Two from Dry Dock Brewing Co.

The Dry Dock Brewing Co. is located in Aurora, CO and the brewers have won a number of awards for their beers over the years including Small Brewery of the Year.  Dry Dock is expanding and they are starting to offer their beers in cans.  I recently picked up Hop Abomination (6.5% ABV and ? IBU) an IPA and Amber Ale (5.8% ABV and 49 IBU ) a British-style ESB that is also known as HMS Victory ESB.  There are other varieties available in cans and distribution of Dry Dock beers should increase as the larger brewery comes online.

American IPA - http://beeradvocate.com/beer/style/116 - BeerAdvocate

Extra Special / Strong Bitter (ESB) - http://beeradvocate.com/beer/style/66 - Beer Advocate

These beers are excellent to try because each is highlighting a different ingredient.  Hop Abomination focuses on bitterness from the hops used in the brewing process, while the Amber focuses on malts bread notes with more subdued bitterness.  I liked both beers and I favored the Amber over Hop Abomination.  I like hoppy beers and was somewhat surprised by my choice, as the Amber is not hoppy.  The Amber is just stunning with sweetness of honey and caramel with bread and biscuit.  I can see why it took a gold medal at the 2006 World Beer Cup.    

Dry Dock Brewing Co. – http://www.drydockbrewing.com/

Cafe Negro and Bitch Creek

Bridgeport’s Café Negro (5.5% ABV and 30 IBU) is a coffee-infused porter.  Café Negro pours ink black with a lacey, two-finger head.  Bridgeport describes Café Negro as, “BridgePort worked with a number of Portland area coffee roasters to formulate its own blend specific to CAFÉ NEGRO that was then infused with the base beer during cold conditioning. The cold conditioning process helps retain subtle coffee aromas otherwise lost during boil and fermentation. CAFÉ NEGRO is brewed with the strong dark flavors of roasted barley and chocolate malt.”  I like porters and I like coffee and I wanted to try Café Negro after I had read about in a magazine article.  It is very good and has a really good coffee flavor.  Porter seems like a very good style for adding coffee and Bridgeport does a great job with Café Negro.  This would be great with chocolates and fruit deserts.  Anything that coffee goes well with, Café Negro would probably be a great match.

Grand Teton’s Bitch Creek (6.0% ABV and 54 IBU) is described as an extra special brown ale.  I am thinking this combines / gives tribute to the two styles that influence this beer – Brown Ale and Extra Special Bitter.  Bitch Creek pours dark tan with some amber undertones and has a two-finger head.  Grand Teton describes Bitch Creek as, “perfectly balances big malt sweetness and robust hop flavor for a full bodied, satisfying mahogany ale. Like the stream for which it is named, our Bitch Creek ESB is full of character... not for the timid.”   This beer has won numerous awards over the years and it is focused on bitterness – I thought a little too much so.  I like American Brown Ales and I use Avery’s Ellie’s Brown Ale as my standard. Bitch Creek is not a bad beer at all, but it does not have the balance that I was looking for in an American Brown Ale.  It makes more sense to me when I think of Bitch Creek as a hybrid between Brown Ale and ESB.