Beer Review: New England Brewing's Imperial Stout Trooper

Ah, drats. Forgot to Left justify that pic. Too late! Anyhow, because I'm still sad to have lost my dog earlier today, I went totally crazy and did a couple funny things.

First, I brewed a beer in her honor. Using the yeast I cultured up from the Jolly Pumpkin 'Oro de Calabaza' bottle, I whipped up a fairly simple Belgian inspired pale ale that I'll sour with the Jolly yeast. I call this beer 'Oro de Maggie', which I think means "Golden Maggie" or "Maggie of Gold" or something similar. Maggie was generally made of stink, feces and laziness, but "Maggie of Gold" is a more approachable name for a beer. You know, something you'd maybe *like* to drink. The beer is made up of 80% two row pale malt, 20% Wheat malt for the base, and 1/2 lb of Crystal 20L for a little flavor and gold color. I also beat a lb of cane sugar into the mix to bring up the strength without affecting the color and to assist in drying out the beer as well. I wanted a really pale, not sweet brew to let the sourness shine, if and when it comes around. the hops are just an ounce of Perle at 7.6% AA for an hour, nothing more.

This mysterious picture: is about the best I can do right now till we find our normal camera. I took this one with the video camera, and that ain't got a flash on it. I lit it up a bit with a flashlight to get this crappy shot! But, you know, mysterious is good. Builds the suspense up, see?

The other funny thing I did was to open up that there bottle of New England Brewing 's "Imperial Stout Trooper" Imperial Stout. I was trying to save this for a special occasion in the far future, but man.. my ol' dog needs a salute, and this beer is supposed to be worth it. Rated at something like 10.5% abv, it's fairly hefty. The price tag is too, as it's the single most expensive beer I've ever bought. $9.00 a 12oz bottle. Snap! Even Dogfish 120 minute is still a bit under that, and that brew packs a twice as powerful punch. Anyway, in drinking this beer, I get.. and I know this is strange.. but I get a sense of bacon. No, seriously. The aftertaste I get in the finish here, is of bacon. I know it has something to do with the roast malts and the residual sweetness and whatever I also taste here, but it's still a funny thing to have in a beer. Otherwise, the beer pours a wicked black color, insanely thick appearing.

It's not bottle conditioned either, so no yeast falls out at the end. The carbonation is fairly low, and there's little head on the beer (light brown in color) in the glass, which in my case is a 22oz Dogfish Head snifter, my favorite glass. There's a serious bitterness to balance all this malt out, but not over the top. Definitely even keel here. This is a good beer, here. About halfway through it now... but I've got some big Stouts downstairs on the shelf that I brewed with my boy Pete W. that are just as good, I think. Of course, you have to age the damn things for several years to get 'em just right...

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I think that's all for now. Don't forget, keep on clickin' that stinkin' Google ad at the bottom there to bring in the money!