CABOOSE CRAZY TRAIN TRIPEL IS A FINE ROAD TO RIDE
Crazy Train Tripel, Caboose Brewery, Vienna, Virginia, Abv 8.2
Chris Mallon has brewed at big regional breweries, but jumped on board Caboose from the start with full creative control. He’s an exceptionally good brewer, careful with the science, and brilliantly intuitive in formulation. Caboose had about a dozen and a half beers on tap when we visited a few weeks ago and just about every one of them showed Chris’s skill. We remember in the last “wave” of breweries and brewpubs in the 90s, that it was pretty common for a small brewery to do one or two styles well, but rare to have success with a wide range.
These days, good brewers are more commonly doing almost everything well. That variety makes for a great evening of exploring beers at the source without leaving your seat.
And thank Uber, you can still make it home.
Several of Chris’s creation made it into our top 25% this year, but we’ve chosen the Tripel because that’s one of the hardest styles to brew successfully. Many of the Belgian attempts at the balance of sweetness, dryness, and fruit fell well short of the mark, and Americans by and large do even worse. Chris’s version is just a bit heavy for the style and has some less than traditional flavor components, but the overall effect is pretty close to the target and not many American tripels get there.
Tasting notes: A rich pale malt holds lots of pepper, melon and some sweet tropical fruit with a bit of finishing banana. The early pepper and ending fruit makes it seem like a distant cousin of a Hefe Weizen, though much deeper and more complex. A bit of metal throughout is very typical of the style.
Food Pairings: Tripels go well with fish dishes – this one is spicy enough to last the meal, get gentle enough not to overwhelm the flavor of the fish. As is true for most big beers, it would make a fine accompaniment to a cheese board at the end of the meal. Beer Review # 0101 20170410
TOMORROW WE’LL FEATURE MANIACAL IPA, A DOUBLE IPA FROM PORT CITY
Leave a Reply