Guest Post: Celebrating with Mannheim Steamroller

One Woman is thrilled to post this review of the Sierra Nevada Celebration Fresh Hop Ale by Some Dude, the extraordinary percussionist who plays with the two piano two percussion quartet Yarn/Wire, The Wet Ink Ensemble, Zs, and Drummers Corpse, among many others.

A snowed-in log cabin, chimney smoking in a deep forest mountain valley. Poinsettia leaves adorn the table and some of the autumn's hops harvest lay in pine baskets under the woodshop's bench. Peat and Moss, the black lab brother-sister companions of many a winter warm themselves by the fire. Trimmed in deep red, the Celebration Ale's bottle puts me in a state of mind/taste before the first sip. Celebration Ale is a special ale for the holidays that features the first hops of the growing season. Made with whole cone American hops, it’s an IPA full of complex flavors and aromas.

The beer pours a deep golden red. (The Christmas tree in the corner of the room looks especially nice when viewed through this amber liquid). The head is thin but active, similar to the highly hopped IPAs of summer, fish eyeballs and all. The smell of this beer is typical of an IPA: yeasty with faint citrus notes. The taste however, differs from other IPAs. It’s hoppy, but not overwhelming, and nicely balanced. There’s a certain 'barkiness' to this brew. Whether real or imagined, this subtle woody flavor is a treat that makes Sierra Nevada's seasonal a beer for the winter and a recommended beverage for any celebration.

Musical Pairing: Mannheim Steamroller plays “Coventry Carol.” Of course, one of my all-time favorite holiday albums, I think this short version pairs nicely with the Celebration Ale. The subtle shifts in instrumentation and texture as the carol progresses (a movement from classical and steel strings to who knows what kind of dulcimer and harp back to guitars again) mirror the beer's progression from yeasty/citrusy nose to the woody mouthfeel and return to the hop's faint bitter aftertaste. I strongly recommend continuing on in the Mannheim Steamroller tracking to experience their version of “Good Kind Wenceslas.”

P.S. Could the ridiculous comment on the Coventry Carol page be from none other than home-of-American-hops-born and Tomahawk frontman polymath Mike Patton?

a question: beer in LA?

one woman, flying without moving, is finding herself once again in los angeles with the question: where do angels go for beers?

recommendations, por favor!

bonus pic: there's a brewdog tokyo - intergalactic fantastic oak aged stout - that's 18.2% ABV chillin' in the fridge. wtf???? stay tuned.

It's not what you think it is: Mikkeller Ris A La M'ale

A beer table with Mikkeller Ris A La M'ale

A beer brewed with almonds and cherries.
It's sweet? - no.
Sour? - nope.

One Woman thinks that Mikkeller Ris A La M'ale is a beer to be appreciated in the quieter moments in life.  Pink, soft, and round in the mouth. It's subtle. So subtle that you almost have to love it first in order to appreciate it. It smells ever so slightly of almonds and muddled cherries, but really just memories of those flavors. Barely carbonated, and not very fragrant the most noticeable feature of this beer is its murky sepia toned reddish pink color. Just a touch of berried vanilla sweetness that could be confused with tartness, a suggestion of yeasty malt, a couple of vanilla seeds and a tiny pinch of allspice. Somehow, it makes you forget that you're drinking, even at 8% ABV.


Musical pairing - Morton Feldman, Piano Four Hands (1958). Crudely put, Morton Feldman's music is quiet, easy to dismiss, and hard to like. And yet, it has the ability to resonate in the moment and linger in your mind in the form of pretty fragments of memories.

Alternatives: Caffeinated on the Road - Kyoto Edition

On the way back from a trip to Osaka, One Woman stopped in the lovely town of Kyoto to admire the changing leaves, the grand temples, and the delicious treats of the old capitol. But most memorably, the trip involved six caffeinated mugs of deliciousness. The day revisited:

8:00 AM -- Cups 1 and 2: Lipton at grandma's
As grandpa says... "what do you mean what kind of tea??? just give me the lipton"

12:38 PM -- Cup 2: Inoda Coffee
A historic coffee house in Kyoto established in 1940, the front looks like another little shop in the old merchants' town, but the inside opens up to a huge, Viennese style coffee room, with people sitting around enjoying their Sunday afternoon coffee and cakes. As for the coffee, it's delicious. They're most famed for the "Arabian" coffee that they serve with milk and sugar in it already, but I opt for the Columbia--Mellow dark chocolate, chestnut, red wine, all this good stuff in a lovely medium body. I'm overcome by a cozy feeling of sunniness.

3:40 PM -- Cup 3: Usu-cha at Kyo-Hayashiya
Skip lunch, do tea. Not exactly your zen-inspired tea ceremony vibe at the Kyo-Hayashiya, but this shop has been serving tea and sweets to merchants and travelers since 1753. Usu-cha is a form of matcha, the bright green powdered leaves used not only to make tea but also to flavor all kinds of sweets from yokan to ice cream. The usu-cha arrives on a wooden tray with a little bowl of zenzai (sweet red bean and mochi soup), and a cup of hoji-cha. The vivid colored tea is frothy, and beautiful to the eye. It's served in a great big bowl of a cup. I take a quick few bites of the zenzai and dive in to the world inside the green bowl. It's fragrant, zippy, grassy, and has an aromatic bite that melds so nicely with the sweet red beans.

3:43 PM -- Cup 4: Hoji-cha
Since the usu-cha basically needs to be consumed all at once (it's kind of like a tea-shooter) the hoji-cha that arrived on the tray is a welcome compliment to the rest of the zenzai. Reddish brown, and medium dark in color, hoji-cha is a mellow, warm tea that's conducive to sipping slowly, and enjoying the warm toasty notes of the perfect roast. It's a delightful contrast to the intensity of the usu-cha experience, and goes with the sweets in a totally different way: whereas the sweets bring out the flavors of the usu-cha, the hoji-cha serves to enhance the earthiness of the red bean flavor.

4:45 Cup 5: Maeda Coffee
Nearing Kyoto station, I want to avoid camping out at the ubiquitous 'buck while waiting for the shinkansen train. Last coffee stop in Kyoto was Maeda coffee near Kyoto station, a classic 1970's mom and pop coffee shop with a few chains around central Kyoto. The coffee's strong and dark, served in a cozy thick ceramic mug. Nice deep earth, not mind-blowing, but then again, it's the sixth cup. (At this point, One Woman thinks she needs a beer.)

*          *          *

But the question remains, where does one find "Kyoto iced coffee" -- that dank stuff that they serve at at fancy coffee places in the US??? Mystified, One Woman did some research. What is "Kyoto" iced coffee, and does it actually exist in Kyoto?

Answer: Search all you want, but actually, it's *Made in USA* ...a recent invention by the one and only James Freeman of Blue Bottle, who was inspired by a trip to Kyoto!!! OMG!--so, is this, like, the coffee version of the "french fry" and "french toast"??? A big thanks to Mr. Freeman for generously responding to my query.



Musical pairing: "Giant Steps" (1959/1960) by John Coltrane (also the name of the lively Blue Bottle brew in my cup right now) in honor of the Trane, travels, and caffeinated discovery. Giant Steps is an early composition by Tenor player John Coltrane. It's a blazing fast bebop classic that, like any good coffee, leaves you in a slightly altered state of mind... such a good track.


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