 Thanks for checking out this episode of brutal battle beer break and as you will recognize something is different with this one It's the number of beers in front of me Typically, I just do one beer per brutal battle beer break, but this one's different and it's special So it makes sense that I would do four at a time. So it's gonna be longer. So strap yourself in Anyway, this is the a special pack of beer. It's a seasonal pack by flying dog brewing out of Frederick, Maryland and They put this out. I think they've put this out for the past three years and around now And it's their Otterbind pack now Otterbind is a cookie company, which I believe is based out of Maryland and They what they've done for these packs each year is they will pick a cookie from Otterbind and then create a beer that they think Compliments the cookie or the cookie will complement the beer. We actually did a special Episode of the actual podcast just audio podcast about the very first one that they did so you can go back and listen to that Just check out brutal battle.com or look for it on iTunes stitcher or Google play So didn't do the one last year figured it'd be fun to just do this one as a brutal battle beer break and see what happens So it should be good should be cool and I'll tell you, you know, what they're supposed to be paired with I'm not doing the cookies. Sorry Not a big cookie person and I don't really want to You know commit to buying a ton of cookies for this, but just gonna evaluate these beers and see what's good So this is kind of my own pack attack just for the Video which we do pack attacks for audio, but anyway, all right, so the first one here is Pop it and then First one here is a raspberry leaf ale now This is a it's six point five percent alcohol by volume and it's an ale with grapefruit raspberry tea and Other natural flavors added So this one is supposed to pair with a lemon sugar cookie by Otterbine So I mean honestly, I'll just show you the first ones labeled They're all gonna look basically the same except different color and a different name on them So just get a good look at that and then I'm not gonna show you the other ones. So Raspberry leaf out and the reason that I have you know one one little goblet for each of them is because I don't want to take The time to go and rinse in between. So this just easier. Anyway, check it out It actually looks like you know, like a pale ale. Honestly, it just looks like a Orange with a little bit yellow tinge pale ale to it's got a lot of carbonation coming up from the bottom decent head around the top I do smell Now it's probably because I know this that it's like raspberry tea in there It does smell a little earthy a little leafy a little tea ask. I don't think I can actually get raspberry out of the smell I do get a little bit of that grapefruit aspect in there Smells pretty malty though. There's a bit of like a honey sweetness in there as well. So let me try this Super light. Let's say be me on this again 6.5. Yeah, it seems about 6.5 I can taste the raspberry tea in this or what I would assume a raspberry tea would taste like it's a very slight kind of raspberry flavor Um, just kind of like, you know hits your tongue lightly Traces along the top of it. It definitely has that kind of leafy tea aspect as well Yep, definitely get the grapefruit aspect in there, too That's like the second thing to come in the first is that raspberry tea and that's a grapefruit And then the finish that is a little bit honey a little bit of a hay Aspect to it as well I could see this going well with a sugar cookie. Is that what it is? A lemon sugar cookie. Oh, yeah I could see that because a lemon would enhance enhance the citrusiness Which the citrusiness isn't crazy the grapefruit and this is more of like a grapefruit peel. So Decent I'm done with it. It's pretty decent All right. So the next one I'm going to go to is a horchata logger Now this one pairs with their straight up sugar cookie And it's brewed with cinnamon and vanilla bean Okay, so that is like a brownish orange Coloration maybe a little bit of a reddish hue in there as well It's got a decent white head to it decent amount of carbonation coming up from the bottom Oh smells pretty horchata-y So let me Yeah, definitely smells cinnamon. Definitely can smell some vanilla bean aspect in there Oh, yeah And I taste it Lots of cinnamon right up front and then it goes right to that vanilla bean malty Pretty like medium mouthfeel to it It's nice. This would this would definitely a good one for the winter season and it, you know Spices and that's the way that cinnamon and vanilla comes together just makes you think, you know cookies and with a sugar cookie I can see how that's nice Hmm. I respect that That's a good, uh, it doesn't even taste all that loggery in the in the finish either like there's typically a particular logger yeast flavor Um, I don't I can't even really get that so much It's just mainly the cinnamon and the vanilla bean and it's kind of nice It's not amazing, but it's good Cool. So the next one, uh, this is interesting a Christmas IPA And oh, I'm sorry. The horch out of logger is 6.8 alcohol. I didn't say that So here's the Christmas IPA. Um, it's 7.6 alcohol by volume It's an IPA with orange peel spruce and tangerine Which sounds quite good And this is supposed to be paired with the orange white chocolate chip cookie I didn't know they made anything like that. That's interesting Got the sucre Right in there All right So we have it looks like your typical IPA. It is very orangey. It's got a nice white head to it Um, not as much, uh, carbonation coming up from the bottom as the last two, but there's some Oh, yeah, very grape fruity Very grape fruity I can smell that tangerine. It's very very very citrusy Now it says there's spruce in there If I really reach for it in the smell, I can get the spruce at the end But I'm probably only getting it because I know it's in there And that spruce I feel like can sometimes come off as being like pine. So Smells good though. I don't like that. I don't like the way the spruce plays in this beer. I really don't Um I get a quick hit of those really nice grapefruit and tangerine flavors And there's a decent bitterness to it to back up those flavors But then there's that spruce and it just tastes it tastes like a tree. It tastes like spruce tips and sappy, you know, and um It's not integrating well to be honest What I do really like that is this same type of idea is dogfish heads, pennsylvania tuxedo I think they did this type of beer a lot better. Um I'm not a big I'm not a fan Too sprucey Too a little too syrupy No, I don't like it It's not horrendous, but I don't like it. Not big on that. So I'm gonna get some water And then the last one oh and that one was to remind you was supposed to be with the orange white chocolate chip cookie I I can't imagine how that would go with it to be honest. Um, okay, I guess All right, then the last one is a Baltic porter I don't see enough Baltic porters out there and I quite like Baltic porters. They have a little bit more of like a salinity They're more robust style porters And I like that So this is 8.4 percent alcohol and it pairs with their straight up chocolate chip cookie And it's brewed with star anise Which anyone out there not that familiar with anise anise has a very licorice to like black licorice Taste to it All right, so it's a lighter looking porter. It's not super dark Um, so as you can see, I mean it looks dark much darker on the screen than it actually pours Uh in real life, but I I mean I can see through it on the edges It's like a reddish brown. Um, yeah, so I can see through a little bit on the edges. So Nice man There's a little bit of a coffee Like roasty coffee note in there There's a little bit of a salinity that I expect from a Baltic porter A little bit of a uh a jerky like beef jerky type smell with some type of soy sauce aspect Smells decent Can't really pick out any star anise though or I mean a nice really I don't know what the difference in flavor between regular anise and star anises. So It tastes like a thinner type of Baltic porter there's a bit of that salinity to it. There's a little bit of that beef jerky aspect There's a roastiness to it Sweetness on the end Um, it's decent I wouldn't say this is the best Baltic pour I've had. I wouldn't say it's the worst. It's kind of in the middle It's okay. It's just okay Okay, so I I could see maybe where this would go with a straight up chocolate chip cookie Actually, I could see where it would go with the chocolate chip cookie because adding chocolate to that flavor would kind of round it out a little bit more so You know, this isn't the full experiment because I didn't have the cookies But you know, draw your own conclusions based on the flavors I gave you on how the cookies would go with it Um, so overall, I mean Christmas IPA did not work for me Baltic porter was okay Uh, the horchata lager was good. Um solid interesting and the uh, raspberry leaf ale was pretty pretty nice Especially for like a lighter style with a little bit of a fruit aspect to it. So overall decent pack um Would I go out and purchase any of these again? Probably not Just because there's so many other beers out there and you really have to stand out for me to want to purchase you again so Sorry flying dog Although I feel like I did short change you guys just a little bit because I didn't do the cookies with these and the cookies could have enhanced the beer And who knows the beer most likely would have enhanced the cookies and you know, whatever But if people want to find out how that goes, uh, we like I said, we had done the original otter bind flying dog pack On the regular podcast so you can check that out. Uh, and that was that was a fun time Just go to brutal battle.com Or check it on itunes stitcher or google play. But anyway, thanks everyone for checking this out I know it's been much longer than it usually is. Hope you enjoyed it Uh, have any ideas for any of these send me an email at brew battle podcast at gmail.com Thank you so much and go have yourself an awesome beer