"Great" Seasonal Beer

[Nilboglin]

Hello
For my fisrt post I want to mention a seasonal beer. I see here inthe battle of the beers that many have posted xmas ales and maibochs and oktoberfests...what about Halloween.
Being from Ohio I have ofcourse drank tons of Great Lakes Dortmunder Gold. A wonderfully tastey beer, but of all thier brews the one I like best, and is the #1 seasonal beer is\
NOSFERATU - A fall seasonal red ale with bite!

[HarkJohnny]

it is DELISH to say the least. :p

[hops99]

Nosferatu is actually a stock ale, and it's released in July (which I don't understand - with that label it SHOULD be a Fall release to coincide with Halloween IMO). It is a great beer, but not my personal favorite from GL. Of course, I love their Christmas Ale, but my favorite under-the-radar seasonal that they bottle is the Conway Irish Red, which will be available this week.

Welcome to the board, fellow Ohioan, and remember, go Falcons!

[HarkJohnny]

Originally posted by hops99
It is a great beer, but not my personal favorite from GL.

hmmm.... favorite GL beer... i would have to say the Holy Moses Wit with the Dortmunder a close second. the Christmas was YUMMY this year too. Even got lucky enought to have a few on tap.

[PrivateWiddle]

Hello,

This is my first post, so please don't flame me if this question seems stupid!

Can I nominate/talk about ales from England here, or is this only for USA/Canada beer.

Cheers,

[steveh]

Just look here: http://www.realbeer.com/discussions/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=27 Or anywhere on the page -- it's all about good beer, no matter where brewed.

S.

[PrivateWiddle]

Thank you steveh. To my shame, I have only recently become aware that there is more to North American beer than Bud, Labatts, Michelob etc.

I shall enjoy learning more on the forum, and I have found a Uk website that specialises in US beer, so I might get to try a few.

Cheers.

[Nilboglin]

Thanks for the warm welcome Hops99!
I have never had the Conway red but you can bet I will see if the local brew shop will get it in. Thanks for the heads up.

I am brewing up an irish Stout recipe right now, i am in the middle of the boil. This time around I used 8oz of malto dextrin, we shall see how that changes things.
After this batch I am going to do a red recipe that I have made up, it is our house brew. Maybe since you live in Ohio too I can meet ya and bring you some home brews!

Another favorite beer of mine, which I recently discovered on tap near here (woo hoo) is Rogues's Dead Guy Ale. I found a place near here that has it in 6 packs, I am going to go broke buying them all the time. If anyone here has had it what do you think and would you campare it to somthing similar?

[Nilboglin]

Ahhh it is good to wake up and smell that sweet wort brewing aroma.
I just brewed my latest stout recipe last night. It had to be the smoothest brewing I have done yet.
I tried out a new cooling technique I got from the guys at G&G. I put 3 gallons of water in my fridge monday night. Tuesday at 9:05 I started with the usual steeping and on into the boiling and so on. I was brewing alone which allowed for it to have my utmost attention...this probably has everything to do with the great success of it all.
After I boiled the wort for a total of 60 minutes I put it into my sink with a couple of freezy packs. You know those blue liquid plastic things you freeze to keep your stuff cold in the cooler when you go camping. Well I tossed those in the sink with cold water and within 10 minutes I had the wort cooled to 110 degrees(my target temp). Getting the wort to around 100 degrees is usually pretty easy. It is gettig it to drop below 90 degrees that gets rough cuz you begin to get so close to room temp.
I then put one gallon of the refrigerated water into my bottling bucket. Vern had popped in to visit and he helped me pour the wort into the cold water. It dropped 10 degrees exactly to 90. I added the next gallon and the next and each time the temp dropped 10 degrees till it was at 70 degrees on the nose. Allready at a good pitching temp I bs'd with Vern to let the trub settle in the bottom of my bucket.
It is an extra step in the brewing process but I use my bottling bucket to prevent cracking my glass primary and since the spigot is 1/2 inch from the bottom it keeps the settling trub from getting into my carboy.
Whilst chatting we hydrated my yeast and transferred the wort to my primary, by this time it was cooled to 68 degrees. Perfect pitching temperature in about 20 minutes without any headaches. Yeah I dig that!
Also I used my deep fryer stainless steel thermometer. I keep breaking those glass ones. It worked like a charm. Accurate and it hangs right down in the brew kettle and in my bucket. I reccomend using one of these over the floaty glass ones.

[chazwicke]

Welcome to both Nilboglin and PrivateWiddle.

I think most of the Great Lakes range are exceptional.

And yes Private we enjoy talking about any good beers here. I have a particular weakness for real ale from your country.

[Sladek]

Originally posted by PrivateWiddle
Thank you steveh. To my shame, I have only recently become aware that there is more to North American beer than Bud, Labatts, Michelob etc.

I shall enjoy learning more on the forum, and I have found a Uk website that specialises in US beer, so I might get to try a few.

Cheers.
Welcome, PrivateWiddle! Nothing to be ashamed of; the fact that you show interest in learning more is totally cool. Probably not many, if any, U.S. micros are exported abroad. As others have noted, discussions of beer, no matter where the origin, are welcome. I tend to go on and on about Czech beers, for example. I, for one, am happy to see another member from the UK! Some truly wonderful beer over there.

[chazwicke]

Some micros are getting across the pond. Dogfish Head is one that I know of.

[Nilboglin]

Yea a retailer near here has like 6 different kinds of dogfish head beers. I havn't tried any...yet. You?

I purchased and drank the Conway's Irish Ale. Awesome.
Any of you been to the Great Lakes brewery and/or pub?

[monkentage]

Young's Winter Warmer is a really nice beer.

[monkentage]

Originally posted by PrivateWiddle
Thank you steveh. To my shame, I have only recently become aware that there is more to North American beer than Bud, Labatts, Michelob etc.

I shall enjoy learning more on the forum, and I have found a Uk website that specialises in US beer, so I might get to try a few.

Cheers.

Morrison's has a couple of Rogue's beers for sale.