My Hoppy Place

I have been waiting for this beer! I heard about it a couple of months ago (along with Dogfish Head’s Limb & Life) and have not been so excited for a beer ever. These 2 amazing breweries got together for the first time and created 2 amazing beers.

First, Dogfish Head created Life & Limb – that was a huge beer with a very high alcohol content (can’t give more of a description because I haven’t had it YET). Then,  they took the mash from that beer and Sierra Nevada created Limb & Life, a lower alcohol beer. They only brewed very small batches that were distributed in October and November locally. I missed it all. It was the thing I listed as my biggest regret this year, beer-wise.

Then I was given a gift, the gift of another chance. We found out that a relatively new restaurant in the Dupont Circle neighborhood, Scion, was celebrating their 6 month anniversary by tapping a Life & Limb keg for those of us lucky enough to get there. I got there!

This is remarkably smooth and drinkable, especially for a huge barley-wine-like beer (10% ABV). It has strong notes of coffee. It would be amazing with chocolate – which it was. It was served to us with a tasting portion of maple-seared pork belly (like breakfast) and a nice light chocolate mousse (like dessert). The pork brought out the sweet, slightly sour notes of the beer. The mousse, served with an orange cookie, brought out the citrus and coffee notes. I preferred the latter, but both were pretty amazing. This is a great beer. I am so lucky to have been able to try it. And it’s green too – made with maple syrup from the Caligione family farm in Mass. and estate barley grown on the Grossman “farm” at the brewery in Chico, CA.

My only lingering hope is that I get the opportunity to try the Limb & Life beer too.

Filed under: Beer, Food, Tasting notes on January 25th, 2010