Tag Archives: lager

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Seven Ales Only Lagers Will Understand! NUMBER THREE IS SO TRUE

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If you have ever tried to figure out some ales, THEY SEEM IMPOSSIBLE, it’s like what really is the DEAL?  Fortunately some lagers will totally understand.  Today we have compiled a super nostalgic list of ales that only true lagers will understand:

1) Hill Farmstead/Blaugies – Le Sarrasin

https://dontdrinkbeer.com/2014/06/06/hillfarmstead-an-incredible-blaugies-job-by-way-of-vermont-sarrasin-slays/

WHO HASNT BEEN THERE

At first blush, you might not really GET what this ale is all about. Unless you are a monocelled bottom fermenting culture, you probably won’t be able to wrap your head around this ale.

2) 2007 Drie Fonteinen Hommage

https://dontdrinkbeer.com/2012/04/26/drie-fonteinen-hommage-paying-hommage-to-all-my-broken-bottles-lost-in-shipment-rip/

EVERY TIME

Many people will give up because they cant wrap their heads around this one.  That’s largely due to the fact that they are humans and not a cultural strain of Saccharomyces pastorianus. It’s hard to hold it against someone for not being a lager yeast, you wouldn’t understand.

3) Dark Horse Bourbon Barrel Plead the Fifth

https://dontdrinkbeer.com/2012/04/08/dark-horse-brewing-company-bourbon-barrel-plead-the-5th-i-choose-not-to-exercise-that-right-in-light-of-tasting-this-beer/

I STILL DONT GET IT

Most people will look at this ale and see a stout made with an ale strain then aged in bourbon barrels: they couldn’t be more wrong.  If you are a lager you will see this ale for what it truly is, simply by virtue of being isolated and described in 1904 by the Danish mycologist Emil Christian Hansen. Everyone else just wont understand.

4) Logsdon Peche N Brett

https://dontdrinkbeer.com/2013/01/14/logsdon-farmhouse-ales-peche-n-brett-get-ready-to-get-your-peaches-gripped/

I STILL DONT UNDERSTAND BUT ITS NOT MY FAULT

Sure you might be like “this isn’t a lager” and you would be right, but that doesn’t mean you come within a country mile of seeing this beer the way a true lager would.  You can rattle off some facts but you wont get it unless you spend your life as a diploid organism. Fake “non-allotetraploid”:haters need not apply.

5) 1996 Alexander Rodenbach

https://dontdrinkbeer.com/2013/08/24/1996-rodenbach-alexander-keeping-teenagers-in-the-cellar-and-exploiting-them-years-later/

I CAME CLOSE TO GETTING THIS BUT NOPE IM NOT A LAGER

Listen. I am a human being. I dont have four copies of my genome, I cant be expected to know anything about this beer from 19 years ago. I tried my hardest but I just can’t lager, like not even that much at all.

6) Troegs Splinter Gold

https://dontdrinkbeer.com/2013/08/20/troegs-splinter-gold-nugget-nectar-aged-on-real-gold-psyche-just-a-rare-wild-ale/

I GAVE UP TRYING TO UNDERSTAND THIS ONE BC NOT A LAGER

If you are close to being a lager, you might be like oh Splinter Gold is Scratch #3-2007 with a slow rest in oak wine barrels dosed with brettanomyces. During a two-year aging period the horsey flavors of the brett combined with the Westmalle yeast used during primary fermentation. AND YOU WOULD BE TOTALLY WRONG.  A real lager will understand this ale with a depth and complexity that human faculties can only imagine, separating the time-oak aging space continuum.  Despite years of research by Jack’s Abby, we still know more about the ocean floor than we do about the true nature of the lager.

7) De Struise Five Squared

https://dontdrinkbeer.com/2012/08/21/de-struise-five-squared-130-euro-bottle-25-abv-gucci-mane/

I DONT KNOW WHAT I CANT EVEN LAGER

I tried, I really did but I think it’s pretty clear I am no lager.  I can’t be expected to fully get this beer.

WHOA TALK ABOUT A SERIOUS LAGER BLAST! We can only hope to use our limited faculties to really try to grasp the foregoing ales.

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DOUBLE FERMENTATION @sapporobeer Reserve, Ultra Whaley Japanese Lagers

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Odds are, if you have ever gotten shithoused while sake bombing in undergrad, there’s a one in three chance that you have encountered one of the three Japanese brewing Megazords: Kirin Ichiban, Asahi, or Sapporo. If I had my choice between the three, Sapporo is usually my go to, despite the gentle and almost diaphanous nature of the three competing styles.

But what do you want, some syrupy old ale or intensely juniper ipa masking that expensive ass Uni you just paid for, you gentrified asshole? But today we have the walezbro Sapporo Reserve, Kotaku culture on full swole.
sometimes I get fully turnt and cant control those fstop values, why do I even bother with nice things

sometimes I get fully turnt and cant control those fstop values, why do I even bother with nice things

Sapporo Reserve, Japan
Euro Pale Lager meets Japanese Lager, 5.2% abv
Commercial tug job:

“Sapporo Reserve is a super premium lager brewed almost twice as long as other competing brands. Reserve is brewed with only finest European barley, and the most select European hops.”
 
A: this pours looking more honey hued and amber than the pale yellow of regular Sapporo, it also has a slight degree of more cling and lacing, well above the call of duty for something a stupid investment banker will spill all over while saying some microaggressions at a sushi bar. As a corollary, their steel can branding is iconic and I love drilling those from the can, the heft like some nimble cutlass in my drunken shuffle boarding Palm. I have no idea what “brewed twice as long” means. It spends a needlessly long time in the primary? They don’t dry hop this so it sits in the secondary uselessly? Who the fuck knows, my external hard drive full of Hentai/tentacle porn offers no answers.
OH SHIT GUIZE: Shiraseru Am: a smartphone-integrated wearable pet behavior and health monitoring device

OH SHIT GUIZE: Shiraseru Am: a smartphone-integrated wearable pet behavior and health monitoring device

The smell is tame and gives a “blast” of Saaz and maybe Sterling Golden. The rice and cloying saltine aspects from normal Japanese lagers is absent here and this comes across more Germanic in execution, like a pale marzen in a way. It won’t change your life but it gives a degree of actual complexity beyond “I am a beer, order extra yellowtail Travis always takes it all.”
The taste is again very European and has a lightly grassy aspect and fades into a bisquik biscuit with a touch of honey sweetness. It is dismissive in its presence, like a neglected girlfriend it allows you to attend other affairs and, as a result, it endlessly pairable. The silent grace has a clean mouthfeel, without lingering dryness or hoppy residuals. “No no palate, you go out with your friends, I’ll stay home and catch up on STITCHERS on ABC Family.”
NO WAY GUIEZ: Chogokin Miracle Henkei Hatsune Miku Rody: the most unusual, awesome tie-up toy of the year!

NO WAY GUIEZ: Chogokin Miracle Henkei Hatsune Miku Rody: the most unusual, awesome tie-up toy of the year!

The chief virtue behind a beer that goes with the flow is placing it in dynamic situations. Pair this shit with Thai or Barbeque, tapas or duck confit. It won’t protest or really compliment the flavor profiles, but it is so malleable that you can shape it and bend it like Floam. I’ll give you a second to go and Google “floam.”
The funniest part about the dipshits who review this beer on BA or dumbass badge hunters who lambast this is the fact that many “craft” offerings are far shittier. Like the adolescent palate defining itself by rebelling against large companies, many entry level tickers rip on the Sapporo lineup unjustly to validate their own weak ass collection of Rogue beers.
Japanese women who are hella into katana swords get me harder than adamantium

Japanese women who are hella into katana swords get me harder than adamantium

It is summer, bring a few of these big ass steel cans to a cookout and see if your normal/non-basement dwelling friends don’t 1) drink the shit out of them and 2) not think you are a Megan’s Law weirdo for once.
It is 85 degrees out, don’t be the foreskin baller who shows up to a bbq with Adam from the Wood: no one gives a fuck except you. Keep that nerdy shit to yourself and drill some Japanese lager like a real God damn american.
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Kona Longboard Island Lager, Hitting the Salty Curl and Getting so Pitted, No Barrels Brah.

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It is hot out, your mouth wants a lager. Admit it. I don’t mean Kuhnhenn Raspberry Eisbock or something crazy, I mean a regular old pale lager. Admit it. In today’s review, we see how it stays light out later in the summer. We learn how the other side drinks with an American Pale Lager. We learn to stand in someone else’s flipflops.

I had this in Maui, appropriately enough. This picture is probably from somewhere in Fresno.

Longboard island lager
Kona Brewing Co.
Hawaii, United States
American Pale Lager | 4.60% ABV

A very light pale gold color with a thin yellow pallor, open any mainstream lager, and well, there you go. What else do you want me to say? When was the last time you poured a pale lager into a glass and had to go retrieve your socks, having them knocked clean off? That’s what I though, Reality Czech, but that doesn’t count. Not a bad looking beer, but a solid type of girl who shops at Forever 21 and begins sentences with “not even gonna lie-” that sort of pedestrian shallowness is what we are dealing with here.

Whenever I hate on pale lagers, the mouthbreathers get all up in arms and defend session beers. Raters gonna rate.

S almost nothing a slight lemon and a hint of bread, water is the overriding note. What does water smell like? Like the salty pipe when you are carving so hard on the barrel getting so pitted. Water smells like a Point Break marathon. It also smells like Trumer Pils, Rolling Rock, Beck’s, those all smell like water+x.

T the taste is very fleeting and imparts a light honey and apple character overall it is water and thin croissant notes. I would make up something flambuoyant or clever but there simply is nothing here but a mild initial taste with a crisp finish. It’s like biting into a malty piece of celery. It is super refreshing and I can see models and size 0 women enjoying this beer judiciously, watching it turn warm in their palms since it serves as a perfect prop so as to say “look, I am slumming it and not drinking a cosmo because the setting dictates such.” It is refreshing and you can drink, well you really would HAVE to drink several, for the desired effects.

Not everything that happens on the beach is a good idea.

M there is almost nothing to comment on, it is exceptionally thin with no coating. The bubbles cascade the limited flavors up and about but, like most Drama club kids, it just doesn’t bring a lot to the table. I would say a Gose would remind me of a longboard, but the limited sweet notes would probably be pretty enjoyable on a hot day. You know what else reminds me of longboards? Long Beach, and no one wants to be reminded of that foul den of iniquity and Sublime fans.

D this is great for manual labor or pushing nerds into trashcans. I can see its refreshing character as having some utility, but the fact is that there are more delicious ways to attain refreshment. Witnessing a high school sophmore deliver a book report on Island of the Blue Dolphins is refreshing, but hardly rewarding. Such is the case with this beer.

SKERLER WE NEED MORE FLAVERS. WE ARE IN DANGER.

Narrative: Tatum’s parents got divorced at age 8, they said it wasn’t his fault. He never got those Streetsharks action figures that he always wanted, he knew it wasn’t his fault. He got placed as a second string nose guard when he was a Senior on the football team, he convinced himself it wasn’t his fault. Somehow, this lackluster individual carried on day by day. He worked diligently at Blockbuster Video, until Netflix arrived and, that really wasn’t his fault either. Ultimately, Ohio’s economy had too many Tatum’s, too many Skylers, too many Aidens, Braydens, Jaydens, Haydens, Maydens, Raidens; but I digress. His strength was his utter lack of individuality. These days, when you get your auto insurance claim handled just appropriately enough, that was the sweet work of Tatum. Update: his job will soon be outsourced.

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The Bruery Humulus Lager, More Clouds Than an E40 Picnic

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Humulus Cumulus Lupulus Dupulus.

A: This beer has a nice cloudy yellow with inviting murkiness to it. It looks like a filthy lemonade with great carbonation. The lacing is minimal but the head is like a clou- no, I will not go there, it’s painfully apparent.

S: The nose is plentiful with lemons and zest with sweet biscuit and citrus hops. There’s a bit of grapefruit that feels like a single IPA, but it doesn’t override. It has more of a crispness to the smell.

Too many of these and some awkward iSituations could go down.

T: The taste is super refreshing with a mellow hop character that rounds out the sweet cornbread notes. It almost reminds me of a mellowed out Gumballhead with more of an acidic character. I feel that this is superior for Gumballhead, for the sheer complexity and balance that it attains.

M The mouthfeel is middle of the road but incredibly refreshing with a great hop resonance that serves as a gateway drug to any person with an IPA aversion. I know the Bruery said that they would never brew an IPA, but this is pretty close, by all accounts.

Solid beer, no mystery here.

D: This is incredibly drinkable because it creates this revolving door wherein you drink it, love the refreshing nature and the hops dry the palate at the end. The result is a moebius strip of refreshment that is ultimately rewarding. The drink ability is huge just hug, right up there with Alpine Hoppy Birthday and Live Oak Hefeweizen. The big league D squad, if you will, although you probably wont.

Narrative: The Celtis bush looked longingly across the yard to the supple humulus fields blooming with careless abandon. What was so different between the two pedigrees really? Was not the Celtis bush blessed with hearty, chloro- efficiency? The children frolicked and hid amongst the verdant leaves of the fragrant humulus bush, but not the old cantankerous hackberry. Everything was going fine until stupid old Pliny made a distinction between the two. It was all downhill for the loveable hackberry at that point. I guess being violently toxic didn’t help. “Oh, here comes a child, he. . .oh he’s counting, PERHAPS THE HACKBERRY SHALL NOW BECOME THE BASE FOR THESE TAG EXPLOITS!” Not within 4 minutes did little Jerry begin to wheeze and scratch himself violently. Two branches were ripped off and made into makeshift guns, later into circus whips for the children’s imaginary animal menagerie. “GOD DAMN YOU HUMULUS BUSH!” The neighboring female humulus bush smiled coyly and self replicated in front of the poor Celtis, no need for any pesky seeds or male intervention here. Stick vinuous tears soaked the fertile ground, poor Hackberry would live to see another day as a critical ingredient in Propecia. Then the joke will be on Humulus indeed. Two sides of the same floral coin.