The World’s Strongest Beer — and Why It’s Like Bud Ice
I'd like to offer one addendum to the Lagerheads' post on BrewDog Tactical Nuclear Penguin, the new strongest beer in the world. How do they get so much booze into this imperial stout, which weighs in at 32% abv? The same technique used by, um, some less savory beer products — e.g. Bud Ice.
As BrewDog's video shows (above), the brewers aged this beer in scotch casks for a year and a half, then froze it in sub-zero temperatures. Because alcohol freezes at a lower temperature than water (try putting vodka in the freezer), they can extract some of the pure water and thus strengthen the beer.
Look, penguins are cute and all, and extreme beer can be fun. Hell, it got two blog posts on Y&H today. But after tasting another "strongest beer in the world" — which kinda sucked — I'm not ready to seek out a 32% abv stout. Which is good, because they're only making 500 bottles and I'd probably have to fight a Scotsman to get it.
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12:10 pm
[...] BrewDog Makes Strongest Beer in the World – In November, we heard that BrewDog, the radical Scottish brewery responsible for this, and this, masterminded a 32% ABV imperial stout that is sure to blow everyone’s socks off once it gets over to the U.S., one way or another. Yet some are skeptical. [...]
4:31 pm
[...] the world’s strongest beer. (See our November post inaugurating its brief reign here, as well this addendum by our very own Beerspotter). At 32% ABV, Tactical Nuclear Penguin is nothing to sneeze at. And [...]