would be Texas Rarities. With SOOOO much good beer coming out of the state these days it's hard to pass at that opportunity! So what do we have lined up for you? Lots and lots of great
brews. I'm going to spend sometime this week talking about each of the hours.

The day starts off with our Austin Hour featuring one of my favorite Texas Beers, Jester King's RU-55, a Flemish Red 7.3% ABV. This beer came to us directly from the Brewery. I had been in talks with Ron Extract (owner of JK) back in early November to get some casks of JK brews here in Addison. JK's philosophy is evolving into more and more bottle conditioning and moving away from force carbonated kegs...so as you can imagine, getting a KEG version of this limited release was extremely hard but we still managed to work something out. The original plan was to feature the beer during our 17th anniversary party but it didn't make it here in time so I stashed this bad boy away for the BeerBQ. As I said, you are going to be hard pressed to find this beer on draught anywhere outside of the Brewery itself. Last time I saw it was for the Jester King Dinner at The Moth earlier this year...so it's a real treat and in my opinion one of the best Sours you're going to find in Texas. Lush red wine notes, tartness and midly sour. Meduim to full body with a tart dry finish. Traditional Flemish Reds are matured in wood casks exposing them to a host of bacteria -namely lactobacillus, brettanomyces, and pediococcus - lending funky flavors, distinct tartness and sourness to the beer. This Texas example is no different. Make sure to check it out!!

Rounding out the other half of the hour is 512's Whiskey Double Pecan Porter...barred aged porter 8.3% ABV. I literally could bath in this beer. So much going on in it, wood notes, vanilla, bourbon, nuttiness from the local pecans with a silky smooth texture. Imagine a nitro poured pecan pie with a bourbon chaser.... It's a true gem! It comes out only once a year and we only ever can snag one keg of it due to it's rarity. I've seen it around DFW quite a bit in the last few months, mostly on other bars anniversary menus and special events. If you are a bourbon fan this is definitely a beer to try. Unlike the JK RU-55, which is also barrel aged, this 512 is matured in recently emptied whiskey casks. So instead of funky flavor you get a lot of distinct bourbon flavors, namely vanilla, sweet maltiness and "wood" without the alcohol burn or the hangover haha.  I love it. Bourbon fans love it. You will love it.

That wraps up the Austin Hour. Make sure you get here a little early because I don't expect either beer to last very long. The last time we tapped the Double Pecan it blew in 30 minutes and with the RU-55 being so rare, who knows? I'll be around all day Sunday so if you have any questions please ask for me!!!

Check my blog for updates on the rest of the beers that day; next up Blanco, TX's Real Ale Mysterium Verum series!