Here it is! Wow Week 52. It feels like I just started this madness. I’m going to do a 52 Beers in 52 Weeks in review post, so I won’t get all nostalgic here!

I had a real treat over Christmas to include as my final week: Upland Raspberry Lambic. The Upland Brewery began in 1998 in Bloomington, Indiana, their story can be found on their website:

The name “Upland” comes from the Norman and Crawford Uplands, the term geologists gave to our area of southern Indiana, which was never overrun by the glaciers that flattened much of Indiana’s landscape. The raised highlands or “uplands” remained untouched, resulting in a region of rugged, heavily wooded hills and hollows. The land was beautiful but poor, and life was not easy for early settlers. This adversity bred independent thinkers who had strong wills, a connection to the land, and a wry sense of humor about life. Our approach to brewing beer honors the spirit of these people and this place.

Their series that includes sours is a pretty difficult get in the beer world. I’ve been lucky enough to try the Peach Lambic, and decided to spring for the Raspberry when the opportunity presented itself.

Muddy red pour with a very fizzy pink head. No retention or lacing at all. The head gushed out of the bottle a bit upon popping the cork. Very oaky smell with a nice amount of raspberries and barnyard funk mustiness. The balance is quite nice, but seems to be a bit on the sour side 4. On the taste the oakiness seems to hide underneath the funk and raspberries. The fruit isn’t particularly strong, as this seems to be a bit more funky than anything else. I very much like how the taste develops: fruity, then a lot of funk that finishes off the taste dry with oak and booze throughout. The body is medium with an extremely dry finish. Perhaps a bit over carbonated, as shown with the gushing bottle (that I remember, in hindsight, occurred with the Peach Lambic I had before). The bite of sour-ness I didn’t find offensive at all. This was very good. I thought it would be a bit more fruity, but the overall taste is well above average. Easily enjoyable, very glad I tried it.

4.38 / 5

The beer for this week revisits a brewery I reviewed very recently: The Bruery. In Week 47, I got into some Black Tuesday and Chocolate Rain. This week I got to taste their yearly addition to a 12 Days of Christmas Vertical: 4 Calling Birds. This is, obviously, the 4th in a set of 12. The first of which is one of the most difficult beers to find on the planet.

Rustico Ballston, in Arlington, VA offered the beer on Cask and Tap for their 2011 Festivus Celebration (yes there was an aluminum pole, but no Feat of Strength or Airing of Grievances). I obliged and tried both!

Tap:

Black pour with a small light brown head without much lacing. Retention isn’t that good. Really spicy smell with a pumpkin like malty aroma. It has an edge to it that isn’t quite alcohol, but it reminds me of it. Not all that pleasant an aroma overall. The taste is a lot more like a spicy pumpkin ale than I was expecting. Malt forward, the taste is a bit disjointed. Can’t say I see this lasting 8 years to complete the 12 Day of Christmas Vertical. Light body, carbonated well. Not great by any means and I don’t see how it’s going to last. Big miss for me.

3.45 / 5

Cask:

Less head than the tap version, still no lacing. The aroma is a bit more balanced. Sweeter, less spicy. The taste follows the smell in being more balanced. The cask makes this a lot better, my guess is the barrel aged version would actually be pretty good as the barrel effects seem to curb the sub-par taste of the beer. The body is heavier, with less carbonation. Something I would expect from a cask offering. I enjoyed it a lot more this way, which surprised me. Still a bit disappointed overall.

3.98 / 5

Lagunitas Brewing Company got themselves into an interesting predicament this year, as they failed to have the capacity to brew their final seasonal. So, what did they do? Create one of the best beers released in 2011! Lagunitas Sucks Holiday Ale, now being repackaged as Holiday Leftovers Ale, sold out the second it hit the shelves across the country, and for good reason. Lagunitas was founded in 1993 in Lagunitas, California and has since moved and increased their capacity significantly as they’ve created some of the best selling beers not only in California, but in the entire US. The description on the bottom of the 6pack is hilarious, stories like this are what they’re known for.

This sad holiday season we didn’t have the brewing capacity to make our favorite seasonal brew, the widely feared BrownShugga’ Ale. You see we had a couple of really good years (thank you very much) and so heading into this season while we are awaiting the January delivery of a new brewhouse we are jammin’ along brewing 80 barrels of IPA and PILS and such every 3 hours. A couple of months back we realized that since we can only brew a mere 60 barrels of Shugga’ every 5 hours, that we were seriously screwed. For every case of Shugga’ brewed, we’d short 3 cases of our favorite daily beers. It’s a drag. This year, we brewed something that we think is also cool and brews more like our daily brews. The new brewhouse will help insure this kind of failure never happens again. It’s a mess that we can not brew our BrownShugga’ this year and we suck for not doing it. There is nothing cool about screwing this up this badly and we know it. Maybe we can sue our own sorry selves. There is no joy in our hearts this holiday and the best we can hope for is a quick and merciful end. F*@& us. This totally blows. Whatever. We freaking munch moldy donkey butt and we just want it to be all over…

Appearance
Amazingly clear yellow pour with about a finger of white head. The retention could be better, but what does stick around laces nicely down the side of my Russian River -tion glass.
Smell
The aroma is of piney hops with mango type fruits underneath. Very tropical and floral smell. Only a slight malt backbone.
Taste
The piney hops start the taste off big and bitter, and give way to the mango, pineapple, perhaps grapefruit middle. The end is all hop bitterness and perhaps some malts for balance. The taste is certainly hop forward, but the amount of fruit curbs the bitterness wonderfully.
Mouthfeel/Drinkability
Light body, this one is extremely crisp and easy drinking. One of the most drinkable beers I've ever had.

Overall
I can see why this has the hype it does. This beer is phenomenal. It's so drinkable and crisp I can't put it down. The hops and fruits are perfect.

4.6 / 5