Tuesday's Tasting - Allagash Curieux & Moylan's Hopsickle

Talk about opposite ends of the spectrum. My friend Milty went on a beer shopping spree and decided to pop the cork on his recently purchased Allagash Curieux- an oak bourbon barrel-aged Tripel from the highly acclaimed brewrey in Portland, Maine. The Curieux had a lot of the Belgian golden ale characteristics going on with fruity yeastiness and a bit of earthy funk, along with some alcohol warmth due to the 11% ABV. To be honest, I couldn't pick up much character of any kind from the oak in this one, like I have in other bourbon-barrel aged beers. The flavor is very good though and I could see this beer being designated as "dangerously drinkable." Scored it a 3.95 on BA.

Afterwards, Milty/Pat and I came back down to my house to split a Moylan's Hopsickle three ways. The first couple pours had pretty good clarity, and a glowing red/orange hue. The aroma and taste were unmatched among any IPA or DIPA of any sort I've ever had. 'Pungent' would be the best way to describe it in both cases. They intended this to be "Triple Hoppy" and they weren't fooling around. The taste is just a huge bitter citrus punch with a bitter pine finish. You might think things start to get a mess when you start throwing that bulk of ingredients into a beer, but their precision was perfect. I am thankful I was able to split this because I don't know if I would get close to even being able to finish something with this much flavor, my taste buds would resign after about 10 ounces. Props to Moylan's, and it's no wonder why their Hopsickle claimed top spot on Hedonist Beer Jive's Top 25 beers. Scored it a 4.35 on BA.