Autumn Beer Festival!!!

A while back, my expert told me her friend mentioned that we should go to a craft brew pub called Open Baladin.  Last Friday, we had a free evening to finally go investigate.  We walked down the dark, cobble-stoned streets near Campo De' Fiori to reach the pub and found that it was rather crowded in there.  Immediately I noticed a sign on the outside of the door.

Wonder of wonders!  MIRACLE!  MIRACLE!

The Roman Beer Gods decided to align their interests with mine for one fortunate evening.  Why?  Because we happened to arrive precisely on the same night within precisely the same hours of...

AUTUMN BEER FESTIVAL!!!!!

19 different breweries from all over Europe, 44 different beers.  All birre artigianale.  All craft beer.

I experienced the utmost satisfaction at that moment.  It's kind of like that feeling you get when you randomly find a $20 bill or a 20 EURO bill just sitting on the ground and no one is around you to claim it.  Or perhaps its more like when you put your business card in the drawing at the carnival or festival and your name is called to win the brand new LCD television!

I had no idea this was going to happen to me that night.  And it couldn't have been a better and more welcomed surprise.

These were the rules:
For 10 EURO, you get 5 glasses of your choice.
Each glass holds up to 33CL, just over 11 fluid ounces U.S.
The exception is barley wines.  Those orders are put in glassware that holds up to 10CL pours.
Each glass of beer was filled about halfway.

Take a look at the line up!  I couldn't even fit the entire chalkboard into view from where I sat at the bar!

So many choices, so little time.... let's figure out what we want, shall we?

I wanted to really mix it up and see what these craft beers were made of!  I wanted to try a dark beer, a hoppy beer, a fruit / special beer, a sour beer and then maybe a standard bitter ale.  Here's what I ended up choosing:

Brewery: Girardin (I've linked each brewery's website on their names for your convenience)
Beer Name: Oud Lambic
Alcohol Content: 5%
Description: Lambic aged for at least 2 years.

My Thoughts: This was an interesting sour beer.  The nose - you could smell the sour, like some sort of sour fruit that I couldn't pin-point exactly.  One disappointment was the ZERO carbonation.  Zero head because of that.  If there was any in there, it wasn't noticeable.  First sips told me it was surprisingly bitter but then the tongue went back and forth between sour and bitter nuances.  Mouth feel was very thin, no heaviness.  It ended up being a wonderful blending of both as the tastes went back and forth.  The first impressions weren't very pleased, but it grew on me over time.  Very well balanced lambic.

Brewery: Montegioco
Beer Name: Demon Hunter
Alcohol Content: 8.5%
Description: Amber beer of great complexity.  The nose hints of dried fruit, prunes and caramel.  The taste, intense, the attack, honeyed with a well balanced finish.

My Thoughts: The nose was not as big as I was expecting.  I imagined this big, high alcohol beer to have a strong hoppy nose full of fruit from the description and it really, hardly hinted at any of the descriptions.  The taste, though, was full of caramel.  The taste of alcohol was noticeable but not overpowering, and I tasted hints of the dried fruit.  It had excellent carbonation, its beige head always retained on the surface of the liquid.  It had a strong, almost heavy mouth feel.  What a great overall blend.  I very much enjoyed this beer.

Brewery: Baladin / Stone
Beer Name: Super Arrogant
Alcohol Content: 8%
Description: The meeting between our Super Baladine and Stone Brewery's (San Diego, CA, USA) Arrogant Bastard.  A beer for all to discover from two grand beers, from two grand breweries.

My Thoughts: Ahh yes, the concoction from Baladin and Stone.  The nose was interesting.  Nicely hoppy, but has a smell of overripe fruit.  Almost unpleasant, but not turn your nose away from the glass unpleasant, if that makes sense.  The taste was absolutely outstanding!  What a floral bouquet, and lots of honey!  An excellent balance.  It's not a very bitter beer.  They clearly didn't go overboard on adding the bittering hops, but they did add a heavy hand on the taste hops.  Again, very well balanced.  And a lovely veil of head remains on top of the liquid from the good carbonation.  My definite favorite of the night.

Brewery: Baladin
Beer Name: Zucca
Alcohol Content: 7.5%
Description: Amber beer made with cooked pumpkin and cinnamon.  The nose of cinnamon is felt.  The taste, soft and pleasant.

My Thoughts: I am very critical of pumpkin beers.  I prefer them to taste more like pumpkin pie with a hint of beer rather than beer with a hint of pumpkin pie.  And this one clearly fit into that preference. The nose smelled like fall.  It was full of cinnamon, even apple-cinnamon.  The taste was light on pumpkin taste but heavy on spices, particularly cinnamon.  It was kind of sweet for a beer.  And the more I drank, the more the cinnamon overpowered the pumpkin.  It was light on mouth feel.  The carbonation was rather light.  The head did not stay, but just ended with a ring at the edges of the glass.  All in all, it was still one of the best pumpkin beers I've ever had because I prefer them to be low on bitter, high on spice.  By the end, I kept thinking I was drinking almost a buttery piece of cinnamon-sugar toast.  Yum.

Brewery: Turan
Beer Name: Sfumatura
Alcohol Content: 7.2%
Description: A dark beer produced in the style of an Imperial Stout, made with smoked malts.

My Thoughts: This was an interesting beer to end on. I'm highly critical of using smoked malts because they can EASILY overpower the entire beer and make you think you are simply drinking bacon.  Which is sometimes ok, but really it's a bad thing.  It had hardly any nose.  Maybe the slightest hint of roastiness, a bit of chocolate in there too.  No hops smell from what I could tell.  The carbonation was great.  A nice beige head.  The mouth feel was perfect.  Not too heavy, not too thin.  The taste finished heavy on the smoked malts at first.  My initial thoughts were it could use much less because it seemed to overpower the roasty, chocolate that is also in there from the use of roasted barley.  Then as I continued, I noticed that the smokiness lasted for at most 30 seconds and then transitioned into the roasted barley.  It left a wonderful, dark flavor in my mouth with only a hint of smokiness.  If I brewed this myself, I would still try to reduce the amount of smokiness by a little, but that's all personal preference.

My beer loving friends, a message to all:  I am finding more and more craft brew in Italy!  Change your impressions that Italy only has wine.  It's just not true!  And when in Rome, I highly recommend checking out Open Baladin Roma, and of course as many places that serve craft beer like them.

Ciao!