Strong Baltika No. 9 for strong apple-picking people

Tapped out: Beers from home and away: Long Trail and Oskar Blues beers

As we reach the final installment of our beer-reviewing saga, the time has come to pay homage both to the temporary home state that has treated us so well and to the states that made us each who we are today. This week we decided to celebrate our favorite Maine beer, sample brews from William’s Green Mountain State of Vermont and try and save face for Shan’s home state of North Carolina and show that it is known for good beer and not just bigotry and being an international civil rights embarrassment. #WeAreNotThis. Shan: For the beer sticklers out there who will try and call me on this, I will start with a disclaimer: I am aware that Oskar Blues was originally founded in Lyons, Colo. (and, fun fact, is the current employer of the esteemed Mr. Polar Bear Class of 2016 himself, Ben WooChing). However, in 2012, Oskar Blues opened a branch in Brevard, N.C. and quickly established themselves as a brewery that made itself at home in the fast-growing N.C. beer scene. Over the summer, while working part-time in a restaurant in my hometown in Durham, one of the highlights of the night was sitting down at the bar after a long shift and enjoying a freshly-poured glass of Oskar Blues’ Pinner Throwback IPA. The name “throwback” is somewhat misleading, as it’s more along the lines of a session American Pale Ale, but any downsides of the beer end there. It packs an incredible amount of hop flavor and aroma, but has an amazing citrusy tartness that more than makes up for its relatively-low 35 IBUs. Combining its incredible taste with its light mouthfeel, I may have to give it a leg-up on last column’s session ale favorite, the Founders All Day IPA. Pinner is truly a beer that makes me think of warm Bull Durham summer nights whenever I taste it. William: Brewed in the rural town of Bridgewater, Vt., Long Trail stands as one of the Green Mountain State’s most popular beers. This brewery is about as local as it gets for me, as I live in the bordering town of Woodstock, exactly 8.6 miles from Long Trail headquarters. Unsurprisingly, I am quite biased. Ever since I was a first year, I have bragged to friends about the enjoyable malts and hops of this beloved Vermont company, trying to convince them to give Long Trail a try. All to no avail. Long Trail’s Limbo IPA is one of their better beers, a double IPA that brings 80 IBUs and 7.6 percent ABV. Those of you who are true IPA gurus will know of the legendary Vermont double IPA, Heady Topper. Limbo is Long Trail’s response.When we cracked open the Limbo and poured into our special glasses, we were perplexed by its aroma. Shan and I discussed long and hard about what we thought the smell reminded us of, until we agreed upon caramelized peaches. With 80 IBUs, Limbo brings with it a quite bitter taste, especially at the end of the sip. Compared to the Pinner, the Limbo had little of the tart, grapefruit taste. Instead, we found that the caramelized peach smell also imbedded itself in the flavor. Although Shan and I have enjoyed Limbo in the past, it did not shine in comparison to the Pinner. It physically pains me to admit it, but Vermont didn’t hold its own in our tasting. Shan & William: It was with misty eyes and nostalgia in our hearts that we set about deciding on a beer that could signify the love we feel for the state that has treated us so well over the past four years. But when push came to shove, we knew that there was only one beer that captured both of our hearts: Lunch. Maine Beer Company opened up in Freeport in 2009 but has quickly become a common name in circles of beer aficionados across the country. Lunch, a 7.0 percent ABV IPA, was the first beer that put them in the big leagues. First brewed in 2011, the first two batches sold out so quickly that Lunch soon gained national recognition as one of the country’s most sought-after craft beers. Five years later, while Maine Beer Co. has increased their production of Lunch so that it is more frequently available, it still hasn’t lost its reputation as one of the best IPAs out there. We first became acquainted with Lunch in the Beer Tent over Homecoming Weekend. Once we had enjoyed our third or fourth glass of the free Lunch that was served on tap, it was clear that we had found a special place in our hearts for this delicious IPA. We opened our Lunch as the final beer in our tasting. After dipping our noses with great ceremony into our glasses, we came away smelling a quite piney and citrusy aroma. The full-bodied taste held the perfect blend of pine, bitterness and citrus, and has a substantial mouthfeel that lives up to the gravitas of Lunch’s street cred. Compared to our two hometown heroes, Lunch struck the perfect balance of the full-bodied bitterness of Limbo combined with the pleasant drinkability and refreshing citrus of Pinner.
In their unique and distinctive ways, each of these beers tasted like home, and we thank our lucky stars to able to feel a connection with each brew and its birthplace. And they were all better than wine.

Tapped out: An introduction to the heightened flavor of unfiltered lagers

I’ve been noticing “unfiltered” and “raw/live” beer a lot on the menus in Moscow. It turns out that this no-filtering thing is a whole trend in beer brewing and not just on Instagram, so here are my thoughts and some information on cloudy, murky, living, breathing beer. Intrigued? Disgusted? Read on.
Disclaimer: This article is less practical and theoretically useful to Bowdoin beer drinkers. I’m sorry to say that I couldn’t find a concrete brand or bar to recommend that’s available in Brunswick, although I bet you could probably find unfiltered beer in Portland. If you were depending on me as your lifeline for beer, you could even try this thing called wine (or water) until my next article! Even your beer columnist spent the other evening at a bar called “I Love Wine,” (which I admit was stellar).
My first unfiltered beer here was a lager at “Beer Time” (I swear I’m not making up these bar names). Beer Time is a small, cheap, dingy and wonderful place filled with Russian bros plus one Asian girl. I didn’t really know I was ordering an unfiltered beer, because the name was written in small text and it was the cheapest option. When my beer appeared, it did not look appetizing. There was barely any foam on top, but the whole glass was filled with a dirty yellow liquid that had stray wisps of stuff floating around haphazardly. I had no idea what exactly was in my murky beer and only found out after I drank it (not recommended), but the taste definitely made up for its looks. Never judge a beer by its cover.
Fans say that the taste and aroma of unfiltered beer are more complex. There are also some opinions on head retention that vary from critic to critic. From my limited experience, the smell seemed average—I won’t lie and say I sniffed my beer extensively—but the taste was, indeed, complex. Although I usually prefer the fuller flavor of ales, my particular lager was very taste-filled. I can’t categorize the taste of all unfiltered beers because they vary wildly, but in general the extra yeast content lends another layer of flavor. That flavor, in turn, enhances the taste of other ingredients such as hops. Basically, try it if you want to heighten your beer flavors. It will not transform a beer completely into a whole new creature—my lager was still definitely a recognizable lager—but it makes it into a 2.0 version, if done nicely.
As much as I liked the flavor, it’s reasonable to be thrown off by the unusual mouthfeel. The unfiltered lager had more of a substantial texture when I drank it; while I couldn’t physically feel the little wispy things (just yeast, don’t worry) in my mouth, the beer did feel thicker. I didn’t mind, but I’m not a reliable source on this front—I grew up drinking kombucha, which has wisps of slimy-feeling fungus floating around. I did like the amount of carbonation in the beer, though, despite its lack of foam—it was the right amount of bubbly. All in all, I’m now a newly minted fan of unfiltered beer. Although it is not a life-changer of a beer, it’s still a pretty great blessing on a Wednesday night.
The website www.homebrewtalk.com sums up the factual differences of the unfiltered beer pretty simply: “Not exactly a beer style but a technique that can be applied to any style, Unfiltered Beer refers to any beer that is intentionally served with yeast remaining in the cask, keg or bottle. Most mass-produced beers are filtered to give them a bright clarity. An unfiltered beer may use the yeast to...contribute to the flavor or mouthfeel of the beer” among other factors. Because unfiltered beers are more “alive” (more yeasty), they’re not mass-produced and usually only served on tap, as far as I know. Fun fact: fish bladders are a common beer-filter; who knows, maybe the next trend will be cold-brewed, fish-bladder-filtered coffee (just kidding, coffee doesn’t need yeast filtration).
Additional Notes:
Tonight's Soundtrack: A sports match of some sorts; loudly drunk guys
Tonight's Toast: "There were quite a few toasts at Beer Time but I forget them, so here's a random one that has no connection whatsoever to this article. 'Noroc,' pronounced 'na-rok'—cheers in Romanian. (@Costin, I didn't forget this, here is proof.)"
Conclusions on my unfiltered lager, whose name I also forget but isn't available in the USA so ultimately is not relevant to this Orient column:
Appearance: 0/0
Smell: 4/5
Flavor: 5/5
Mouthfeel: 3/5
Overall: 4.5/5

Tapped out

Strong Baltika No. 9 for strong apple-picking people

This piece represents the opinion of the author:

Jae-Yeon Yoo

Columnist

September 30, 2016

You more or less made it through the first month of college (and Epicuria)! Also it’s autumn—so hooray! Leaves! Instagrammable landscapes! Midterms! My prediction for the rest of the semester: it’ll be Fall Break soon, with some midterms, then midterms until finals, midterms during finals and then some finals. To celebrate, why not try a festive Baltika No. 9?

Reasons why Baltika No. 9 pairs well with apple picking season:

The Baltika No. 9 can is beautifully autumnal—red, with gold rimming. The beer itself matches the can; poured into a mug, it’s a nice color—inoffensively golden with not too much foam.

With its extremely malty flavor and smell, Baltika No. 9 goes well with sweet or tart foods like apples. I wouldn’t recommend drinking it with anything savory, but it would go superbly with apple cider or donuts.

It’s also slightly smoky and nutty, but be warned—the aftertaste is metallically malty, so pairing it with food is a good idea.

It’s efficient; this strong lager has an alcohol percentage of at least 8%. The can advertises itself as “genuine strong beer.” Okay Baltika, thanks for your genuineness.

I really could not taste the high alcohol percentage and it was very drinkable, albeit bubbly. This is not a beer to shotgun, but one to drink leisurely while you pick apples or eat pumpkin-spiced foods.

It’s a new beer that I’m willing to bet you’ve never tried before. Go ahead and push your beer boundaries.

That said, I thought Baltica No. 9 was a little too carbonated and sweet. The initial smell and first sip were nice, but a stronger taste of hops would have balanced it out better. My least favorite aspect of this beer was its strong metallic aftertaste—perhaps it’d be better out of a can, but I wasn’t a fan. However, it’s good for a cheap beer (especially after the first one), and I would drink Baltika No. 9 over a regular Budweiser—at least it has a distinctive character to it.

You could probably find Baltika No. 9 at Bootleggers or another liquor store because Baltika is the biggest Russian beer exporter—but it’s unfortunately not available at Hannaford. It costs anywhere from $1.00-2.30 per bottle in the U.S.

There are also a lot of different types of Baltika beer if you’re looking for something lighter than No. 9. To give you some idea of how big this beer industry is, the Baltika brewery in St. Petersburg is as big as the Vatican, Baltika started out in Russia as one of the most popular beers in the U.S.S.R. but is now a part of the brewery company Carlsberg Group, a German-style business with headquarters in Denmark. Now Baltica beer is sold around the world.

Next time, I’d like to try out the intriguing idea of “beer cocktails” (as advertised by my constant Spoon University emails), but if you have any other ideas, please email me at jyoo2@bowdoin.edu. The “2” is of utmost importance, because my younger sister is jyoo@bowdoin.edu, and she doesn’t like beer (also, she’s not 21). Come on Bowdoin, why am I number 2 when I was here before her?

Additional Notes:

Tonight's Soundtrack: Fiona Apple, because I wanted some angst to balance out the sweetness of the beer. And also: Apple, get it?

Tonight's Toast: "Za osen"- "To autumn," in Russian. Side note: "Na zdorovye" is actually not the Russian toast, which is a common misconception. Literaly translated, it means, "On your health," and while it is a popular toast in Eastern Europe, it's not a thing in Russia. However, Russians are rightly famous for their lengthy, varied and althogether spectacular toasts.

Appearance: 4.5/5

Smell: 4/5

Mouthfeel: 2/5

Overall: 3.5/5

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