Russian River Consecration

This past weekend, while adventuring around the Mission in San Francisco, we made our obligatory stop by Monk's Kettle.  Monk's Kettle is a small hole-in-the-wall gastropub (aka awesome beer-bar).  The food here is also great, but having eaten there several times before, we tend to just go for drinks.  The drink menu is very extensive, containing just about anything and everything in bottles that you can get in this area (and therefore the menu is actually encased in an old Brittanica Encylopedia cover).  However, most of the time we go here we find ourselves ordering off of the rotating draft list.  There is always something different and exciting to try.  Another added bonus is their usual featuring of Russian River Brewery's Pliny the Elder on tap.  There are very few places that you can get this beer on tap outside of the brewery itself in Sonoma.

In our visit last weekend, Erica and I tried the Russian River Consecration horizontal flight on draft.  This consisted of two versions of the same beer, Consecration, from different years.  One was from the 2nd batch ever made in 2009, and the other was the current 2012 batch.

The beer is one of a few of Rusisan River's American Wild Ales that are aged in wine barrels after their primary fermentation.  Consecration in particular is aged in Cabernet Sauvignon barrels from local Sonoma wineries for around six months.  The initial taste if you haven't had many Wild Ales, is a strong sour taste.  It is not the type of beer that you would want to have several of in a night, but more of a beer meant for sipping.  The beer takes on some wine characteristics as well, as it contains added fruit (black currants).

I was very excited to see the difference in the 3 year old batch vs the 2012 batch. Not surprisingly, the aged 2009 batch was slightly better than the less-aged version.  The flavors of the beer just seemed to have melded together over time and created a more defined taste.  Although, there have probably been several slight tweaks between batches of Consecration over the years, so it is tough to tell what differences are from age verses recipe refining.

Monk's Kettle, we will be back!