Friday the 13th - The Beer Thrillers

Spring House To Open the Coffin Bar on October Friday the 13th

B. Kline — Tue, 10 Oct 2023 21:36:17 +0000

The Coffin Bar Will Creak Open on Friday the 13th

On Friday the 13th, the freaks and ghouls will come out. Especially on October 13th in Lancaster, PA. The Coffin Bar by Spring House Brewing Company creaks open at 11:30 AM on Friday, welcoming all the creepies and crawlies into the eclectic bar.

They took to Instagram and Facebook to make their official announcement:

Grand opening: Friday, Oct. 13th!

Hours:
Mon – Sat 11:30 am – midnight
Sun 11:30 am – 9 pm

#springhousebeer #thecoffinbar #lancasterpa
The Coffin Bar – Instagram Post

The Coffin Bar is located at 30 W. Lemon St, Lancaster PA.

The Spring House Tap Room Has Closed

As we previously noted – Spring House Tap Room Has Closed – the Spring House Tap Room has closed. The tap room was located at 25 W. King Street in Lancaster; they stated that they closed their tap room to be able to open The Coffin bar and to concentrate their efforts on the brewery at the bar.

For More Information on Spring House Brewing Company

For more information on Spring House Brewing Company, you can read our articles here:

The following information comes from Untappd: Spring House Brewing Company is a micro brewery located in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. They currently have 574 unique beers and over 285,000 ratings. They currently have a global average rating of 3.71 (as of 10.10.23). Their Untappd description reads: Perhaps few people understand this concept as well as those in Lancaster, PA, a small city that’s bursting with a strong sense of community and a burgeoning beer scene, where breweries like Spring House Brewing Company can flourish among its peers.

You can find them at the following social media pages:

The Coffin Bar Location and Hours

The Coffin Bar is located at 30 W. Lemon St, Lancaster PA.

Their hours of operation will be:

Monday: 11:30 AM – 12:00 (Midnight)
Tuesday: 11:30 AM – 12:00 (Midnight)
Wednesday: 11:30 AM – 12:00 (Midnight)
Thursday: 11:30 AM – 12:00 (Midnight)
Friday: 11:30 AM – 12:00 (Midnight)
Saturday: 11:30 AM – 12:00 (Midnight)
Sunday: 11:30 AM – 9:00 PM

Brewery News

Interested in finding out about many other brewery openings, new locations, closings, movings, and in general brewery news? You can check out our links below:

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Beer Review: Fruit Monster (Great Notion Brewing)

BKline — Thu, 29 Oct 2020 14:37:43 +0000

Fruit Monster by Great Notion Brewing

Continuing the beers from the stream; I get to the third of the series, and I present to you the fabled FRUIT MONSTER of Great Notion Brewing. Firstly…. let me say, finally, I’ve gotten to try Great Notion Brewing, and they absolutely live up to all of the hype their beers have received. I got a few of their beers from Breski’s in a mix-a-six, and I’ll be reviewing the others as well at some point. But first I wanted to do the beers I had on the stream as part of a series. You can check out the streaming page at Knights of Nostalgia. I’ll put a list of the beers from the stream that I did beer reviews of at the end of this article. Its a series of reviews, just like my Tree House beers I reviewed as a series. Make sure to check out the others.

Look at that picture above, doesn’t that look like pure juice? Like orange juice? Like a good breakfast OJ to get the day going? Well, its not OJ, and its not a New England IPA, but it is pure straight juice, and its straight fire.

This is part of the Great Notion’s Tart Ale series, each batch being a different blend of fruits. This particular one (in the above review) was Mango, Guava, and Passionfruit. The Untappd description reads that its Passionfruit and Pineapple, but that was for a different batch, and they don’t have a unique beer check-in for each batch. So the description reads off a bit different than the beer itself; but its a simple fix – where it says “pineapple and passionfruit” just think “mango, guava, passionfruit”. Problem solved.

Fruit Monster by Great Notion Brewing

Beer: Fruit Monster
Brewery: Great Notion Brewing
Style: Sour – Fruited
ABV: 6%
IBU: None
Untappd Description: The first in our new tart ale series, Fruit Monster! Each batch will have a unique blend of tropical fruits and milk sugar, and the first one has a scary amount of pineapple and passion fruit. Drink up before the monster gets it all!

Appearance is like your morning juice with a nice breakfast. Not quite like the hazy juice of New England IPAs, this looks more like your pineapple or slicker clearer juices. Its still not transparent and is mostly opaque, but it not as hazy or turbid and it doesn’t have any sediment or floaters in it. It had a thin (very thin) small head when poured that quickly evaporated. Good carbonation. Beautiful orange color, bright, and all around just appealing.

The nose for this is just as described and offered. Mango, guava, passionfruit. Very fruity, in a heady mixture. It all hits together at the same time in the same way and makes one giant blend of an aroma. You can really smell the three fruits; but I think the mango and guava is probably the two that come through the most, hard to say though with just how well it all blends together.

Now we get to whats always my favorite part of the review…. because its my favorite part of beer; and that’s drinking it! Just like its appearance would make you think, this is pure juice. And just like its aroma would make you think, this is pure fruity. So… guess what? Its pure fruity juice! This is completely, absolutely, ridiculously, incredibly… delicious. As the ‘cool kids’ on the interweb would say, “its pure fire”. (See, I’m still hip and with it. I can get jiggy with it too.) There is a very slight tartness to this, but its refined and mostly negligible; what you are primarily getting is a fruity, juicy, drinkable and crushable beer. I think I downed this in no time, savoring the first sip and the last, and draining the rest of it far quicker than I should have. (Its so good its hard to savor it.) The fruits do blend in the tasting just like they did in the aroma. You get the notes of the mango, guava, and passionfruit, very heavily. Probably mostly mango and mostly guava with the passionfruit being more subtle. Guava can be an interesting flavor to me, its very hit or miss, in this though, I think its definitely a hit, most likely because of how its used in combination with the mango and passionfruit. I am a huge fan of mango in beer and this nails it completely and perfectly. Providing such a deep tasty mango flavor that combines really well with the guava and the passionfruit flavors and makes a really nice blend. This is 6% so its certainly not heavy or boozy or too powerful, and its very crushable, a four pack of this would go down waaaaaaaaay too easily. I think 5-7.5% is the perfect range for beers if you are sitting down and drinking; don’t get me wrong, I love the deep heavy boozy barleywines and stouts (as many faithful readers of the blog can attest to), but for hanging out with friends, drinking, playing video games, etc, a good 5-7.5% beer is perfect. You can have multiples, its not too boozy, too heavy, and sits well. Just like this does. Perfect for playing Friday the 13th and being a camp counselor running away from Jason Voorhees. Also, just a perfect beer, period, in general, flat out. Make sure you find yourself some of this and give it a try, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed at all.

My Untappd Rating: ****.75
Global Untappd Rating: 4.11 (as of 10.29.20)

This is the third of the four beer series from last week’s streaming session; when me and Drew played Friday the 13th on Knights of Nostalgia. You can check in with us to see what we’re drinking, and you can watch Drew on there a lot, usually drinking craft beer and / or bourbon or scotch.

Beers:

Beer Review: Pixels (Seminar Brewing)
Beer Review: Isolation Anniversary Beer (Aslin Beer Company)
Beer Review: Fruit Monster (Great Notion Brewing)
Beer Review: Villeinage (Elder Pine Brewing and Blending)

So be sure to check out Villeinage soon. Probably sometime in the next day or two.

You can also see some of our other beer reviews here:

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

Tonight I will be joining Drew again on Knights of Nostalgia for another stream, this time we’ll also be joined by Rory. So make sure to see the three of us play some video games and drink craft beer and joke around.

Cheers!

-B. Kline

Beer Review: Isolation Anniversary Beer (Aslin Beer Company)

BKline — Mon, 26 Oct 2020 03:15:00 +0000

Isolation Anniversary Beer by Aslin Beer Company

Welcome back to round number two of the four rounds of four beers I had during the last streaming I did with Drew on Knights of Nostalgia. The first was Pixels by Seminar Brewing, this is the second, the third will be Great Notion Brewing’s Fruit Monster, and the fourth will be Elder Pine Brewing and Blending’s Villeinage. (Spoiler alert: all four beers were really good.)

Aslin Beer Company is one of the many great breweries along the East Coast. In the middle of the East Coast; Virginia, Maryland, D.C, West Virginia, Delaware area; Aslin Beer Company, Burley Oak Brewing Company, The Veil, The Answer, Adroit Theory, Dewey Beer Company, are often mentioned on “must visit” and “top breweries” and “great” lists; they are usually the sought after, the traded for (the Facebook group ISO / FT), and the breweries that people mule back from. So needless to say, it’s fantastic to see some of these breweries (notably Aslin Beer Company and Burley Oak Brewing Company) popping up in distribution (distro) in the area. Breski’s Beverage on Eisenhower Boulevard (outside of Harrisburg between Harrisburg and Middletown) has been getting some wonderful cans from both breweries, as well as many other notable breweries, and is always worth checking in to see what they currently have in stock.

The mix-a-six selection at Breski’s and similar places are phenomenal right now (…phenomenally tasting; horrible on your wallet however). Last Tuesday before stopping at Tattered Flag for their Taco Tuesday, I stopped at Breski’s and got two mix-a-six six-packs (and paid about 60$), but picked up some tremendous beers; like the Isolation Anniversary Beer, two Great Notion beers, a pilsner (Billsner) from Burley Oak, a Black is Beautiful from Non Sequitur, Stickman’s The Growfather (can’t resist a good Godfather pun), two from Stranger Root’s Experimental Ales, Alarmist, Atlantic, etc. All in all, a wonderful selection of beers that you will be seeing reviews of (at least nine out of the 12 anyway, and hopefully in a timely fashion).

So, since I have a ton of reviews to do, and limited time (don’t we all limited time afterall?) I better get right down to this and do this beer review shouldn’t I?

Ok…. lets do it!

Isolation Anniversary Beer by Aslin Beer Company

Beer: Isolation Anniversary Beer
Brewery: Aslin Beer Company
Style: IPA – Imperial / Double Milkshake
ABV: 9.4%
IBU: None
Untappd Description: (Blank)

Always a little disappointing to see the description left blank (its nice to see notes from the brewers / brewery, or maybe a joke or pun, or some context behind the beer or the beer name, or why or how it was brewed, if it was a collaboration, if its someone’s favorite recipe, or something at least), but I think this beer doesn’t really need a description, as it stands on its own.

Appearance is similar to that of a New England IPA; its opaque, its hazy, its bright, and orange, and glowing, but its even thicker than a normal New England IPA looks. It has ‘floaters’ especially if you don’t roll it before opening it up and pouring it. Its very well carbonated and has a great foamy white head, with a good pour it has just the right amount of head, with a bad pour I could picture this filling a whole glass with just head. The bubbles on it are nice and it leaves a nice lacing in the glass. It’s turbid, busy, and active.

The nose on this is hoppy, juicy hoppy, citrusy hoppy, but also creamy and vanilla and lactose, like silky smooth creamy milk with lots of fruity, citrus, juice, hops in it. I get mango, peach, citrus, a bit of zest, and a small whiff of grapefruit hop notes in this blended with the vanilla sweetness and cream of the lactose.

First sip… wow. Second sip… double wow. This has a LOT going on. Which is not a fault or problem at all; granted sometimes it can be, but not in this case. This has a lot going on, but all in proportion to the beer itself and within its style and how the beer is supposed to be. It’s not going off into all kinds of different places with varied and confusing mixtures of flavors, or with off flavors, or with competing notes. This just has a lot going on within it, but all with a purpose, all within the style, and all just how you should want it. Its a milkshake, its a hop bomb, its juicy, its turbid, its hazy, its strong, its delicious. Most importantly…. its delicious. And… did I mention yet…. that its delicious? This was hands down my favorite of the night, and it was the boldest, most flavorful, and had the biggest wallop of flavors, notes, aromas, hop, juiciness, and outright drinkability. I could easily kill a four pack of these, and probably in short time too; its just that drinkable. Which is scary at its 9.4% ABV, but it doesn’t feel heavy, or boozy, or knocking you on your face and teeth skittering across the cement floor of the basement kind of alcoholic; its just crushable but at a higher ABV. This is like drinking a smooth, juicy, silky, creamy, orange juice with the fruity citrus juicy hops in for extra flavor. Just like with aroma, I got mostly mango and peach with the flavor, but also got citrus, some zest, and a teeny weensy bit of grapefruit. I do have to say, as much as I could crank down a four pack of this, as someone with lactose intolerance, thats probably not a great idea. These milkshake IPAs and milkshake sours and such with some having an insane amount of lactose in them (this one probably has a rather large amount in it) typically give me some ‘gastro’ issues next morning when I wake up. One or so don’t usually hurt too much, but after that it starts pushing it, especially with the very heavy lacto ones.

My Untappd Rating: ****.5
Global Untappd Rating: 3.98 (as of 10.25.20)

After wrapping up the beer review here, I wanted to do a bit more research on the beer for the blog, so I did a quick Google search (ASLIN ISOLATION ANNIVERSARY BEER) and the first site was their online ordering form for the beer, which you can find here: Order Isolation Anniversary Beer. It also came with a description for the beer which reads:

“🎉 ISOLATION ANNIVERSARY BEER 🎉 Today‘s the day we opened our (garage) door 5 years ago! 🍻In honor of the 1825 days that have passed since then, we bring you our Aslin ISOLATION ANNIVERSARY BEER. Soft ripe yellow peach, mango, and passionfruit unite with explosively juicy results, and a full-bodied, perfectly zippy taste that finishes off with woody resin notes from Cypress & Sugar Maple wood. This is juicy fruit flesh squeezed into a hazy DIPA!! We’re raising a glass of this to all of you for your incredible support that has helped bring us to YEAR 6. Hang tight, this is not the only drop in our 5th Anniversary series! 🎉 🍻”

Also came with a picture:

Aslin Isolation Beer (Picture courtesy of their Online Order Form: https://www.aslinbeer.com/online-ordering/Isolation-Anniversary-Beer-DIPA-4-Pack-p236935594)

Hopefully that provides a bit of closure on the beer and fills in for the lack of a description on Untappd for everyone.

As always everyone, thanks for reading, and be sure to check back soon as I do the other two beers, as well as some recent travelogues (just did a recent hike with my faithful canine companion Leela to the Pinnacle Overlook in Hamburg and stopped at 1787 Brewing Company and Schaylor Brewing Company). As always, there is a ton to check out here on the blog, so be sure to be on the lookout, hit the subscribe and follow button, and always feel free to comment, we love to hear from you!

You can see my latest beer reviews here:

Also, in recent news, the Great American Beer Festival (GABF) 2020 ended (their 34th edition; this year virtually rather than in person in Boulder, Colorado), and they’ve announced their winners. You can see what Pennsylvania Breweries won here. As well as the 2020 NAGBW Awards.

Cheers everyone, and stay safe and healthy out there with all the rises in COVID cases. Remember to mask up, remember to wash hands, and most importantly: remember to drink some great craft beers!

Aslin’s Isolation Anniversary

Isolation Anniversary Beer by Aslin Beer Company

-B. Kline

Beer Review: Pixels (Seminar Brewing)

BKline — Thu, 22 Oct 2020 18:25:17 +0000

Pixels by Seminar Brewing

Last night was another ‘stream night’ with my friend Drew over at Knights of Nostalgia. I had four amazing beers last night (and will be doing a review of each). I had this – Pixels; Aslin’s Isolation Anniversary Beer, Elder Pine Brewing and Blending’s Villenage, and Great Notion’s Fruit Monster. This was my first time having all four of these beers, and my first time having a beer from Seminar Brewing, from Elder Pine Brewing and Blending, and from Great Notion Brewing. And none of them disappointed.

Don’t worry, I will be doing a review for all four of these. They were way to good not to do a review for each. (And made for quite the costly mix-a-six at Breski’s too, so I better put the drinking to good use!)

I had been saving the Pixels for a night of doing video game streaming with Knights of Nostalgia just due to its image and name-sake. Funnily though, we didn’t play a pixelated game, we did a more modern game (normally on Knights of Nostalgia we play old school NES or SNES games, like Zelda, or Metroid, or Mario, etc.). But, either way, it still made for a good fit for the stream. We played the Friday the 13th game, which you can play against people multi-player online. You are either Jason (the killer) or a camp counselor (someone who wants to escape). You play from various levels like Crystal Lake, Jarvis House, etc. Drew has all of the different Jason’s unlocked, so if you are Jason, you can play as any of the Jason’s from Parts I through X, including NES Jason. (Which looks absolutely horrible by the way, I do not recommend that Jason; just on aesthetics alone.) The game is ridiculously fun, and every time you play it, it’s simple, same yet different, and has endless possibilities. The surprise and shock factor of Jason appearing and things like that are always great too. Absolutely a blast to play with friends, definitely worth checking out. (Or go to Knights of Nostalgia and watch us play it.)

So after work yesterday, I ran home and got the beer and then went to his house and from 7:30 to roughly 12:30 we played Friday the 13th, and then hung around chatting until about 2:30 while having another beverage or two (St. Boniface’s Theory and Reality; and lots of water).

Enough jibber jabbering; let’s get on with the review!

Pixels by Seminar Brewing

Beer: Pixels
Brewery: Seminar Brewing
Style: IPA – New England
ABV: 7.2%
IBU: None
Untappd Description: New England Style IPA – Juicy, hoppy and cloudy, just like it should be!

This beer comes from a co-worker (shout out to Jam; who also brought me Up a Creek Extreme Ale) who grabbed this and a few other beers for me from South Carolina. Interesting note on this – the can’s tag price was 4.19$. Not sure why it’s such an odd amount, but possibly / probably because of tax I would assume. This is my first time having anything from them, and I was not disappointed. On Untappd their listed as having 60 unique beers. You can find the link to them above.

It’s hard to tell from the picture above (didn’t want to detract from the streaming by taking a beautiful photo, so you’ll have to deal with the crappy photo pic of the beer, half drank), but this looks like a juicy dank normal New England IPA. It’s hazy and opaque, and it foamed up a lot more than I imagined it would (could be traveling causing some shaking), but it had a lot of head to this. White foamy, billowy head to it, that left a fair bit of lacing on the glass.

Aroma is a very juicy, citrus, hoppy New England IPA. Its bright, powerful, and strong hop notes, this smells every bit as what you’re expecting from a hoppy and hop forward New England IPA. It’s definitely taken the knob and turned it up to max on the hop aroma, and there ain’t a thing wrong with that.

Taste is just like the above two – spot on for a New England hoppy / hop forward IPA. Very juicy, very strong hop notes and flavors, very powerful hop presence, that will really knock your socks off (be careful; drink this with shoes on to protect yourself from flying socks). There isn’t a crazy amount of things going on with this beer, its pretty much standard, by the numbers, but its done extremely well. You get a lot of juicy citrus hop notes up front, that taper off into more subtle earthy hop notes, with a slight background of mango hops flavors. It all blends pretty much by the end, and all blends very well to boot. Sometimes the best beer is just a beer done extremely well. Doesn’t need to have five thousand adjuncts or forty million different ingredients or a bunch of crazy recipe additions, late hop this, or dry hopped that, just a well brewed, delicious, tasty, and drinkable beer is all you really need most times; and this is just that beer. It hits all of the palate well, and spot on, doesn’t have any lingering or bad off flavors, and gets you wanting more when you are finished. At 7.2% ABV its not super strong and comparison wise, that puts it near Perpetual IPA (7.5%) by Troegs Brewing; so its not incredibly strong, and easy to drink a few of these at a time. A great beer to have while hanging out with friends and playing video games and streaming the game, while being chased and hacked to pieces by Jason.

My Untappd Rating: ****
Global Untappd Rating: 3.95 (as of 10.22.20)

Thanks for reading everyone. Today has been a slow day for me, I had wanted to go hiking and taking the dog walking and checking out a brewery or two or something, but that doesn’t look to be happening (started off slow… I may or may not have a pretty decent size headache when I woke up this morning, and woke up at 7AM thinking it was a work day, and then went back to sleep and woke up at 8:30-9AM). But hopefully tomorrow will be a hiking and traveling day. I’m thinking of hitting up the Hamburg area for hiking and obviously the breweries in the nearby areas.

You can see my latest beer reviews here:

Cheers everyone, and stay safe and healthy out there with all the rises in COVID cases. Remember to mask up, remember to wash hands, and most importantly: remember to drink some great craft beers!

Final notes – be sure to check out our article on Pilger Ruh Brewing and their crowd funding, they begin construction work on their brewery tomorrow, and need every cent they can get, so check that out and see if you are able to help out. Also, tomorrow, Tattered Flag released their Pitties beer; which some of the proceeds go towards helping Pittie Rescues. Be sure to check that out.

Ok everyone, have a great Thursday, and it’s time I get my butt moving instead of doing nothing all day. Alright, cheers everyone!

-B. Kline

Pixels by Seminar Brewing

Multiple Beer Reviews: Kettle Sour Gose, ESB, Dandy-Lion Saison, TropiKolsch (Mount Gretna Craft Brewery)

BKline — Sun, 15 Sep 2019 12:40:00 +0000

A flight of beers at Mount Gretna Craft Brewery, from left to right: Kettle Sour Gose, ESB, Dandy-Lion Saison, and TropiKolsch.

After dropping my oldest off with her mother in Campbelltown, off of Lawn Road, I was right there by the brewery, so I just had to stop in right? I mean, I couldn’t say no to a brewery that is literally right on the same road as me…. so I had to stop. Had to.

So this is all a direct continuation of Friday night. I know I meant to post this blog update after work yesterday…. but well…. I got distracted by drinking. (It happens… don’t stare at me like that.) My friend Drew called me out after work so I stopped there, and we pounded some beers with another friend (Dan) and discussed everything and anything pop culture and then watched Terror in Beverly Hills. Which, is a must see if you are a big FRANK Stallone fan. Anyway, you might be seeing some articles on here by Drew in the future, or at least the podcasts he is working on. Which I will be participating in as well. (Gaming and beer related podcasts, where we drink and play old NES or SNES video games. So be sure to check them out whenever we get them done and posted, and I will be putting links to them here on this blog.) We did drink some quality beers last night, Spundae by Spring House, Velvet Cake by Spring House, Key Lime Pie Confectioner by D9, Atomic Pumpkin by New Belgium, and then we segued into drinking Natty Daddy’s, Naturdays, and Miller Light…. and random liquors around his house. Yea… it devolved pretty quickly and into one of those kinds of nights.

But have no fear, I’m up early, sober, and with minimal hangover, so its time to write this beer review of the flight I had at Mount Gretna Craft Brewery, just like I promised, …only a few (14-ish) hours late(r).

Kettle Sour Gose by Mount Gretna Craft Brewery

Decided to do a flight of all light, tart, sour-ish beers. But unfortunately the one kicked so I stuck an ESB in the middle, which still isn’t bad. So my flight went Gose, ESB, Saison, Kolsch. I can handle a nice flight like that, especially after a night at Troegs and eating tacos and soft pretzels and drinking pale ales and IPAs.

Beer: Kettle Sour Gose
Brewery: Mount Gretna Craft Brewery
Style: Sour – Gose
ABV: 4.3%
IBU: 11
Untappd Write-Up: German-style beer with a refreshing tart lemon verbena mixed with a touch of Summertime Salt. 4.3 ABV / 11 IBU

This is a very typical, light, airy, nicely tart kettle sour / gose. Its crisp, its tart, its light, its relatively smooth, it has a nice bit of a pop to it. Its nothing extraordinary, but its far far far from bad. Its a good beer.

Appearance is clear, bit of fiz head to it, has the light look of a gose and tart sours. Like an off-hue of lagers and pilsners, there’s that translucent quality to goses and most sours that you can just tell its going to be tart.

Once again aroma is that tartness, bit of lime and lemon whiff you get from kettle sours. Not a lot of adjuncts or anything to differentiate it from other similar goses and kettle sours.

Taste is also exact for kettle sours and tart goses; its clean, crisp, refreshing, effervescent, a nice clean beer. Summertime calling type beer. I wish I had more descriptors and could go on more about it, but I really don’t have much to say about this. Its just a nice, plain, generic kettle sour beer thats good but won’t wow, its tasty, nothing bad to say about it, just nothing amazing to say about it.

My Untappd Rating: ***.75
Global Untappd Rating: 3.55 (as of 9.15.19)

ESB by Mount Gretna Craft Brewery

The odd-ball of my flight, the non-sour/non-tart/non-refreshing/non-crisp beer of my flight. The only “dark” beer on the flight. Sadly, it didn’t quite hold up, and not in the least because of the style.

Beer: ESB
Brewery: Mount Gretna Craft Brewery
Style: Extra Special / Strong Bitter
ABV: 4.7%
IBU: 37
Untappd Write-Up: The British version of a pale ale. Made with traditional European malts and hops, it’s a balance between bitterness of the hops and sweetness of the malts. An earthy, floral flavor profile and aroma with a hint of residual sweetness. Pairs well with chicken, fish & chips, cheeses.

Sadly, this just felt off and tasted off to me. Not exactly to tradition, and not exactly the beer style’s fault, this was more of a problem with the beer recipe I think (or perhaps production, but I think it wasn’t bad brewing, just not a good recipe).

Appearance is dark, malty, typical for ESB’s. Its brown, bready looking, and kind of with a slightly unfiltered look, little bit of floaters. There is some clarity, and it has a lager-ish look (albeit darker), and appearance is good and on point for the style.

Aroma is bready, malty, and heady. Some roasty notes but not much, you get some of the hops in the aroma, all bitterness and no fruity hop notes. Still nothing out of the ordinary and everything looks and smells fine with this beer.

Taste is straight up bitter. Which isn’t necessarily a problem, but there is no sweetness of malt, just bitter hop, bitter malt, bitter roast, and with an astringency. The sheer overwhelming bitterness is what makes me think its a recipe problem and not a brewing problem. Just too much bitter hops, too much bitter malts, too much everything bitter, and nothing to kind of thin it out or to mellow it even the slightest. Like the style was ramped up massively. This is what leads me to believe its the recipe, that they took the style and tried to overachieve with it. There is nothing too off about the beer outside of all this, some astringency, and some after-taste thats a bit bad, but could just be from the massive amounts of bittering rather than anything else.

My Untappd Rating: ***.25
Global Untappd Rating: 3.45 (as of 9.15.19)

Dandy-Lion Saison by Mount Gretna Craft Brewery

Catalogue this one under good but weird after-taste.

Beer: Dandy-Lion Saison
Brewery: Mount Gretna Craft Brewery
Style: Farmhouse Ale – Saison
ABV: 5%
IBU: None
Untappd Write-Up: French style saison with a seasonal kick of sunflower seeds and dandelion heads. This might yellow ale boasts a foamy white head that finishes dry with an herbaceous hint of dandelions

This was delicious, just left a weird after-taste. Let me be up front about that. I really enjoyed the beer, up until after I finished it and then it just had a weird after-taste that kept me burping a bit with a bad taste in my mouth. Not really horrible, and not enough to knock it crazily, but, was unpleasant.

Appearance is a mellow yellow, a soft translucent, clear, see-through off-key Belgian-esque orange that is far more yellow. Little bit of a head to it, but not much due to just being a taster.

Aroma smells like an open field. Grassy, full of summer time air. Dandalions being picked by kids, sunflower seeds, garden plants, grass dewy yet.

Taste is refreshing and crisp, you get the sunflower seed flavor, but not roasted sunflower seeds like you sucked on and chewed and spit out when you were a kid in little league. This is like fresh picked sunflower seeds. Nice refreshing tartness to this.

….but then that aftertaste. After I sat down the sampler for the last time, it kicked in, and got me. A wave of funkyness from the beer. Just something off, and it made me burp a few times, and not pleasant “oh I get to taste this again” burps, but almost like a funky brett or funky sour kinda taste. Maybe it was a one time thing, or maybe its the beer, I don’t know.

My Untappd Rating: ***.50
Global Untappd Rating: 3.56 (as of 9.15.19)

TropiKolsch by Mount Gretna Craft Brewery

The last of my flight, a Kolsch by Mount Gretna Craft Brewery. This one was the fruitiest of the bunch, and perhaps my favorite of the flight as well.

Beer: TropiKolsch
Brewery: Mount Gretna Craft Brewery
Style: Kolsch
ABV: 5.2%
IBU: 21
Untappd Write-Up: Campbelltown Kolsch has a clear, sun-bleached straw color with a medium white head that doesn’t stick around very long. It is light in body with delicate fruit and bread notes and good carbonation. A balanced beer with soft malty sweetness and a smooth crisp mouthfeel. With the addition of mango! Pairs well with salads, chicken and fish

This was very refreshing, light, and good. The appearance, like the kettle sour gose, is light, translucent and see-through, clear and refreshing looking. No sediments, no floaters, no haze, just simple, clean, crisp, clear beer.

Aroma is fruity and bright. Hop notes of like cirtra and the other fruit forward hops. Some mango and possibly peach aroma.

Taste is crisp, refreshing, cool, and smooth drinking. Nothing cloy, nothing clinging to your mouth, nice light mouthfeel. Mango flavor dominates a bit, but it has an overall crisp fruityness to it. Tart and refreshing but not sour and no punch to it.

My Untappd Rating: ***.50
Global Untappd Rating: 3.26 (as of 9.15.19)

So, it didn’t come out when I promised (last night, 9.14.19, after work), but it came out now, and I’m off for work. While I’m busting and working hard, you all need to root on the Bengals vs. the 49ers for me. Its only fair afterall!

Keep enjoying the suds!

-B. Kline

A flight from Mount Gretna Craft Brewery

Two Beer Review: Fresh Fest and Trail Day Pale Ale (Troegs Brewing)

BKline — Sat, 14 Sep 2019 03:45:37 +0000

Whats better than good music, good tacos, and great beer? Getting to spend it with your daughter!

Every so often I manage to get a game-plan to work out. And this was one of those rare occasions! The game-plan going in was to pick up my oldest daughter from her volleyball practice, quickly get to Troegs Brewery and surprise her with getting to see her favorite (local) band, Vinegar Creek Constituency.

We were here for a previous Second Friday at the beer garden at Troegs, I believe it was when they released the cans of Golden Thing and another beer, perhaps Lollihop or one of the other scratches turned main roster, and they had their food truck going and the band playing, and my oldest daughter just fell in love with the band(‘s music).

So, I got her at 6:30 from her volleyball practice, quickly got to Troegs, drove around their entire lot a good 3-4 times and found not a single spot, so I parked in the back corner by the warehouse and the gazebo, in a “not exactly a parking spot – parking spot”. (Which later on, a SUV would totally block off a whole section of the parking lot by parking at a spot where it was a parking spot for him, but he didn’t back into his spot fully, and it basically made a pincer area out of two parked cars so an entire row of parking spaces couldn’t get out…plus my “illegal/legal” spot.)

This was a special Second Friday though at Troegs, not only was it a Second Friday, not only was it a full moon, and not only was it “Friday the 13th”, it was also a can release! (Oh yea, the importance of those might be in the wrong order, I don’t know). They released cans of “Trail Day Pale Ale”, a recent scratch that they perfected. Also, to my shock, when I saw the menu, they had Fresh Fest on the taplist (inside) – which wasn’t there Sunday when I was last there.

After parking, and getting into the beer garden, which amazingly isn’t packed, we found a table three away from the band, with a couple sitting at it but with room for us, I plop the kiddo down and her gatorade from practice, order us two chicken tacos, and head inside for my beers (since they didn’t have Trail Day outside, which I was a bit surprised by since it was the release of the day). The inside was jam packed. Upstairs, downstairs, packed, tour going on as well that looked full. Every booth was full, even the patio tables were full, the bar was full, and without going upstairs but looking up at the loft, it looked full too. Wait in line at the bar, and see that they have Fresh Fest. I decide on just a taster for that (8.50$ for a half pint or 3.50$ for a 4oz, plus I was getting a full pint of Trail Day, and with the kid and driving, figured it’d be the safer route). Take the beers back to our table right as the band finishes their set-up and starts up at just a bit before 7 and the tacos are done and its time to dive in.

In the taster – Fresh Fest, in the pint – Trail Day, and an amazing Chicken Taco.

Craft breweries do some amazing tacos. They are “high end” tacos, like the ones at Newfangled, and at other food truck type things, or even the specialty day tacos at certain breweries, but they are always fantastic. Not exactly the most filling usually, and obviously you’re dropping a few more dollar bills on this than the 5-pack at Taco Bell, but for taste, its so worth it.

I was surprised to see Fresh Fest on the menu and having not had it, I figured why not, and grabbed myself a taster of that. (Was originally just planning on drinking a few Trail Days while listening and hanging out with the kid, but its always nice to get to try a couple new beers, so of course I’m gonna jump on that chance.)

Beer: Fresh Fest
Brewery: Troegs Independent Brewing Company
Collaboration: Apis Meadery
Style: Honey Beer
ABV: 6%
IBU: No IBU
Untappd Write-Up: We believe that good beer brings out the good in people. To celebrate the return of Fresh Fest -the nation’s first black beer festival- The drinking Partners, Apis Meadery and Troegs Independent Brewing gathered around a brew kettle to combine two quintessential summer flavors: peach cobbler and a bright refreshing honey ale. Pilsner, Vienna and honey malt stand in for the flaky crust, Pennsylvania honey and kveik yeast provide a sweet glaze, and peaches, apricots and a late dose of El Dorado and Lemondrop hops fill in the middle with balance of slight tartness and sweet fruit. Ready for seconds yet?

This is kind of a mix between a mead, and a tart/sour beer. Its a wonderful and interesting combination and does make me wish I got a full pint of it. Though, this is definitely no pounder, and not one you will be drinking more of one in a sitting most likely, not due to ABV or anything like that, but its just a heavy, full beer, that will sit on you for a bit. (Not a bad thing.)

Appearance is a bright orange glow. A meadish bright orange hue that (perhaps my picture doesn’t do justice to it) is clear, translucent, and has a shine to it. Honey colored through and through.

Aroma is very heavy peach. Kind of a funky peach, kind of ripe peach, but a tart, funky peach. A nice smell that tickled the nose and was just overall appealing.

Flavor is very heavy peach as well. The honey makes it smooth and provides that heavyness. It finishes with the tartness, but before that you get the heavy peach, the heavy sweet honey, and some breadyness, almost like a sweet peach pie (if I ate those kind of things) before it transitions into a tart peach pie (again, if I ate those kind of things). Its not overly dry but the tartness gives a bit of a sensation of that at the end, but this isn’t anything unpleasant and compliments the sweetness at the beginning of the beer very nicely.

My Untappd Rating: ****
Global Untappd Rating: 3.63 (as of 9.13.19)

The Fresh Fest went perfect with the taco, complimenting it very nicely. Debated even getting a second taco, or maybe trying one of the other two styles they had available (Corinitas or Black Bean), but opted out of that idea. (Not sure what corinitas is, but their website listed a “savory pork” taco, so perhaps thats that? I don’t know.) But we did see a few soft pretzels and my daughter decided we needed one… …and she was right, we did. So at the break in the band’s set, I braved myself up, and ventured back inside for the pretzel and a drink for her.

Oktoberfest Soft Pretzel with Cheese sauce and mustard sauce. 11$

After about a 15-20 minute wait in line, and another 2-3 minutes for it to get done, got back outside as the band was starting up their second act. So at least timing worked out perfectly on that one.

The soft pretzel was absolutely phenomenal (and for 11$ for a soft pretzel, it better damn well be). Passed on getting my regular hop fries, hoping the pretzel would be filling, and it was. We were also (at this point anyway) planning on picking up a smores kit to do by the firepit later on (we ended up not doing it, I guess smores aren’t as cool when you’re 12 years old, I dunno).

Trail Day Pale Ale

Time to drink down this delicious looking pint of Troegs new Trail Day Pale Ale. It was a great beer to wash down the Oktoberfest soft pretzel and to continue our night listening to her favorite band.

Beer: Trail Day
Brewery: Troegs Independent Brewing Company
Style: Pale Ale – American
ABV: 5.5%
IBU: None Listed
Untappd Write-Up: This is the beer you want in hand when your compass lands you at trail’s end. The scene is set with a malt bill full of soft oats. Unmalted wheat from Pennsylvania adds haze and props up the oils of a bright hop combination. Citra dominates with notes of passionfruit and lychee, Lotus adds hints of orange rind and vanilla, and El Dorado works with a fruit-forward yeast to pull in flavors of candied peach. and beneath all that is a foundation of good. When you buy a Trail Day, you’re helping protect the Kittatinny Ridge, a 185-mile Appalahchian superhighway that provides clean water, rich forests, recreational trails and safe passage for migratory wildlife. We taste: peach, passionfruit, lychee.

I really enjoyed this beer as it was a nice typical Troegs beer, which means it had the characteristic Troegs taste for a pale ale/IPA/etc. I legit think I could be given five or six different pale ales/IPAs/wheats/hefeweizens and other similar style beers, blind-folded, and only one of the five or six being a Troegs beer, and I’d be able to pick it out. Its probably the yeast strains they do, or their technique brewing, but they just have a characteristic taste, (perhaps the water?), or maybe I’m over thinking it, or maybe its just because I’ve had over 200+ different, unique beers from them, so I’ve built up a bit of an ‘idea’ on them. I don’t know, but this beer fit that mold, and it tasted great.

Troegs is very big into conservation and helping with wildlife protection, environmentalism, and other great things like this. Like donating and paying for the mural in Harrisburg with proceeds going to the conservancy, just like this beer does. Some money from each pint/can sold (not sure on percentages, you might have to check with Troegs directly for that information), goes to help Kittatinny Ridge conservancy.

As per Wikipedia:
“Kittatinny Mountain (Lenape: Kitahtëne^[1]) is a long ridge traversing across northwestern New Jersey running in a northeast-southwest axis, a continuation across the Delaware Water Gap of Pennsylvania’s Blue Mountain Ridge (also known as Kittatinny Ridge). It is the first major ridge in the far northeastern extension of the Ridge and Valley province of the Appalachian Mountains, and reaches its highest elevation (the state’s highest), 1,803 feet, at High Point in Montague Township. Kittatinny Mountain forms the eastern side of Wallpack Valley; the western side comprises the Wallpack Ridge (highest elevation: 928 feet (283 m) above sea level.”( Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kittatinny_Mountain.)

So its always great to see this, and great that Troegs is helping them out, just makes buying that pint or can of this that extra bit special and nice, and gives you warm glowy butterfly feelings in your tummy.

This is a very hazy pale ale. Its pretty much just one step up from Scratch 380 – Trail Day Dry Hopped Pale Ale. Might even be the same recipe but just given a full name as a regular/seasonal rotation, I don’t know, but its listed as a Pale Ale – New England on the scratch, and a Pale Ale – American on the new fully named version. (I gave the scratch version a **** on Untappd). Either way, this new version of it could easily be labeled a New England Pale Ale as well, as it is very hazy, especially so for a Troegs beer, that typically shies away from the haze.

Appearance is orange, unfiltered, hazy. Its not fully unfiltered but it definitely looks somewhat unfiltered and there is a bit of sediment and floaters (but nothing appalling or unappealing about it). The haze makes it not exactly un-see-through-but-not-super-dense either. (Thats the best way I could explain it.)

Aroma is soft, pale ale qualities, but with a good dose of hops. You can deeply smell the hops and the dry hopping. You get some fruity qualities, mostly stone fruit, like apricot and such, but you get the dry hopping mostly.

Taste is soft as well, pillowy, like the little bit of head that came with the beer. Soft, mellow, but also bursting with taste. Not mellow bland, but mellow soft. There is no hop bitterness from this, and it tastes like a typical NE-IPA or NE-PA. There is a smoothness t it from vanilla that helps with that New England vibe and taste to it. I also pick up notes of orange, passionfruit, and peach, kind of like candied peaches. Almost reminiscent of those peach ring gummies (like the ones Tattered Flag used in a few of their beers, which I reviewed one of). There is a definitely malty backbone to this that isn’t super typical for New England Pale Ales but its pretty subdued, just there, and you know its there. The Citra hops gives it a nice citrus punch that combines with the peach and passionfruit flavors very nicely. And it has a great finish that leaves a very nice and pleasant aftertaste on your tongue.

My Untappd Rating: ****.25
Global Untappd Rating: 3.87 (as of 9.13.19)

Vinegar Creek Constituency playing for the last Second Friday of the year at Troegs’ Beer Garden.

The beer garden is a wonderful experience and venue at Troegs whenever they do music here, its always a nice, relaxing atmosphere, with good, low-key vibe music playing. You could hear the band up on the patio, but with the beer garden’s setup you would not have been able to see them. Back beyond the band, they have a firepit that was open all night and lots of families were roasting s’mores on it. My daughter I suppose was “too cool” or “too old” (or just too tired after the band got done) and didn’t want to do it. So once the band packed up, I tried to get her to talk to them or at least get a picture with them, but she got too shy, and refused, so we made our way back to the car. Where… I had to wait and struggle to get out our area due to the SUV.

Afterwards, I dropped my daughter off with her mother, and being in the area I couldn’t help but stop in at Mount Gretna Brewery. So look for a review of the flight I had there probably after work tomorrow (Saturday, the 14th).

Vinegar Creek Constituency during their set, at the end of the night.

All in all, it was one of those rare nights when the game-plan went according to plan, and it was the rare daddy-daughter date night that actually worked out and everyone was happy. So I’m marking it down as a win. She got to see her favorite band that she’s been crushing on, I got to eat tacos and soft pretzels and hang out with my daughter, and she got to eat tacos and soft pretzels and hang out with her old man, and I got to try two new Troegs beers that were delicious. All in all a total win.

Look for my review of the flight from Mount Gretna sometime after 8PM or so when I get home from work, until then, keep “doing what you do”.

-B. Kline

Delicious tacos, delicious beers, fantastic music, and getting to spend time with my daughter, a total win.