THE ROOTS OF XVI – FEBRUARY 15 @ 6 P.M. AT HARRY’S HOFBRAU IN SAN JOSE

There are many great looking SF Beer Week Beer Events in the South Bay.   One  that look particularly promising comes this Friday to Harry's Hofbrau in San Jose.  Check out the press release below.  A map to Harry's Hofbrau in San Jose can be found here. 

 

THE ROOTS OF XVI – FEBRUARY 15 @ 6 P.M. AT HARRY’S HOFBRAU IN SAN JOSE

One of California’s most acclaimed barrel-aged beers is set to be deconstructed as Firestone Walker Brewing Company and Harry’s Hofbrau in San Jose present “The Roots of XVI,” a one-of-a-kind tasting of the rare component beers that were blended to create Firestone Walker’s XVI Anniversary Ale.

The doors open at 6 p.m. No tickets or reservations are required. Guests can simply come and purchase samples as they wish.

This SF Beer Week event will be hosted by Jeffers Richardson, director of Firestone Walker’s new Barrelworks facility, which is dedicated to barrel-aged wild beers and strong ales.

The Chop on XVI…

XVI is the seventh release in Firestone Walker’s anniversary series, dating back to the release of the inaugural anniversary release called “Ten” in 2006.

Every year, local Paso Robles winemakers gather with the brewing team to taste through a variety of strong ales and determine the final blend. This year, the result was XVI, which was composed of 226 barrels spanning eight diverse components.

“Dozens of notebooks, hundreds of questions and countless beers have refined our approach to creating the best flavors possible through barrel aging,” says Brewmaster Brynildson. “Then we step back and let our winemaker friends help us put the final puzzle together. This year, the result is XVI—our finest achievement to date.”

At “The Roots of XVI,” the puzzle will be pulled back apart, and guests will savor these rare component pieces and learn about the art of blending. The featured component ales are:

Velvet Merkin / Aged in Bourbon Barrels

-Traditional Oatmeal Stout

Double DBA / Aged in retired Firestone Union Barrels

-Double strength English Pale Ale

Parabola / Aged in Bourbon Barrels

-Russian Imperial Oatmeal Stout

Helldorado / Aged in Bourbon and Brandy Barrels

-Blonde Barley Wine

Bravo / Aged in Bourbon and Brandy Barrels

-Imperial Brown Ale

Wookey Jack / 100% Stainless Steel

-Black Rye India Pale Ale

Beer of the Month : Firestone Walker's Solace

When I started this blog slightly over a year ago, I made two promises to myself. I wouldn't let it become a chore where I felt obligated to have to post things at specific times, and I didn't want it to become yet another beer blog posting beer reviews. In one fell swoop, I'm breaking both of these promises to start a Beer of the Month series of postings.

I've written beer reviews before, and enjoy reading them on other blogs, so it seemed like a monthly focus on a particular beer seemed like a good idea. I've been kicking this idea around for a couple months, and it's been increasingly appealing over time, so it's time to start. So starting this month, I'll be posting a Beer of the Month review within the first couple weeks of each month. I hope you'll enjoy my perspective on interesting beers to try.

The first beer of the month is FireStone Walker's Solace, their recently released summer seasonal. I was intrigued this unusual, somewhat complex, wheat beer for reasons I couldn't quite put my finger on. There were some light fruity banana esters, as well as nice clove spiciness, along the lines of a classic German Hefeweizen. But there's also a little melon-like fruitiness and a slight peppery character as well. It's quite refreshing, and liked the subtle complexity to the brew, which could be easily ignored if one is just in the mood for "lawn-mower", thirst quenching beer.

Not that I get too bent out of shape over styles, but I remained curious. What was this? A Hefeweizen, or something else. After doing a little research, I found the answer to this little puzzle in an announcement on beernews.org, which states:

While Solace is somewhat devoid of style, Brewmaster Matt Brynildson said it will be a sort of unfiltered fusion of a Hefeweizen and a Belgian Saison. Subtle hints of banana and clove aroma will merge with sweet fruit flavor, a medium body and tangy finish. This combination will result in drinkable spring/summer beer with about 6% alcohol by volume.

"Style guidelines are definitely being stretched and exaggerated with the rise of craft beers in the U.S.,” Brynildson said. “I call it a Summertime Belgo-Bavarian Zwickle Saison,” he added jokingly.

OK, so that clears things up. A hybrid beer like this one could end up as a muddled, confused wierd homebrew experiment gone amok. But thankfully, that's far from the case here. So kudos to Firestone Walker for coming up with something innovative and unique, that makes for a nifty summer seasonal. It's available on the West Coast through August.