Bear Republic's Pete Brown's Tribute Ale, an award-winning beer, was quite a bit more than I was anticipating.  Thinking I was just about to encounter your standard brown ale, I was perplexed when it poured a deep ruby-brown, barely translucent enough for a hint of light to shine through it.  It has a thin tan-white head with big bubbles and moderate retention, and a burly aroma that fills the nose with strong molasses, roasted barley, and definite coffee notes.  This is not your average brown ale.  This is more like the Bigfoot of brown ales, in fact.

It follows up its dark appearance and hearty smell with a solid, medium body that borders on thick.  It's smooth, but rich with dark, roasted flavors, lots of molasses, and sweet malts.  It's a big beer, and perhaps not as refreshing as your average brown ale, but it's certainly worth trying, and I'd certainly recommend it.

This afternoon as I sat back to enjoy a few pints of beer, I cracked open a bottle of Three Skulls Ales' Pillagers Pale, which poured a rich, slightly cloudy gold and produced a wonderful off-white head that proved to have good retention and a lovely, solid lacing.  As I leaned forward to sniff the beer, I contemplated the recently discovered "G-variant", or Churchill gene, which apparently causes alcohol to have more of a creativity-inspiring opiate effect instead of instilling that common sottish idiocy we've all seen so often before.  But I didn't have time to contemplate much before encountering the odd, yeast-heavy aroma of this particular pale ale, which seems out of place with this particular style.  I sniffed again, and indeed it has a curious bready odor almost entirely masking the mild hops beneath.

In any case, according to a recent article in Prospect Magazine, about 15% of Caucasians possess this miraculous variant, which was named after Winston Churchill because of his life-long love for alcohol and his legendary consumption.  But how legendary was his consumption, really?  It has been argued that his omnipresent scotch-and-water was but a smidgeon of the strong stuff liberally laced with the weak, and that the man used his reputation to his advantage, but certainly knew his limits.  Nevertheless, it's truly inspiring to see that science has finally acknowledged that some good can come to the creative mind from a modest tipple or two.

As I pondered these heavy thoughts, my tastebuds were hard at work on the Pillagers Pale.  It has a very nutty, roasted malt flavor that does a good job masking the hops.  I would suggest that it's perhaps too good a job, and that there are certain aspects of this beer that depart from what one would usually expect from a good pale ale.  However, it is not a bad beer, and if one is ready for the unexpected, it can certainly be readily enjoyed.

It's been nearly a year since Mr Maujean and I have reported on our drinking-and-airgun experiments, and when we last spoke about it we discussed the unsuitability of cigars as an accompaniment to shooting.  Well, it was a hot summer day, and I had an imperial stout to review, so I thought it would be nice if I could just sip the stout while I was doing something else.  I've always thought that a really nice stout has a range of flavors that develop as the beer warms up, and though I'm not necessarily a proponent of drinking room-temperature (or outside in the summer in Oregon temperature) beer, it can really help one get a handle on a dark one.

So I dug out my BB gun, which hadn't seen any action in probably eight months, and set up some targets at an embarrassingly close range.  I then popped open the beer, an Eel River Raven's Eye Imperial Stout, and began drinking and plinking.  My first step was to take a look at this beer, because I suspected that analyzing the brew up close might help tune and refine my eyesight, thus honing my aim.  This is a rich-looking, dark, espresso-colored brew with a brownish-tan head that has poor retention, which doesn't throw me off too much, as I figured it would have a rather high ABV and thus not a lot of yeast life left for bottle conditioning.  I then fired five shots at my first target and did horribly.  My lack of practice was really showing.

"Maybe it's the wind," I thought to myself, and so I sniffed the beer hoping that a bit of olfactory exercise would sharpen my wind-detecting senses, whatever they are.  Pleasant coffee and roasted grain aromas wafted into my nostrils.  This beer certainly smells like a stout, and certainly looks like a stout, and what the hell, I may as well admit it.  I was going to shoot at my second target before tasting the beer, but I couldn't help myself.  I was in for a little bit of a surprise.

The Raven's Eye has a fairly light, drinkable body for an imperial stout.  It's still a big beer, with a surprising fruit character and a rich, medium body that highlights all of the flavors you'd expect from an imperial stout.  The heat of its 9.5% ABV is well-concealed, however, and since I didn't look at the bottle while I was drinking it, I assumed it to be perhaps a 7% ABV beer, which would be quite low for an imperial stout.

As I continued to shoot, the beer warmed up a little, and the rich sweetness became accented by a nice roasted bitterness in the finish.  I enjoyed the beer quite a bit, I must say, and whether it was the quality of the brew or the practice, my shooting improved noticeably by my sixth target, and I was getting much better grouping and even a good number of bull's eyes.  While I could never sanely endorse drinking and shooting at the same time, I can sanely endorse this beer, and would urge you to go out and buy some, and maybe save it for the chilly Fall months ahead.

The Mad Belgian is the new seasonal release from Mad River Brewing, following in the footsteps of Serious Madness and Double Dread, both earlier this year.  This new release is a Belgian-style golden ale, one of my favorite varieties, so I was really looking forward to trying it.  I've had a couple of bottles now, and have formed a pretty solid opinion.  The beer pours a hazy, deep gold, and is translucent with very tiny, champagne-like bubbles.  It has a finely-textured, slightly off-white head, but unlike a traditional Belgian golden ale, the head is thin and has very poor retention, leaving little lacing.

On the nose, this beer is sweet and candyish, with strong malt notes and perhaps a hint of honey.  It has an effervescent and smooth body, with a clean, fresh flavor backed by a malty strength, an acidic tartness that was difficult to place, and hints of hop bitterness.  Aside from the poor head, I found it to be a rather tasty, malty version of a Belgian-style golden ale, and one that I'd recommend trying.