Southern Tier Plum Noir

Brewed By: Southern Tier Brewing Company in Lakewood, New York
Purchased: 22oz bottle bought at West Lakeview Liquors in Chicago, IL; 2013

Style/ABV: Imperial Porter, 8.0%

Reported IBUs: ?

I love plums...I love beer...I love beer with plums. This beer seemed like a logical purchase, and will be yet another plum beer in my repertoire. Yay me. About Southern Tier.

Southern Tier Brewing Company is based out of Lakewood, New York. The brewery was founded in 2002 by Phineas DeMink and Allen "Skip" Yahn. Using equipment purchased from the old Saddleback Brewing Co., the company began production with the vision of reviving traditional small batch brewing to the region. By 2003, the brewery was distributing their small batch ales, and by 2005 their sales covered New York and Pennsylvania. Before the brewery had any seasonal beers, it produced a Pilsner, Mild Ale, and IPA. Due to popularity, in 2009 a 20,000 square foot facility was built to allow for the brewing of large-scale beers. Since then, Southern Tier has continued to expand, and continued to invest in better equipment to keep up with the increasing demand for their beer. You can read more about Southern Tier's history on their history page.

The bottle of this beer has all sorts of good info on it, and reflects Southern Tier's new bottle art designs. This beer lists a myriad of ingredients: 2-row malt, caramel malt, barley flakes, chocolate malt, debittered black malt, pureed plums, and chinook & willamette hops. Punching in at 8.0%, this is a big beer. If you roll over to the Plum Noir page, you get much of the same info. This beer is brewed with Prunus cocomilia plums, which are an Italian plum that has a dark color and flesh. The pureed plums are added during fermentation to provide sugar and residual flavors. 

Southern Tier Plum Noir

This beer is like...a Stout. I guess I wasn't sure what to expect. This beer pours into a dark black/purple body in low light, and kicks up one or two fingers of super thick, bready head. The head is a dark tan/wheat bread color. In bright light the beer is still surprisingly dark, and the head has settled into a pinky's worth of dark tan, bready coating. There's lacing from where the head used to be, and some light legs.

As with the aroma, I wasn't sure what to expect, but it's not this. This beer plays the Stout/Porter thing straight, if you like your Stout/Porter dressed up as a Bock. I'm getting a LOT of coffee on this. I'm also getting big bread, toast, and toffee...maybe some Bock-esque melanoidins. There's some bready grain on the nose as well. As the beer sits, stagnant, you go without fruit. When I swirl the beer in the glass, I kick up some raisins and plums.

This is surprisingly light and void on the palate...it's very clean, and almost reminds me of a Doppelbock or Dunkler Bock. You get grain and coffee up front, with some hints of roast and huge toast in the middle. The back end finishes with toast, toffee, and coffee. Hints of raisin/plum/molasses sweetness linger throughout, and the alcohol is completely hidden.

Seriously, this really reminds me of a dark, chocolaty Bock. The mouthfeel is medium-light, veering towards creamy, with airy carbonation. The whole thing finishes super clean, and there's just a hint of bitter towards the back. No flavor really jumps out at you, at least not at first. Once your palate adjusts the beer turns into a refined and mature beer. The 8.0% is absolutely undetectable making this beer both highly drinkable and deceptive and dangerous. The palate depth is actually really nice for a Porter, and there's some nuance to this. Far too often I associate complexity with aggressive flavors, but I think this beer has something going for it. You get a blast of caramel sweetness followed by grain, coffee, and sweet bread/toast up front; that rolls into more toast, bread, coffee creamer, and sweet toffee/caramel; the back end is trailing toast, a hint of roast, more coffee, and fade to light dryness and slight sticky.

Rating: Average (3.5/5.0 Untappd)

I'm feeling a Strong Average on this...this is by no means a bad beer. It's actually quite refined and quite enjoyable, and it's a nice change of pace for Southern Tier. Compared to something like their Creme Butterscotch Rape Brulee, this is a welcomed change of pace and is very drinkable at 8.0%. There's a wonderful toffee sweetness at work in this beer, and tons of nice toasted notes. The plums don't really assert themselves...at least not as plums...and this beer is very clean and reminds me of a Bock. That's not a bad thing at all. And this was priced fairly at around 10 bucks a bomber. I would pair this with dry chocolate cake, coffee-braised meats, or a pulled pork sandwich. I give this a lukewarm recommendation if you like Southern Tier, plums, or Strong Porters chocolaty Bocks.  

Random Thought: I'm actually deviating from my own recommendation and pairing this beer with some cheesy mashed potatoes with green beans. Ideally I'd go the chocolate cake route, but it's only Monday...I haven't jumped that shark just yet.

Sierra Nevada Ovila Quad With Plums

Brewed By: Sierra Nevada Brewing Company in Chico, California 
Purchased: Fancy 12.7oz bottle from a 4-pack, bought at Binny's in IL; 2013
Style/ABV: Belgian Dark Strong Ale/Quadrupel, 10.2%

Reported IBUs: 21

I'm feeling my Belgian-style beers tonight, so moving past Boulevard's Tripel...Sierra Nevada has two versions of their Ovila Quad. One brewed without any plums, and one brewed with plums. The one brewed with plums comes in a sexy 4-pack with corked 12.7oz bottles. The packaging is sexy as hell, and the fact is, plums are better than no plums. Right? About Sierra Nevada:

Sierra Nevada are one of the big players in craft brewing, and one of the first craft breweries to arrive on the craft beer scene. If you check out their history page, you will see that founder Ken Grossman began his quest to build a brewery in 1976. In 1980, Ken Grossman and co-founder Paul Camusi brewed their first batch of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. According to Wikipedia, Sierra Nevada's Pale Ale is the second best selling craft beer behind Boston Lager. Sierra Nevada is the sixth largest brewing company in the United States as well, cranking out over 750,000 barrels in 2010.

Tonight's beer is part of Sierra Nevada's Ovila lineup. The Ovila Abbey Quad With Plums is described as featuring aromas of caramel, malt, and dark fruit. This beer is a collaboration between Sierra Nevada and the monks of the Abbey of New Clairvaux. This one features sugar plums grown on the grounds of the Abbey that were harvested by the monks. This one clocks in at 10.2% ABV and packs 21 IBUs. This beer is brewed with pale, Munich, chocolate, and caramel malts; uses Styrian Golding and Saaz hops; and is fermented with Belgian Yeast. 

Sierra Nevada Ovila Quad With Plums

This one pours a raisin-cola color, with some hints of red and brown in the body. This kicks up a finger of tan/golden raisin head, but the head quickly dissolves into a hazy cauldron effect. The body is dark and moderately opaque, making it impossible to judge the carbonation. I can't tell if the bottle art is supposed to be gangster or all religious. Either way, those sexy, corked, 12.7oz bottles are the business. 

The aroma on this beer is AWESOME. Actually, this entire beer is awesome...I won't lie, I've had this before. You get big raisins and plums on the aroma, with some rum, spicy phenols, perfume, and some big earthy malts approaching tobacco. There's some peppery clove, and hints at smokey malts.

The taste is everything the aroma is, and it's delicious. This opens up with huge boozy phenols, with rum, spice, clove, earthy malts, and big dark fruits of the plum/raisin variety. There's some nice malty sweetness in here, with caramel and toffee playing off the raisins and plums...lots of phenolic spice, and big rocky booze. This is very much an earthy Quad, with hints of tobacco, smoke, and anise from the malts.

As far as American-style Quads go, this is definitely one of the better ones. There's good complexity here, and the earthy malts add a lovely dimension to this style. The mouthfeel is full-bodied, and yet creamy and smooth thanks to lots of carbonation. You do get a bit of chewiness, and some noticeable booze. At 10.2%, this IS boozy, and as a result you do want to sip on this...or not...but yeah. I like this beer as a warming sipper, and this would be great around Christmas. Palate depth is good, and complexity is pretty high. You get lots of raisins, dark fruits, caramel/toffee, rum, and spicy phenols up front; that rolls into some bitterness, earthy roast, tobacco, anise, light smoke, some spice; the back ending dries out with lingering phenol-spice, and some boozy complexity to round things out.

Rating: Above-Average (4.5/5 Untappd)

I'm feeling a Strong Above-Average on this..almost approaching a Divine Brew...actually, getting really close. I don't know why I'm not committing, but I'm not. Maybe it's the complexity...maybe I need more time...I just don't know. But still, this beer is excellent, and happens to be a really good American take on a Belgian Quad. This would pair well with spicy meats, a hearty stew, soups, a raunchy burger, strong cheeses, fruit pies, or a cold winter night by the fireplace. Unfortunately, it is hot as balls out. So.... A 4-pack (12.7oz bottles, caged and corked) was around 15 bucks. Not bad for such a potent beer.

Random Thought: I just killed a giant centipede that was distracting my cats. The thing was HUGE. And after I squished it, it hissed at me. WTF mate?