Dr. M nr. 6 – Lys Vår

Lys Vår by Dr M, Belgian Ale, 6.8% ABV, 45 IBU.

Lys Vår is of course not light in colour at all, this is after all a Dr. M brew! The body is quite cloudy and has a medium amber to orange colour. The head is large, off-white and rather long-lasting, and settles as a fully lasting layer. A good amount of foam is left on my glass.

Dr. M nr. 6 – Lys vår, enjoyed 7 months after bottling.

The aroma is strong, very sweet and fruity and absolutely inviting. I get lots of berries, especially overripe strawberries and raspberries, maybe some fermented sour notes as well. Also a good deal of Belgian yeast.

The taste is moderate sweet,  moderate bitter and yes, there are some sour hints in the aftertaste along with the bitterness. I don’t know it it’s supposed to be like this or if it is very lightly infected, but I still like the sour touch. The flavours are not very strong, but the same pleasant notes of well ripe red berries as I found in the aroma are present in the flavour profile as well. The same goes for the Belgian yeast, and finally there are notes of not that well integrated alcohol.

The mouthfeel is very pleasant, especially the creamy texture is lovely. The body is medium and the carbonation is moderate.

Conclusion: one of the best brews I’ve had from Dr. M. The berries gone slightly sour are refreshing and exciting, and the nice mouthfeel makes this one even more drinkable.

Aroma:      7/10
Appearance: 4/5
Taste:      7/10
Palate:     4/5
Overall:    13/20
Ratebeer score: 3.5/5.0

JoKr Brewers Leprechaun Lager

Leprechaun Lager by JoKr Brewers, 5.8% ABV, 48 IBU.

JoKr Brewers Leprechaun Lager, batch no. 20.

This one pours a hazy, pale golden body with a creamy, white, long-lived head that ends up as a fully lasting layer, and a good amount of foam is left on the glass. However, I’m not quite sure if this is how the beer is supposed to look like, because when I empty the last .5 cm into the sink, as I tend to do to keep the sediments out of my glass, I see a green, algae-like goo coming out! What is that? And was this supposed to give the beer a green tint? And how will this mysterious component influence the aroma and flavour? Or is it just trub with lots of hop leftovers?

This one could have been green.

The aroma is certainly a bit special, there are stuff in here that I have no idea what reminds me of. Maybe the green secret ingredient? It’s a quite strong aroma with fruits, mostly lightly fermented apples and pears, pale malts and there are some refreshing and exiting sour notes, there is definitely something funky about this brew!

The taste is light sweet and light sour initially while the finish is moderate bitter with the light sourness lingering on. The flavours aren’t that strong, but they are pleasant. Nordic fruits, resin, malt and again these wild and funky notes that makes it more exciting.

This is an incredibly crisp, refreshing and dry beer, I really wanted to down this one and open another one right away! The body is medium and the carbonation is moderate.

Conclusion: Mysterious, funky and dangerously drinkable.

Aroma:      6/10
Appearance: 4/5
Taste:      6/10
Palate:     4/5
Overall:    12/20
Ratebeer score: 3.2/5.0

JoKr Brewers The S & E sessions

The S & E sessions by JoKr Brewers, Vienna, 4.7% ABV, 22 IBU.

JoKr Brewers S & E Sessions, batch no. 19.

Oh, a vienna, how extraordinarily exiting. With this positive attitude I open the bottle, and pour a clear, dark copper body. Quite good-looking, actually. The light-brown head is very small, but it hardly shrinks in size at all, and the everlasting layer laces my glass well.

Small but everlasting head.

The aroma is moderate and quite sweet, with notes of caramel and fruits. In other words a typical vienna, if it hadn’t been for the interesting smoky notes. That’s a new one! Also some lightly roasted notes in the back.

The taste is light sweet, less sweet than the ones sold as “juleøl” in Norwegian grocery stores. The finish is long-lasting and light to moderate bitter. The flavours are quite strong, again caramel and dark fruits, with lovely notes of gentle wood smoke.

The body is medium, the texture is pleasantly dry and the carbonation is soft.

Conclusion: as good as a vienna can possibly be, with a tasty smoky touch. A lovely session beer indeed.

Aroma:      6/10
Appearance: 4/5
Taste:      7/10
Palate:     3/5
Overall:    13/20
Ratebeer score: 3.3/5.0

ClubGonzo’s Solskrog

Solskrog aka. Contract Batch #2 aka. Solo Batch #17. ClubGonzo is a complicated brewery.

Solskrog by ClubGonzo, American Amber Ale, 5.5% ABV, 40 IBU.

Well well well, a beer brewed for my wife’s third cousin, this is a small world, isn’t it?

As always when I rate a beer I initially pour no more than some 15-20 cl into my glass to ensure a decent headspace which makes it easier to swirl the beer without spilling and to characterise the aroma. This initial pour is clear with a copper colour, but when I’m done with the smelling I see that a 3 cm layer of dirty foam has built up in the bottle. This little fellow is certainly highly carbonated! When I pour the rest of the bottle into my glass, I therefore end up with a murky body with lots of sediments of all sizes. This doesn’t look good at all! The head is better: it’s large, creamy, quite dense, very light brown, laces the glass well and settles as a long-lived layer.

Let’s concentrate on the good-looking head and forget about the murky body.

The aroma is moderate and rather pleasant, but also quite simple. I get caramel and fruits with some unclean yeasty notes lurking in the back, and not much more than that.

The taste is light sweet and light bitter initially and it ends with a moderate bitter finish of a decent length. The flavours give me a bit more than the aromas, here I find fruits, grapefruit and resin, the dirty yeast is still back there, and of course I find traces of solvent-like alcohol, although I have to admit that the latter are very faint.

Standard and ok mouthfeel, light to medium body, dry texture and lively carbonation.

Conclusion: too faint and boring aromas and flavours, and the over-carbonation causes too much yeasty notes.

Aroma:      6/10
Appearance: 2/5
Taste:      5/10
Palate:     3/5
Overall:    11/20
Ratebeer score: 2.7/5.0

Anodyn Hindu Saison

Hindu Saison by Anodyn, 7% ABV, unknown IBU.

The previous saison I rated on this blog was the delicious ANodyn Rosenkrantz Sommer-Saison, a beer with a bit more bittering hops that I’m used to for this style. One of the very best homebrews I’ve ever rated is the Houblon Saison from Meilby Brewing, so my hopes are really high when I open the bottle of extra hoppy saison from the Anodyn crew.

Anodyn Hindu Saigon (batch 5)

In the glass it looks opaque, with a medium orange colour. The huge, white head is very long-lived, and it laces the glass very well.

The strong aroma is definitely more IPA than saison, it lacks the crispiness and freshness of the latter style. Instead this is very sweet, it’s almost like smelling a soft drink. I get notes of sugary, overripe tropical fruits like peach. The aroma is in fact so overripe that I sense some rotting leaves far in the back. Also yeast, bubble gum, candy and some faint ripe strawberries. It’s a pleasant aroma, but a bit unexpected.

There is quite much sweetness in the taste as well, and the finish is moderate bitter. The flavours aren’t that strong, but they are fairly decent. Fruits, yeast, a bit too much alcohol and traces of spices.

On the palate the beer feels dry to oily, but the finish is definitely dry. The body is medium and the carbonation is moderate.

Conclusion: a quite ok IPA with hints of saison, but a bit too sweet and overripe fruity.

Aroma:      7/10
Appearance: 4/5
Taste:      6/10
Palate:     3/5
Overall:    11/20
Ratebeer score: 3.1/5.0