Day 49 (9/11/2011): Pizzeria Paradiso (Washington, D.C.)

I had been meaning to visit Pizzeria Paradiso since the first time I stayed in Dupont Circle for work last year. Good beer and good pizza? Very little can beat that. They have a great tap and bottle list and have a good happy hour on drafts during the week.

I ordered a 2007 Cantillon Iris, a wonderful unblended lambic that uses only pale malts and utilizes a 50/50 mix of dry and wet hops (More info here). This beer has a bit darker of a body due to the malt bill; almost amber rather than the typical straw color. Iris is definitely sour just like any other unblended lambic, but it has a slight caramel flavor that helps to counter a tiny bit of the tartness. A great beer for sure. Not my favorite sour, but it's definitely up there. I'll give it an A-.

They also had Founders Breakfast Stout on tap, so I got to try my first of these this season. If you like coffee stouts, this is your beer. The coffee flavor was a bit overwhelming for me, but it is what it is. There's definitely a ton of roast in the taste and then the rest is almost like a beer iced coffee. It seemed like the carbonation was high for an imperial stout, as well. I'm going to have to get some bottles of this to re-review, because I remember finding this a lot more outstanding than I did here. B+ for Breakfast Stout.

The meal was absolutely amazing. I started off with a caprese salad, with mozzarella, cherry tomatoes, sun dried tomatoes, and basil, all covered in good, tasty olive oil. I was starving and scarfed it down before taking a picture.

For my pizza, I got an 8" Atomica, which featured salami, black olives, hot pepper flakes, and mozzarella. And not the crappy, shredded stuff that has become standard fare on pizzas today, but creamy, slightly browned real  mozzarella. I also added sausage to it, which ended up being a great choice. The chunks of flavorful, spiced meat added a lot to the pizza. Overall, a great pizza. Probably one of the better ones I've ever eaten before.

I definitely will be back to Pizzeria Paradiso again (most likely the next time I'm in town). Like I said before good beer and good pizza. Can't beat it with a stick!

Founders Breakfast Stout
Style: American double/imperial stout
ABV: 8.3%
IBU: ?
Beer Advocate: A/A+
Ratebeer: 100/98

Cantillon Iris
Style: Unblended lambic
ABV: 5%
IBU: ?
Beer Advocate: A-
Ratebeer: 99/96

Day 42 (9/4/2011): Nemesis (2010) by Founders Brewing Company

The 2010 Nemesis is a black barleywine and the looks of it reflected this clearly. It pours a brown about one tint away from black with a creamy, bubbly off-white head. The smell is a complex sweetness coupled with some floral hops, which can be expected from a beer with 100 IBUs. You also get some spiciness from the alcohol, along with vanilla and some dark fruit.

The taste starts roasty which leads into a complex dark fruit taste with molasses, brown sugar, and chocolate. There is a pretty good hop bitterness on the finish. Perhaps a bit much for my tastes in a barleywine. It is definitely a sipper, not necessarily because of the alcohol taste, but because of the complex taste and the slightly syrupy body (Not to mention the 12%).

This is a good barleywine that just happens to be a bit too hoppy for my likings. I would like to sit on some of these bottles for a few years, though, to see if the hops take a back seat a bit. I recommend this to pretty much everyone if you can still find it anywhere. I give Nemesis (2010) by Founders Brewing Company an A-.

Style: American barleywine
ABV: 12%
IBU: 100
Beer Advocate: A-/A-
Ratebeer: 99/96

Day 7 (7/31/2011): Hyde Park Craft Beer Symposia

Yesterday my wife and I headed over to Teller's in Hyde Park to attend the 2011 Hyde Park Craft Beer Symposia (ignore the fact the the graphic above says 2010). This will be a small teaser of a larger review that will be featured over at CincyVoices with Chris Nascimento, a fellow Cincinnati-area craft beer lover (who happens to know infinitely more about beer than myself). Hopefully this will tide you over for the time being.

I'm going to focus on my two favorite beers I was able to try there. I was impressed with many, but none like these two.

The first of these, from Goose Island, is Madame Rose, a sour/wild ale. From the source:

"Madame Rose is a crimson colored Belgian style brown ale fermented with wild yeast and aged on cherries in wine barrels. Layers of malty complexity, sour cherry, spice and wood notes make Madame Rose an ideal beer to suggest to Bordeaux enthusiasts and beer drinkers fond of Belgian Kriek and Flanders Brown Ales."

This was a wonderful beer. The tartness from the wild yeast fermentation and the cherries was substantial, but not over the top. It's a refreshing beer for the current hot, hot heat. It has a funky, tart smell, with a little bit of the cherries shining through. They are a lot more evident in the taste, luckily.

The other beer that really impressed me was Kaiser Curmudgeon from Founders Brewing Company. This special release is their regular Curmudgeon old ale, aged in bourbon barrels that were used to age maple syrup in.

There is a ton of sweetness and bourbon-y notes in the nose, with vanilla and butterscotch. At just over 10% ABV, the booze isn't particularly hidden well, but it's not overly harsh. I actually didn't care for this a ton at first but it improves markedly as it warms up. It is certainly a sipping beer, though. Between the high ABV, the moderate booziness, and complex flavor, you won't (or shouldn't) be chugging this.

These were definitely my favorite of the night, but with 32 offerings from 16 breweries, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Keep your eyes peeled for a more comprehensive review of the beers and the event itself hopefully later this week!

Madame Rose:
Beer Advocate
Ratebeer

Kaiser Curmudgeon:
Beer Advocate
Ratebeer

(Note: I had a tough times matching the pictures I took with my tasting notes this morning. I believe I have the two correct above, though. Also, they were taken with my cell phone camera, so excuse the crappy quality.)

Day 5 (7/29/2011): Dirty Bastard by Founders Brewing Company

I've always been partial to Founders. Being a Michigan boy who went to undergrad in Grand Rapids, I've always had a soft spot in my heart for both them and Bells. Though I didn't appreciate them enough when I lived there, they both have been mainstays in my beer rotation.

I've never been partial to Scotch ales, though. In fact, I rarely buy them and can probably count the number of them that I've tried on one hand. The sweetness always seems a bit cloying and the strange metallic scent/flavor present in many of them always seemed strange to me. I figured I would give this one a chance, though.

This one pours a relatively translucent brown-red with a white head that dissipates quickly. Looks about how I would expect for the style. It smells of caramel and butterscotch, and leads me to believe that this is going to be a sweet one. There is no hop smell at all, all malts here. The typical metallic smell, which has been present in every other Scotch ale I've tried before, is here. Can anyone tell me what in the brewing process makes it smell/taste this way?

The taste is definitely the caramel and butterscotch in the smell, along with molasses and dark fruits (raisins, prunes). The metallic (iron?) taste is present in the background. It's not unpleasant, just different. This is definitely a sweet beer, but is never cloying. The sweetness is countered with a slight hop bite on the finish. The contrast between the sweetness up front and the hoppy, dry finish is really nice.

The mouth feel is really nice and smooth, medium-low carbonation with a somewhat thick body. The alcohol is almost entirely hidden, only the smallest burn.

This is a solid beer from one of my favorite breweries. I'm still not a huge fan of the style, but Founders definitely brewed this one right. If I was in the mood for something on the sweeter side, I'd definitely consider picking one of these up.

I give Dirty Bastard by Founders Brewing Company a B+.


Style: Scotch ale
ABV: 8.5%
IBU: 50
Beer Advocate: A-
Ratebeer: 98/97

Picked up a single bottle from Party Source for $1.89. You can also get a six pack there for a little under ten bucks plus tax. You can find this pretty much anywhere that sells Founders beer. It is available year round.