Beltway Beer

So, for the first time I tried a couple of “fresh hop” or “wet hopped” ales. To understand what this means, you first have to understand a little bit about how beer is normally brewed, so bear with me for a little bit. Hops, the ingredient that gives beer a bitter/piney/citrusy flavor, depending on the variety, are usually harvested in early September and are quite perishable. Generally they’re dried and pressed to prevent spoilage, so the vast majority of the beer you drink has been brewed using dried hops.

When the hops are sapped of their moisture, they also lose essential oils and resins, and quite a lot of them (I read a statistic somewhere saying that fresh hops are 60 percent water). So some breweries go to great lengths to brew a special “wet hopped,” limited edition “harvest beer” right at harvest time, using hops that haven’t yet been dried. Often this means either having fresh hops shipped in overnight, or brewing on harvest day, for breweries that have their own hop fields (like Sierra Nevada). All of this can serve to drive up the price of wet hopped brews, but many aficionados will pay a price premium for freshness, like someone else might for vegetables at a farmer’s market.

I actually am not a huge fan of IPAs — a handful I love, most I can do without — but I’d been told that fresh hops often impart more hop aroma and earthy flavors, without all the bitterness, so I decided to give a couple a shot.

With that brief explainer, on to a couple of my first tastings. I started off with one of Harpoon’s 100-barrel series, the ‘09 Glacier Harvest Wet Hop Ale. It pours a clear, brassy amber with a thin tan head that fades quickly to a cap. Rather low carbonation on this one. Subtle nose, all grassy and earthy hop smells that dominate what aroma there is. This one drinks very mellow and slick, slight piney hop tingle along the sides of the tongue with a surprising little sweet malty kick at the finish, and a lingering malty crispness. Not easy to categorize. Mellow yet flavorful, overall a pleasing beer that’s pretty easy to drink.

I then moved to Sierra Nevada’s Southern Hemisphere Harvest Fresh Hop Ale. This is really intended to be a springtime fresh hop ale, because they import fresh hops up from New Zealand. So I probably didn’t consume it at its freshest, and my review should be read in that light. Pours a hazy light tea-colored brew with a thick, frothy head. Wow, this one delivers a nose full of piney, grassy hop aromas. Aggressive nose on this one. On the drink, the Sierra delivers an initial hop blast that’s really pronounced, and yet not bitter or unpleasant. The hop blast fades on the tongue to be replaced with a warming malt flavor that would make for a really nice finish if it wasn’t immediately socked by a sourish resiny aftertaste. Medium bodied. Pretty easy to drink, and I love the start and midpoint of the quaff, but the finish is pretty offputting. Of the two I enjoyed Harpoon’s take more.

According to an email sent a bit ago, Brickskeller tonight will be selling 22oz. bottles of Port Brewing’s “Hot Rocks Lager,” which was brewed by using hot rocks as a heating element as opposed to a burner.

This follows on another recent rare beer Brickskeller put out for sale, Lost Abbey’s Red Barn, which I wrote about in an entry here. The email from Dave seems to imply that they’ll be making rare beers available as a semi-regular event. Sounds like a good idea — my only knock is that DC law won’t let you buy bottles and take them home, so you have to drink it at the bar.

It was with an enormous amount of anticipation that I went down to Churchkey last night for their official open. And let me just say at the outset that I was not disappointed.

The bar was originally supposed to open at 5, I showed up around 5:20 and they hadn’t started letting people in yet. So I got in the (already-forming) line and waited. There must have been 50 people queued just to get in the door by the time they opened up at 5:40 or so. People were walking past rubbernecking the line trying to figure out what the big deal was. Most people went straight up to the bar area, though by the time I left there were maybe 4-5 tables occupied at the restaurant downstairs, but it was clear that the bar was the star.

The bar area, for a DC bar in particular, was absolutely enormous, with a long, J-shaped bar that can probably seat 30 – 50 people by itself if I had to guess. Four-top booths behind the barstools with plenty of standing room in between. There were LOTS of people there last night, and it still never felt unmanageable — although the bar staff definitely had their hands full. They had all 50 taps and 5 casks up and running with a supremely impressive tap list (which can be found here. I started off with a Gaffel Kolsch, then moved to the Ola Dubh 40 (on cask!!), to BrewDog’s Paradox (also on cask), to the Ommegang Obamagang.

The start was a little rough, it took way too long for someone to take my order. However, it was made right without my even asking — a manager noticed another gentleman and myself without any sort of liquid refreshment and pulled us a couple for free. Through the evening I saw several bumps smoothed like this — wrong orders, waiting for a drink, whatever. To me it wasn’t that they made mistakes, it was that they cheerfully fixed it and then went a step beyond to make people happy. If Churchkey can keep up this kind of selection, and this kind of customer service-oriented attitude, they’ll do great.

I’ll probably even be back tonight.

I am told that Churchkey, the upstairs beer bar part of the Logan Circle duo, is set to open tonight at 5 p.m. Birch & Barley, the downstairs restaurant, will open an hour later.

According to the CityPaper, all five casks will be tapped tonight, including Harviestoun Ola Dubh 40, an English ale aged in 40-year whiskey barrels; BrewDog Paradox Isle of Arran, a whiskey-barrel-aged imperial stout; Weyerbacher Imperial Pumpkin Ale; and two others as yet a mystery.

More from CityPaper:

Of the 50 taps, about half will rotate every week or so, while the other half will be good standbys. The dependable session beers include: Victory Prima Pils, Allagash White, Brooklyn Lager, Stone Pale Ale, Smuttynose IPA, Green Flash Hop Head Red, and Climax Nut Brown Ale. $5 for about a 12 oz. glass.

Now THIS is a beer. It’s brewed by Weltenburger Abbey, a Benedictine monastery in Bavaria, Germany. Classed as a dunkel, the German word for dark, these are known to be smooth, malty brews.

Pours a dark amber with ruby red hightlights and ample, tannish bubbly head. Nose is all big, biscuity malts — hard to detect much else. It really goes down smooth, with a slick, soft mouthfeel that makes it very drinkable. For all its aggressive aroma, though, it’s actually quite tame in the best way. Malts up front with a very slight hop taste on the finish. For its deep amber color, it’s actually very light and refreshing, extremely sessionable. Not as in-your-face malty as something like Spaten Optimator (which, by the way, is one of my favorite beers at the moment). This has a very delicate sweetness that is extremely satisfying. I’d say this is an excellent “training wheel” beer, to introduce people who are curious about craft brews to some more robust and complex flavors without scaring them off.

While I’m on the topic, here’s an interesting article about how aging monks at monasteries that sell well-known beers (like Westmalle) are increasingly taking a back seat as they grow long in the tooth. Link here.

The other night I had a chance to sample Scottish brewery BrewDog’s “laid back amber beer” called The Physics. I’m not that familiar with BrewDog, but they seem to delight in pushing the envelope. That being said, this particular beer was pretty tame. (Then again, it does advertise itself as “laid back.”) In its defense, my particular bottle was about two months past its “best by” date.

Pours a hazy gold-amber color with hardly any head. Extremely low carbonation. I mean really, it almost reminds me of cask beer in that way. There are like two bubbles struggling their way up to the top of the glass. The nose is sweet fruit and malts, quite nice actually, more would be cloying but it walks the line well. Unfortunately it doesn’t translate to the taste — it’s very, very mellow, with a hint of dark fruits, malt, and just a small hop bite up front. Very soft, actually quite drinkable, but not much there to excite.

According to the Washington City Paper, sometime this winter DC will get a proper biergarten: Biergarten Haus. It’ll open on H St., occupying a 5,000 square foot storefront adjacent to Rock N’ Roll Hotel. Twelve taps, traditional German food and an outdoor beer garden. Link here.

Relentless Thirst has an interesting interview with the beer sommelier/export director of Weissbraueri Schneider, discussing some of the push-pull between innovation and attempting to stay within the bounds of the Rheinheitsgebot, the German beer purity law. Link here.

Went to RFD for lunch today and brought back the current tap list. Unfortunately nothing on cask, the bartender tells me it’s been difficult for them to get a variety of cask beers lately, probably because of how easily it spoils in the summer months.

On tap:
Anchor Steam
Atwater Blocktoberfest
Avery The Kaiser Imperial Oktoberfest
Bell’s Java Stout (which will be replaced with Founder’s Breakfast Stout soon)
Boulder Cold Hop English Style IPA
Bulmer’s Strongbow Cider
Cape Ann Fisherman’s Pumpkin Stout
Czechvar
Dogfish Head Punkin Ale (which will be replaced with New Holland Ichabod soon)
Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA
Duvel Green Belgian Blonde Ale
Erdinger Oktoberfest Weizen
Flying Dog Doggie Style Classic Pale Ale
Grimbergen Dubbel
Guinness
Hoegaarden
Hofbrau Oktoberfest
Lucifer Belgian Golden Ale
Magic Hat #9
Magic Hat Roxy Rolles
Schneider Aventinus Weizenbock
Sierra Nevada Yakima Harvest
Southern Tier Pumking Imperial Pumpkin Ale
St. Louis Framboise lambic
Stone Levitation
Stone Vertical Epic ‘09 (which will be repaced with New Holland Existential soon)
Weihenstephan Hefeweiss
Weyerbacher Harvest Ale

Probably among the last chances to get Oktoberfests on tap; the winter seasonals will be here soon. In fact, I’ve already spotted the first one on the shelves: Troegs Brewing’s “Mad Elf.”

Looks like Victory will soon be introducing a new beer, what they call a “Dark IPA.” From Victory’s blog, via the DC Beer mailing list:

Featuring four hops from America’s heartland of hop-growing, the Yakima Valley of Washington State, our new Yakima Twilight serves as a celebration of American hops. “I thought of hop farmers as I formulated this beer. I wanted to create a malty platform to showcase the intense flavors and aromas that these dedicated hop-farmers have developed in their wonderful hops.” stated Ron Barchet, CEO and co-brewmaster of Victory.

Full release here.