AaronS

the duke riley show at the brooklyn museum is well worth seeing.

there's a nice documentary about him on apple+ that has some stunning architecture he's done in chicago. it's part of a series called home.

didn't manage to see the copperwhite but the frank and marshall shows were terrific, and if you're over there see the keifer and the norment too.

I remember being completely shocked by the realization that the reason my high school girlfriend’s parents never walked in on us was because they didn’t want to.

I did it too but unfortunately that doesn't make the statement above wrong.

sierra nevada celebration fresh hop ipa - 6.8% abv. this is the fortieth release of sierra’s malty, centennial focused winter seasonal, which was the first real ipa I had from them. this has the usual bitter mix of pine, citrus, and actual malt flavor. it’s hard to say why, but I remember liking previous vintages a little more. my strongest recommendation.

lawson's finest liquids fayston maple imperial stout aged in mad river distillers rum barrels - 10.5% abv. the only other dark beer I've had from lawson's is the black ipa that they released in the fall. that's a style that I was convinced shouldn't exist - even maine beer co can't make a good one - but theirs really blew me away, and I was really happy to finally come across a lawson's stout. apparently the base beer is made with made with maple syrup, and while the rum is local to the brewery they don't make one with maple sugar, which could be impossible or otherwise unwanted for all I know

to øl goliat maple beacon edition smokey imperial coffee stout matured with bourbon barrel chips - brewed at de proef, lochristi, belgium, 10.2% abv. this is probably more new old stock left over from the shelton brothers bankruptcy, but I’m not sure how old it is. this was first released in 2018 but tastes like it’s about a year old to me. this starts out with a great mixture of peat, roast coffee, and vanilla, which is followed by some really well done bourbon and a mixture of milk chocolate, fig, raisins, and a hint of anise and maple. there’s a lot of detail here despite the relatively low

the last meal I had at korzo was awful. still a loss for the neighborhood.

the one in across the street from pratt that's been there forever? I read about it but never went. I didn't like lulu and po as much as you did.

three floyds x pig destroyer permanent funeral imperial ipa - 10.5% abv. this is one of those old school beers I’ve been so into recently. the recipe goes back to 2013, but it actually seems older even though it’s all citra. this is a huge, bitter beer that’s also fairly sweet, which gives the pineapple and citrus the carmelized or marmalade character I like so much in these kind of beers, and there’s a mixture of honey, pine, and resinous mango in the finish. these cans are a little older than usual, and this isn’t as good as the way I remember previous years versions, and so on. recommended

finback ba banna drip barrel aged imperial stout with banana, coffee, vanilla, and peanut butter - 13.2% abv. the coffee is from finback's own invisible force roaster and the barrels they used previously held an unspecified type of bourbon. I really don't know why I like these so much, but... this starts out with a pretty bitter combination of roast coffee and chocolate that's followed by the adjuncts. it would be easy for something with this set of adjuncts to be cloying, but each of them works well with the bitterness and there's a lot of depth here. it's definitely sweet though, I guess I'm

I went and found the cooking a little sloppier than I thought it would be. some of it was very good tho, especially the duck main and the rillete and liver apps. I liked the tripe a lot too. really terrific service. I tried to get the people I went with to go to frenchette.

scarr’s had much better beer than dhamaka too.

I don’t know if it’s more or less fun now.

the short story collection is good too.

jw lee’s harvest ale 2011 vintage limited edition - 11.5% abv. this has always been one of my favorite examples of my second favorite kind of beer, and I’ve posted about a couple different vintages over the years but this is the oldest one I’ve had in a while. this really seems older than anything I’ve had in a while. it’s still mostly enormous malt notes, but it’s not as sweet as it was and it’s more fig and raisin than anything else, with some bitter toffee underneath and orange treacle in the finish. these are exactly the same flavors it has when it’s younger, but they’ve been rearranged an

three floyds alpha klauss christmas porter - 7.3% abv. this is the dark version of their venerable alpha king pale ale, which gets english chocolate malt, mexican sugar, and “tons of strange american hops” and a slightly higher abv. this is really nice - there’s a nice mixture of cocoa, coffee, and other roasted malt flavors followed by some sweetness and some orange citrus and mint that works really well with the chocolate malt. there’s a nice amount of detail here, it’s really well put together, I always love three floyds, and so on and on. strongly recommended.

dhamaka and l’abielle.

three floyds barrel-aged behemoth barleywine ale - released jan 2022, 13.6% abv. I can’t remember if I had this right when it came out or if I had the 2021 version, but I remember really liking it the first time around and this is excellent. this is a great example of a barrel aged beer - it starts out with the huge toffee and fig notes you get in a barley wine, and then the barrel takes over and there’s some roasted coffee, cocoa, vanilla, pear, and bourbon. this doesn’t have the depth of the much more expensive anchorage beers mentioned above, but it’s a little bit better put together and th

seeing this reminded me that I forgot to mention the vanum show I saw last month that I found completely life affirming.

to øl mine is bigger than yours barley wine-style ale - brewed at de proef brouwerij, 12.5% abv. this is another part of the leftover shelton brothers stock, only I know for a fact this one sat around their warehouse and not the store I bought it from. I emailed to øl to ask how old this is and they said the code on the cap means it was probably brewed in 2018. barley wine is probably the beer style that ages best, so it’s unsurprising that this seems like it has a lot of life left in it. it’s got a nice mixture of the basic barley wine flavors - toffee and dried fruit - along with a little bi

mikkeller beer geek cocoa shake imperial stout brewed with chocolate -brewed in norway by lervig, 12.1% abv. this is an older bottle of a beer that goes back to 2014, the cap says drink by 2025 so I guess this was probably brewed in 2015. (I bought it from a place that has some truly ancient stock sitting around, including quite a few things that haven’t been made in at least ten years.) however old this is it’s holding up well enough, there’s a very simple set of basic flavors that are smooth and well rounded but not as well defined as the way I remember this when it first came out. it’s mos

I liked her new novel a lot.

happy birthday (un or not) to all!