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Bottle Logic Fundamental Observation

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It's been amply established that my inner curmudgeon tends to prefer regular, plain ol' bourbon barrel aged stouts (or life, for that matter). Bottle Logic Brewing has quickly garnered a good reputation for barrel aged beers, but also for kooky ingredients like poppy seeds, marionberries, cassia bark, and all manner of coffee, coconut, fruit, and so on. While I like a good pastry stout as much as the next guy, that curmudgeon in me generally wants to know what the beer'd be like if it didn't have all the adjuncts and fancy doodads. I'm often happy to try a kitchen-sink variant of a great beer, but I usually find that the base remains my favorite. That being said, there is one kinda/sorta exception to the rule, and that's vanilla. For whatever reason, my inner curmudgeon loves him some vanilla.

Now, yes, vanilla is generally a requirement for any pastry stout, but I think there's something to do be said for a well balanced dose of vanilla without any of the other hoopla. One of the reasons coffee is such a popular addition to stouts is that it adds complementary roasty, bitter flavors to the beer. Now I don't drink coffee, so that doesn't resonate with me as much as vanilla, which also tends to be a complementary addition, particularly to the barrel character. A lot of people use "vanilla" to mean "boring" or "plain", but those people are basically just wrong. Vanilla is a fundamental cooking ingredient that is great on its own, but is also often used as a foundation to strengthen and build other flavors upon.

So what we have here is a big imperial stout aged in a combination of Buffalo Trace, Woodford Reserve, Four Roses, Heaven Hill, and Knob Creek bourbon barrels (so, uh, a pretty broad cross-section of the major players in the bourbon world), with multiple additions of Madagascar vanilla beans. My kinda pastry:

Bottle Logic Fundamental Observation

Bottle Logic Fundamental Observation - Pours a very dark brown, almost black color with a half finger of light brown head. Smells fantastic, plenty of vanilla, but also underlying caramel, bourbon, and oak. Often, added vanilla overpowers everything else (and since I'm a big fan of vanilla, that's not much of a big deal, but I digress), but here it's prominent without being overbearing. Taste is rich caramel up front, with that vanilla quickly emerging, followed by a little underlying roast, and a big, boozy bourbon and oak bite in the finish. Mouthfeel is rich, full bodied, and chewy, well carbonated, and pleasantly boozy. Not quite the perfect balance that the nose would imply, but close enough. Overall, yes, it's a pretty damn spectacular beer. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 13.55% ABV bottled (500 ml). Drank out of a snifter glass on 8/30/19. Vintage: 2019.

I've had and enjoyed quite a few of Bottle Logic's barrel aged wonders, but come to think of it, I don't think I've had a plain BA stout from them. Everything has vanilla or coffee or pumpkin spice, &c. So even though I love this Fundamental Observation, I'm genuinely curious about a BA stout with no other additions... I"m sure they make one, I just haven't come across it yet. In the meantime, I'll just have to drown my sorrows in whatever Bottle Logic hooch I can get my hands on...

Bottle Logic Sight and Mind

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Picture, if you will, a beer. Four simple ingredients, added to which a fifth: the barrel. In this case, a blend of barleywine aged in bourbon and brandy barrels. An enticing elixir To Serve Man. You're traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land of bwizzle. Next stop, Bottle Logic.

Rod Serling, I am not, but this beer, clearly inspired by The Twilight Zone, is truly One for the Angels. Let's crack the sweet malt cipher:

Bottle Logic Sight and Mind

Bottle Logic Sight and Mind - Pours a cloudy, dark brown color with half a finger of tightly bubbled head that doesn't stick around long. Smells great, brown sugar, caramel, toffee, molasses, fruity malt, and the requisite bourbon, oak, and vanilla. Taste is amazing, tons of rich caramel and toffee, brown sugar and molasses, dark candied fruits, bourbon, oak, and vanilla. Mouthfeel is rich, full bodied, and chewy, finely carbed, with a pleasant boozy heat. Intense, but complex and very well balanced. Overall, a spectacular, dimension spanning beer. A

Beer Nerd Details: 13.7% ABV bottled (500 ml). Drank out of a snifter on 11/2/18.

Yes, I drank this over two months ago and am only getting to it now that I have Time Enough at Last. Alright, enough with the Twilight Zone puns. This is a great beer and fully deserving of the hype around Bottle Logic, which is all in the Eye of the Beholder. Sorry, couldn't resist. Incidentally, I just realized that Serling never said "Picture, if you will" in the Twilight Zone, but rather, his other show, Night Gallery. Drats. Truly, we have entered a land of both shadow and substance.

Bottle Logic Red Rover

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I drank this on Friday, April 13th, so yes, I'm far behind on reviews here. A thousand pardons. That date being what it is, I decided to have a little movie marathon and broke out my 8 movie set of Friday the 13th films. Yes, I still use physical media from time to time, wanna fight about it? Also, yes, for some reason I love the Friday the 13th series of films, such that I'm probably going to spend a lot more time writing about them in this post than the beer in question. We can fight about that too, if you like.

So I started off with the original Friday the 13th. Made in 1980, it's not an ur example of the slasher genre or anything, but it may be a codifier of a few conventions. In other words, it's derivative as all get out, but it solidified the template that many of the trashier examples of the genre follow. There's not much in this movie that was not done earlier and better by the likes of Black Christmas or Halloween, but this shows how lesser filmmakers imitate greatness. Some elements are still great. Tom Savini's makeup and effects are a step up from earlier examples, even when they're lifting gags wholesale from obscure proto-slashers like Bay of Blood. The ending is also a notable example of a broader horror movie trope (I won't spoil it here, but it's a good one, despite the implication that it's a dream sequence? Whatever, it works.) It suffers a bit in my mind for the lack of Jason, though it's also interesting in that respect. It was fun revisiting this, but it's not the one I usually reach to rewatch.

Next up was Friday the 13th Part 2. Made on the cheap just a year later, this one features Jason for the first time, though he's still in backwoods overalls and with a bag over his head (which again, are elements stolen from earlier films like The Town That Dreaded Sundown, etc...) Again, decent makeup and effects work here, and the film is still aping Bay of Blood for its kills, but the real standout of the film is Ginny (played by Amy Steel), arguably the best final girl of all time. She fights Jason with a kick to the nards, a machete, a pitchfork, a chainsaw, and of course, a cable knit sweater (or, like, her wits, whatever). She also subverts a lot of the supposed final girl conventions, which are generally overstated to make a case that slashers are conservative morality plays (which they can be, but aren't always). Anyway, the film is a bit marred by Steve Miner's unimaginative direction and the nonsensical ending, but it's still a fun little flick.

Ginny kicking ass

Realizing that I probably wouldn't get through all of the series in one night, I then skipped ahead to Friday the 13th: A New Beginning, the much maligned fifth installment of the series. While certainly not one of the best of the series (a distinction that belongs to Parts IV and VI), I do think it's a bit underrated. It's got a neat-ish idea. Since Jason was "killed" in part IV, they decide to follow the little boy who killed him. Now grown up, he's haunted by visions of Jason. Currently living in a halfway house with other troubled teens, people start dying, and it's implied that Jason may be returning, perhaps as a copycat. Or something. It's not a very well executed idea, but the movie still has some fun characters or moments here or there. I mean, come on, how can you not like Violet?

Violet doing the robot

Well that's probably way more about Friday the 13th movies than you wanted to know (and I'm betraying way too much about my knowledge of these movies), so let's get to one of the beers drank whilst watching. Bottle Logic's barrel aged beers are hyped and praised to the point where obtaining them tends to be rather difficult, but it's not so bad for lesser efforts like this one, an Imperial Red Ale made with Cassia Bark (basically cinnamon), aged in Mitcher bourbon barrels, then finished on French oak. It's all done in collaboration with Barks of Love, a dog rescue organization, so it's for a good cause too. Red Rover, Red Rover, I call Jason over:

Bottle Logic Red Rover

Bottle Logic Red Rover - Pours a dark amber brown color with a solid finger of dense, off-white head that leaves a bit of lacing as I drink. Smells very nice, a spicy, cinnamon-like character, floral and almost fruity aromas, woodsy, with a bit of boozy bourbon lurking around. Taste hits the same profile as the nose, sweet and spicy, cinnamon, a little fruit, rich toffee, some bourbon, oak, and vanilla. Mouthfeel is full bodied and rich, hints of spice and booze on the palate, but in a balanced way. Overall, tasty, complex, refined, and balanced stuff. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 11.3% ABV bottled (500 ml). Drank out of a tulip glass on 4/13/18. Release: 2018. Level 1.

Alright folks, maybe I won't wait a month to post again. Maybe.

The Spice Must Flow

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The most wonderful time of the year has rolled around, bringing with it the requisite leaf piles, mutilated pumpkins, paper skeletons, decorative corpses, "fun" cobwebs, and other oxymoronic traditions that are nominally ghastly but suddenly become socially acceptable during this season of seasons. Oh there's also tons of complaining about pumpkin beer and other pumpkin spiced abominations. As per my personal orthodoxy of "extremist moderation", I generally find everyone's reaction here overblown. Pumpkin beers are fine and I always make room for a few in my beer drinking agenda, especially when I can find one that's an interesting take (read: someone put it in a barrel).

This year's entry in the "pumpkin beers can be perfectly cromulent" sweepstakes is Bottle Logic's The Spice Must Flow. Since everyone's first joke of the season is now (and frankly should be) Decorative Gourds, I have started to rely on my backup of Dune related humor. Fortunately, Bottle Logic has already gone and done that work for me. Clearly members of House Atreides. (Kaedrin: Come for the beer, stay for the cutting edge cultural references.)

Anywho, Bottle Logic is one of the new hotness breweries out of Anaheim, CA and their wares have been melting faces amongst a certain subset of the beer dork community, particularly when it comes to their barrel-aging (and I guess coffee-dosing) program. What we have here is an ale brewed with pumpkin, coffee, and spices, then aged in rum and bourbon barrels. Look, I know some of you hate pumpkin beers, but this sort of beer is why I end up drinking some every year. It feels a little weird for this to be the first thing I write about, but then, everyone knows about Fundamental Observation and Darkstar November (I've had the latter, it's great). Not everyone can fold space and time, as the spice melange can:

The Spice Must Flow

Bottle Logic The Spice Must Flow - Pours a dark brown color with a finger of light tan head. Smells of coffee and pumpkin spice, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, a little caramel and brown sugar too. Taste hits some rich caramel, toffee, brown sugar, with coffee and pumpkin spice emerging quickly, followed by oak and vanilla, a hint of bourbon and rum. As it warms, the coffee takes a backseat to the pumpkin spice. I'm sure some would hate that, but my coffee ambivalence means that I kinda love it. Mouthfeel is well carbonated but rich and full bodied, hints of pleasant booze, perfectly balanced. Overall, this is awesome, even with the coffee. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 11.9% ABV bottled (500 ml). Drank out of a snifter on 10/7/17. Vintage: 2017. Batch: 2 (label sez Level 2)

I've had a couple barrel aged offerings from these folks and they're fantastic. Some of their more normal beers are solid too, but the Barrel Aged stuff is where it's at. I will most certainly be looking for more.

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Hi, my name is Mark, and I like beer.

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