Portsmouth Kate The Great

Kate The Great
Portsmouth Brewery
Portsmouth, New Hampshire
12.00% ABV
Style: Russian Imperial Stout

C: Too Dark to Tell
H: BLACK
N: Very complex nose including Coffee, Sweet and Dark Chocolate, Roasted Malt, and Molasses.

The Ferm: This was my "whale" that I decided to go after this year....I was very lucky to land it early on in the year. Kate the Great is released in a very limited quantity once a year from the Portsmouth Brewery. This is the beer these guys are known for. To call it a "hyped" beer may be an understatement. This beer is a hype-machine.
The beer poured pitch black with a solid tan head. The nose was insane with tons of dark and sweet chocolate in the nose. Coffee and Roast almost over powered all the other odors once the beer warmed to room temperature. The taste....extremely balanced, very good body, and the scents carried over well to the taste.
In my honest opinion, I was sort-a let down. I expected something bigger, better, and memorable from a beer with sooo much hype around it. Don't get me wrong this was a GREAT beer, but it is not one that I will actively seek out every year, like other once a year releases. This was a solid beer though. I'd say we can change Kate's name to Kate the Good.

Score : 3.99

White Birch Oak Aged Tripel

Oak Aged Tripel
White Birch Brewing
Hooksett, New Hampshire
10.40% ABV
Style: Tripel

C: Cloudy
H: Light Straw Yellow
N: Very light nose with hints of coriander and lemon

The Ferm: Listen I am all for Oak-Aged, Barrel-Aged, Taxadermied Animal-Aged, just about any thing aged on anything. Just please make the beer taste like it was aged on something besides a steel fermentor! PLEASE!
OK, enough about that....partially because the Oak did come through strong on the taste, but light on the nose. This was a surprise because I jumped the gun and was thinking of the rant above when I smelled my glass. Tons of oak on the attack, but yet the beer finishes very smoothly on the rear of the palate. Overall a very good beer. In fact, just about everything I have had from White Birch has been very tasty. They are doing something right up there in NH!
Score: 3.66