Yeah.. home alone on a Saturday night.. what about it?! I went out last night, OK? And tomorrow being Super Bowl Sunday, a low-key night sounds about right. So I threw 2 randos in the fridge to enjoy...
Trying to keep up with the Harpoon 100 Barrel Series... #37 - Rich & Dan's Rye IPA.. 6.9% ABV and 54 IBUs. From the start it's not your typical Rye IPA.. tough to tell but it's a brighter golden yellow color, most are a bit more golden orange to coppery in color. Nice fluffy head though! Medium nose.. some grassy/floral hops, biscuit/bready malts and some rye spice (all a DUH.. look at the name).. but nothing standout. The taste, to me, was a let-down. A fairly standard IPA profile.. citrus and floral hops come into play after a quick burst of faintly sweet malts. Some lemon peel and other citrus fruit notes mingle with some very very faint spices towards the finish.. The rye barely comes into play and the elements of these beers don't seem to be in great harmony. It all sort of falls apart in the finish, not much malt and a not-so-super-pleasant bitterness.. for a one-off style, Harpoon coulda stepped their game up a bit with this one..
Saranac - Caramel Porter.. a 5.4% ABV porter in their Fall variety pack. Seen it a few times before, and finally caved (a real arm-twister.. caramel is one of my favorite sweets!). And damn! For a porter, this is crazy inky and a huge mocha head.. The nose is just wow.. thick, heavy, sweet caramel dominates with some bitter cocao and super faint hops. Taste might be off-putting to some, but c'mon folks.. read the label! So many people complain about the artificial taste to this beer.. they straight up USE caramel flavor and color! You can get HINTS of caramel just using malts.. to get a full-on caramel beer, you gotta add something in. Personally, this was a complete hit! Roasty malts underly the crazy thick caramel tastes.. like pouring some coffee into a cup full of caramel ice cream topping! It is not, however, a thick beer by any means. Bitter chocolate and vanilla pull up the finish to this beer, with one of the biggest lingering sweetness to any beer I've had.. Get past the fact this tastes artificial.. bc it's supposed to be.. and it works. Damn well, at that!
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