It’s time for bottle number three from my gift pack, the only one that appeared to have its full volume. This is the pale ale, “Smash” pale ale, although the name makes you expect the typical lager. As far as I know, cerveza rubia has been in the lager style at least since lagers were introduced. All of the labels had some subtle and slightly surreal designs on them, but Rubia clearly shows a guinea pig on one side and a cat on the other. I do not know the reason. There isn’t even a quirky name to point to a fairy tale or weird ass children’s show.
Once again, extremely fizzy and well-headed, lovely golden color and subtle but standard beery aroma. It hits hard on the tongue with its carbonation, but the taste is right up the alley of any ale fan. It’s in-your-face bitter, but with a little garnish of grain to keep it floating. Like the weiss, it has a bigger, bolder body than I associate with the style, but it’s still a smooth and happily drunk brew. It is, perhaps, even more summery than La Balluca’s weiss, with a somewhat simpler profile and a less layered flavor experience. A little time brings out some sourness and turns down the bitter, leaving a more candied feel to the whole business. Of course, I will turn my eyes to darker horizons after this, but it was a nice little interlude of local beers that I wouldn’t have come across otherwise. The beer stores of yore will be missed, and sorely.
I didn’t see any leakage on the bottle, but this La Balluca Weissbier also had a lower level of liquid than you would expect to see. I’m going to trust that it is also still in drinking condition, having been kept from light and heat (for the most part). It looks like a pretty standard weiss, very short ingredient list, all natural. Things are really heating up these days on the street, so it would be nice to have something to cool down with on an August evening.
Yep, not quite regulation level
A little hissy under the cap, but looks good pouring and has a little wheaty tang to the smell. The head is fluffy, white, and does collapse into a manageable amount within half a minute. The beer is clear gold, showing off a lively amount of carbonation. The taste is stronger and heavier than I would expect from a wheat, with a little graininess but a big dark bitter spot. It has a crafty feel thanks to that roughness, not as sweet and effervescent as more industrial or at least bigger brand wheats. It’s less summery and refreshing than many of them are, but it’s true that a lot of wheat beers do have some pretty hefty body to them. There is a little sediment in the bottom, so the last bit of pouring should be done with care.
Sometimes people like to help you in your hobbies. When your hobby involves food and drink, it’s always easy to pick up a little something on a trip as a gift. Even now, there are local microbreweries and craft breweries working along steadily, supporting local hop farms and bars. I have not heard of La Balluca, maybe if some of the old beer stores were still open they would have had a few bottles. As it is, a pack of three bottles was gifted to me by a friend who was taking a trip through Guadalajara. They all looked like pale ales at first, but on opening the package I saw that there was an English brown, a wheat, and, yes, one pale ale. The brown and the wheat seem to have had some mishap occur; both of them were missing some liquid and the brown had some residue around the cap where some leakage must have happened. In spite of the loss, it’s mostly there, and probably still perfectly fine, so into the shitty fridge with 5 Maltas brown!
Uh oh
Hmmmmm
Seems a little low, yep
It is certainly a brown ale, cloudy with an off-white head, and a sweet-and-sour aroma. It’s like a lemon glazed cinnamon roll. The head dies back pretty quickly, but not completely, leaving a little cap. It has a strong malty flavor, with a little bit of gritty texture. The sourness is also there, very light, just balancing the bready, grainy taste. It has the hallmarks of its style, the warm roundness, the tingles on the tongue, it hits high notes for summer and low notes for times of less oppressive temperatures. As expected, the shitty fridge did not cool this beer way down, even in a bottle over a couple of days, but it works well with the style. It’s a soothing beer for the evening, probably not one that would take center stage, but it’s a welcome accompaniment.
Number two stout from my last foraging, Basqueland’s Seven Minute Siesta. It sounds more like some kind of IPA than the Imperial Pastry Stout is claims to be, but we’ll see if there isn’t a surprise in the can. It might be that an 11% beer is just the thing to knock you out for seven minutes. This is part of their 10th anniversary series, one of the two stouts in a sextet of other ales, including a black IPA. For some reason, it seems to me like Basqueland ought to be even older than 10, but we must remember that the 2010s was the high point of establishment of Spanish craft beer. 2015 is a solid year to be born. Actually, it’s my nephew’s birth year too, so it must have been a year for crazy creative things to come into the world.
Again, very appetizing going into the glass, with a very fluffy mocha colored head and more tiny bubbles than I was expecting. As the head dies back I take a whiff of a cakey, fruity, chocolate syrupy beer. It has the aroma of the best kind of pastry stout, the one that has sweetness but isn’t a sugar bomb. A deeper sniff brings up some toasty maltiness too. The mouthfeel is surprisingly thick, much more robust than I thought it was going to be. The sweetness is well-balanced, strong but not overwhelming. It’s something akin to dark chocolate, doing away with the bitterness of stouts without drowning the flavor in lactose or sucrose. While filling, it was not very sticky at first, although there is some build-up in the mouth over time. It doesn’t leave much of an aftertaste, just the sensation of having your tongue varnished. And not shitty cheap stuff either, high-class celebratory shine for the ages. Happy birthday to you, Basqueland, may you keep your quality and your market for decades to come.
How hot is it? Hot enough to explode beer cans! No, actually it isn’t today, I’m not sure what happened to Samhain. Maybe it just isn’t a summer beer in any way. I was told it was something akin to barleywine, with a lot of spice and a heavy body to it, a specialty beer from its northern brewery. I assumed it was Galician, since it has that Celtic touch, but it’s actually Reptilian Brewery of Cataluña. It wasn’t quite chilled in the fridge at Hidden Beers, but that just means it wasn’t hit with a big temperature difference on the street, where it swelled out the top of the can and popped a hole in it. Fortunately I was close to home and I didn’t lose much. An hour in the shitty fridge here and we’ll see what this does.
As expected, extra frothy, but still spicy and autumnal in aroma, nothing unpleasant about it. It’s a good dark amber color and a nice light beige head, which does calm down eventually. It’s a thick and robust feeling beer, yet smooth. I was expecting it to be a little rougher, maybe like that Australian ale, but it has almost a pumpkin pie filling feel to it. It also has a little bit of pumpkin spice taste, which makes it a shame I couldn’t hang onto it until October. Chestnuts and habañeros are in the ingredient list, but for the life of me I can’t pick out any heat. The wood aging is also not clear to me, although I don’t know what kind of wood was used. Apparently not one that had been infused with other alcohol. The chestnuts might be part of the nutty pie filling sensation. Since it isn’t thoroughly chilled, the candiness is evident in the flavor, not as overwhelming as some pastry stouts, but definitely in the realm of a dessert beer, or perhaps just a sweetish snack.
I’m not the biggest fan of pale ales, especially with an unreliable fridge. But, the label swayed me this time, as many another time in the past. It’s so focused, so determined, so much a beer that wants to kick itself down your throat. Plus, it’s Australian pale ale, so that’s something unusual up here. Bomb Squad is the name, but there’s also a little tagline at the bottom that resonates in these times: There Is No Tomorrow. Hits a little harder than that carpe diem crap, doesn’t it? Oso Brew does not have a particularly dour image, quite the opposite, but maybe it’s meant to be a call to action. I hope it doesn’t blow up in my face, after being shoved around in that fridge.
It is indeed a pale ale, straw colored, almost glowing white foam. The aroma comes in like a double decker bridge, with a strong whiff of fruit on top and a piney woodiness chugging in on the bottom. That bridge in Sydney isn’t a double decker, is it? Not like our beloved Gummint Bridge. I can’t quite see trains being bright and tropical at this time, since I don’t think they’re bringing in fruit these days. Somebody else must know a breezy pineapple bridge somewhere. There isn’t a lot of fruit in the flavor, it’s almost more of a rind or even grassy taste. This could be what you get when you eat dirt in an Australian football game. A pale ale is not an IPA, so you don’t expect it to be overwhelmingly hoppy, but it’s not a lager either, so you shouldn’t expect too much sweetness. This is a much more powerfully flavored pale ale than I’ve had for quite some time. It’s not quite what I expected, but I get to like it more with each sip. It might not be to everyone’s taste, especially in the summer, since it’s not especially easy-drinking. It’s rough around the edges and with a low and foresty flavor, not light and airy like other pales. Those traits make it feel like a get-up-and-go beer, though, not a sit-back-and-sleep one. Good for an early afternoon, in the on-street seating, ready to attack the rest of your obligations right after. If I’m not mistaken, 4.1% fits in the mid-strength category, so I guess it’s one Ozzie Man might recommend.
New place and new surroundings…not especially impressive for me. Who knows, though, I didn’t like my old neighborhood when I first moved there and when I got kicked out I was sad about it. Maybe I’ll come to enjoy Las Tablas. In any case, I have a metro station to take me to my beer stores, and this time it took me to Be Hoppy. I hadn’t read the story of the French artist when I bought the beer, so it’s just by coincidence that I have the preening sheep and the embarrassed Statue of Liberty. Garage might have some better connections to France than I do. You might expect a dark beer, given the circumstances, but this is an IPA, a DIPA in fact. It’s Pacific Trifecta, named for its three hops: Centennial, Idaho 7 and Simcoe. Classic.
A little happy to leave the can, maybe thanks to the weak fridge. Unsurprisingly hard to pour smoothly, I something like one of those Czech pours with all the foam at first, and it’s pretty resistant head too. It looks appetizing, with a distinctly golden color and clean white head on top. The aroma is IPA all the way. I get a little bit of rubber as an undertone, though. The flavor starts with an arrow toward bitter, but quickly swivels to fruity with a mild sweetness and a velvety feel. It would be more refreshing at a lower temperature, but it’s still bright and delicious, with essence of hops wrapped around it. I can complain about a lot of things, but I can’t really complain about this beer.
It’s summertime, for fuck’s sake. Streets are baking, heads are sweating, beers are calling. I even saw my first heat mirage! I’m not sure why I haven’t seen one yet in this town, I’ve been here through many a summer, and even hotter temps than these days. Must be something about the road composition in different neighborhoods. Since it is hot, hot summer, I relent on my stout obsession for a West Coast IPA. It’s national, though, from Caleya, a reliable brewery. And also, how can you resist Mola Lisa? Just look at that smile! She belongs in a museum.
Bright and golden looking, abundant and clean white head, firm but delicate tropical fruit aroma. It feels like a blend of whatever’s in season, it’s hard to pick out a particular one. It’s not more citrus or peach, for example, it’s just like walking past a fruit store. Does it translate to the flavor? Not quite, it’s a little sweet and hoppy at first, but suddenly you’re rolling through a pile of grain. There’s a strange distance between the light sweetness and the heavy, toasted base. After a bit, you start to get a little sourness, just for some variety. The flavor is stronger, and I would say more forceful, than the aroma, and while not quite what you expect from West Coast IPAs, it has a wildness that you might associate with the area. The pine isn’t very noticeable, that pine you might expect from a West Coast, but it’s scratchy and rough, a forest of a beer. There’s even something a little punk and/or New Wave about its sneakiness, with the whispered aroma and the punch of taste. A surprise, and a pleasant one.
What kind of German film watcher am I, without German beers for my weekend? Not to worry, I’ll have a couple on Sunday. For tonight, it’s a strong imperial stout, to go with bittersweet feelings about film festivals. This is not the first time I’ve picked up a Pyrene, and I seem to recall being impressed. This Black Boots is also a collaboration with Pink Boots Brew, named for the women’s society looking out for them in the industry. Maybe I should have had this one in March…
Yep, yep, new towel
It is a very proud pouring beer, with quite a thick head. It does kind of deflate like a cocoa soufflé, though. There’s a very breakfast cereal-y aroma, with chocolate, but also a savory breadiness, so toast is definitely present and maybe a little bit of sausage? The flavor starts out with a somewhat cold dark chocolate whisper, but then something green floats up out of the abyss. It tastes like a health drink pretending to be a shake or something. It doesn’t taste so much like an old beer as a beer that hasn’t quite settled yet, but it could still be that it’s older than it should be. And has been dragged around out of refrigeration more than necessary. I’m not enamored of the sprouting flowers flavor, that also starts to develop a little sourdough aftertaste, but it’s not the worst beer I’ve ever had. It’s not even the worst one I’ve had this month. But maybe I really should have had it in March.
It’s Beermad number ten, and more populated than the last time, from the very beginning. It wasn’t that much of a line, not like years ago, but last year I was the only one at the gate until practically opening time. There were about 20 people hanging out patiently this year, even as opening time came and went and the gate remained shut. They got us in pretty quickly once things were worked out inside, whatever it was that had to be done; people are pretty used to what is expected by now. It’s only 11(:15) and I’m already feeling thirsty, so I set off to get my first drink and take a look around.
There are quite a few new names this year, along with some old familiar friends, so I’m feeling hopeful. As usual, I want to start off strong with a nice stout/porter. Not far from the entrance I found Japi, beer from Cantabria, and a new one for me. Fortunately, they have a black beer, simply called Japi Negra, which I happily accept as my first of the day.
Kinda looks like an Ozzy Man more than a … Cantiman
It has a good look, dark brown, fluffy beige-ish head, and with kind of an oaty stout aroma. Maybe a little malt-heavy, but that’s not bad for a dark beer. It hits a little malty on the tongue, and gives a heavy first impression, but it really is pretty slick drinking. It takes a bit for some bitterness to make an appearance, but eventually it does, from the back of the tongue, interestingly. As a relatively light stout, it’s a good beginning for me. Other times I dive in a little too fast, but this feels…sensible.
I do not remember that motto for Leiner
Now it’s time for something different, and I noticed quite a few different things on the signs. As usual, lots of IPAs, but also some fruity sours with less common fruit. I toss some plans around in my head as I head for another new name, Tensina. There’s a Little Cherry Sour waiting for me.
Incredible color, Kool-Aid worthy, bubbly but not much head, and not much aroma either. It does have a little bit of a cherry yogurt smell, maybe due to the lactose that they told me was in there. Although it looks fizzy, it’s very smooth feeling, not a single tickle on the tongue. The sour cherry flavor is there, but it’s hardly overpowering. It has a very dry feel, in fact. It seems like Kool-Aid with less sugar than normal, and a little watered down too. Well, the color is right anyway. That’s not necessarily bad, we need to have some subtle things to tune our palates to once in a while, to keep us on our toes. I’ve been awfully spoiled with strong flavors as of late.
Is Iris the brewer? Got distracted, didn’t ask
Now we get back to my preference, the dark beers. I saw Pohjala’s Chocolate Porter listed alongside some Lervig and others, and had to go back for that. I think I’ve probably had it either at Taproom or from the bottle, but there’s no harm in trying a new serving style and new environment.
As expected, it looks splendid with it’s color and head. It smells a little coasty, but it is a Baltic porter, after all. A second whiff gives me a hint of licorice. Dark chocolate taste, crumbly, slightly savory, a real mouthful. Licorice is enhanced by the Sachertorte, which is quite dry. Again, it’s not a kick you in the face kind of beer, it’s very mild, but the flavors that are there come right out without shame. I start to pick up a little porter plumminess after a while, adding something sweet on top. The bottom of the Sachertorte has some fruity, jammy surprises awaiting, which end up adding some moisture, but overall it is the porter that is carrying the weight of softening things up here. Not a bad combination at all.
Finally, one more tongue cleaning sour. There’s some mystery about the exact fruit in it, it might be cranberry, but probably raspberry. This is DAI Sour.
Big bubbles, but little head, suggestive if light aroma. It’s fuzzier than the cherry, but with more woodiness and confidence. It does have the essence of a cranberry drink with something sparkling added. A cranberry virgin cocktail, I guess. I am a little whistful for the days of tongue wresting brews that fight all the way down, but Anne Bonny here is no doubt a thirst quencher. Not a flavor bomb in any way, but definitely palatable, and not as dry as Little Cherry. It’s very much a drink, not a sensation.
And with that, my Beermad concludes. See you next year…
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