Tag: pale ale

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Food GPS Teaser – 10 Great California Pale Ales

The “10 Great California brewed” series continues tomorrow over on Food GPS, with pale ales the topic of conversation.

Today’s tease though is that I want to run a different list by you good readers.  5 Underappreciated Craft Beers from California.

I would start with Scrimshaw Pilsner from North Coast – You see it everywhere but it gets no beer geek love.  Then follow it with Craftsman Poppyfields a British style pale that is chewy and malty but geeks either talk (and deservedly so) about 1903 or Triple White Sage.  Third up would be Anchor Liberty Ale.  A really pleasant beer that never fails to make a good impression.  Next would be Bear Republic Racer 5.  Everyone seems to try all the different variants but not the original.  Lastly, Kellerweis from Sierra Nevada is a great Hefeweizen and should get more cred.

What beers do you think people should be talking about more?

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Enter the Hop House

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I am starting to really enjoy the Belgian IPA style.  And yes, I know, this new Ommegang offering is a pale but I like the interplay of the Belgian funk and the bitterness of the hops.  It eases the throttle on both flavors.

I am torn about the new label design though.  It does look fresher and more of a brand than before but the graphics are muted to me.  Maybe it is the colors that are not to my liking.

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Not Enhanced

Recently, I went over to Beer Guy LA headquarters.  Jeff had received the two flavors of OnTap Beer “Enhancers” and he had a ‘fridge full of the surprisingly high 5.9% abv Natural Ice (Coors Light, Bud Light, PBR and King Cobra Malt Liquor also joined the fray later) to use as a flavorless beer to “enhance”.

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The dispensing of the liquid “enhancer” was not easy.  You either got too little or way too much.  It probably didn’t matter since either option tasted as foul as it smelled.  The American Ale (I’m guessing amber-ish in style) smelled like soy sauce at first and then mostly Nestle Quik.  It certainly did change the color to amber but that may have been due to my excessive second squirt of the malodorous stuff.  But the foam was left with a weird brown color on it.  I certainly could not barista a pretty design like leaves with this stuff.  The pale ale was less “stain” looking but, to me, somehow smelled worse.  Like a cross of skittles and sour patch kids. And the dispersion of the bright orange stuff through a clear beer was like watching an IV drip at work.

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The American tasted better because it was like adding chocolate to a beer which is something that my brain could reconcile.  And since the Natty Ice was a decent base in comparison to the corn accented and practically water colored Coors and Bud Light, it was something you could grimace your way through.  The Pale (with a dog on the label that suspiciously looked like the Lagunitas Dogtown Pale ale version) though was just bad from start to finish.  If it was supposed to convey hops, it failed and failed badly.  It was candy flavored and the sugar was overpowering.  I tried a couple of different beers with it and none could cut through that high fructose corn syrup.

Braver souls than I attempted to drink a combination of both of the “enhancers”.  The painful grimaces on their faces and the subsequent drain pours told the story of that experiment.  Thank God that actual craft beer was also on hand, otherwise my tastebuds would have been very angry with me.

After on the left - before on the right
After on the left – before on the right

 
With Dave Willis and Craig Berry also on hand, the dismantling of this “enhancer” was too easy.  What we all kept coming back to was, how could this have escaped the lab as an actual sellable product?  How could the creators have possibly been satisfied with what they had? At best, enhancing a crappy product is not the way to go.  No one adds Hook’s Cheddar to a McDonald’s Big Mac. To strain the analogy, OnTap is not even government cheese.

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Beer Enhancer?

This “product” floated around the internet back in June but I wanted to make sure my specific audience saw it and shunned it like the plague.

OnTap Beer proposes to add good beer “syrup” to a bad beer to make it better.

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Now back in the day, Bert Grant from Grant’s Brewery (sadly, no longer with us) would carry hop drops for lack of a better term to bitter up his beers.  He would use an eye dropper, I guess, to improve the IBU quotient in his glass.

But he went on to brew beer. Groundbreaking beer.  Beer that I still remember fondly.  This “Beer Enhancer” probably won’t save you money when you factor in shipping and you still have to PURCHASE a bad beer to fix.

Just buy good beer.  Much easier and tastier.

 

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Review – Saint Archer Pale ale

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Here is my thumbnail review of my first ever beer from San Diego’s Saint Archer, their pale ale…..

“Pours a light orange. Has almost a Nelson Sauvin aroma and taste. Some herbal dankness as well. Almost a white wine set of notes. Bitterness is medium. A bit sharp. I am a bit conflicted on how to rate this.”

Here is the description from the brewery, “Balanced toward the hoppy end of the spectrum, this straight-foward, California-style pale is eminently sessionable. Crystal and Munich malts provide a backbone to showcase the bright, citrus, piney notes of Cascade, Chinook, and Simcoe hops.”

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DC Brewery # 3 – Port City

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Our final District of Columbia stop is at Port City which is based in nearby Alexandria, Virginia but was voted best local brewery by the City Paper of DC.

They also reached the 2nd year milestone earlier this month and these are the beers that I would like to put into my ‘fridge and then into a pint glass….

First would be the Tartan Scottish Ale
“Our Tartan Ale is crafted by Head Brewer Jonathan Reeves. It has a deep, copper-color and is produced in the 80-shilling style. It offers a slightly fruity flavor that complements the luscious malty roast caramel flavor and faint hop aroma.”

Followed by…
“Tidings Ale is a strong Belgian style blond ale is brewed with local Maryland wildflower honey and Virginia wheat. These special ingredients store away the flavor and essence of summer, and later warm us during the cold winter months. It is gently spiced with coriander, cardamom, fresh ginger and grains of paradise.”

and then I would finish with their flagship
“Essential Pale Ale is a deep golden color with hop aroma reminiscent of fresh fruit. The pleasing bitter taste from American hops is balanced with English and German malts, and offers a complex full flavored character that is smooth and refreshing.”

Or maybe I would go the other way around.

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New Albion via Boston


This is great news. I was happy to see that Sierra Nevada honored Jack McAuliff in one of their 30th Anniversary brews and now Jim Koch is doing so as well. This will really help the new generation (myself included) who never got the chance to try New Albion back in the day.

“Jack McAuliffe, a pioneer in craft brewing and founder of The New Albion Brewing Company, and Jim Koch, brewer and founder of Samuel Adams announced today their plans to brew McAuliff’s original New Albion Ale for the first time in 30 years. Recognized by beer experts as the original American craft beer, this American pale ale will be brewed true to its original recipe using the original yeast, which has been carefully preserved at the University of California since 1977.

Koch and McAuliffe both share an enormous passion for craft beer and are seen as pioneers in the American Craft Beer Revolution. McAuliffe, a Navy veteran, acquired a taste for flavorful beer while stationed in Scotland in the 1960s. Shortly thereafter he developed a passion for homebrewing and eventually started the nation’s first craft brewery, The New Albion Brewing Company in 1976. Although the brewery closed its doors in 1982 due to a weak economy and a lack of financing options, McAuliffe’s vision for New Albion Ale was ahead of his time, helping pave the way for other American craft breweries, and its impact is still felt today.

“Jack was brewing craft beer when nothing was easy. Nobody made small scale brewing equipment, nobody wanted to invest, retailers and distributors didn’t want your beer, drinkers couldn’t understand why the beer didn’t taste ‘normal.’ It was so different from today,” says Samuel Adams founder and brewer Jim Koch. “New Albion is a true legacy. Jack’s passion for craft beer has had a widespread influence, and has shaped the craft beer landscape. What Jack started 30 years ago inspired brewers to explore brewing full-flavored craft beers. His New Albion Ale was the original craft brew. We wanted to work with Jack to brew his recipe for the first time in almost thirty years and recognize him for his contribution to brewing.”

Samuel Adams is brewing the original recipe for McAuliffe’s flagship beer, New Albion Ale. McAuliffe traveled to Boston in early July to join Koch and the Samuel Adams brewers as they brewed the first batch. New Albion Ale is a deep, golden beer brewed with American Cascade hops and a 2-row malt blend. The Cascade hops, sourced from the Pacific Northwest, create a moderate hop bitterness and lingering notes of citrus and floral, balanced by the upfront cereal character and sweet finish from the malt.

“Jim and I share a common passion for craft brewing, so I was honored when he approached me about bringing the New Albion original recipe back to life,” says Jack McAuliffe brewer and founder of the original New Albion Brewing Company. “I can’t believe I’m brewing New Albion for a new generation of craft beer drinkers – a group that has more great beer choices than I ever had! New Albion will have a place in the growing and diverse craft beer landscape thanks to a fellow craft brewer.”

When McAuliffe decided to turn his passion for homebrewing into a microbrewery, it was one of the first of its kind. At its height, New Albion Brewing Company brewed about 450 barrels annually. Microbreweries struggled under a market dominated by mass domestic beer but paved the way for growth in the 1990s. The number of craft breweries has gone from 8 in 1980, to 537 in 1994, to close to 2000 in 2012.

Jim Koch and Jack McAuliffe share the same pioneering spirit, and like McAuliffe, Koch was convinced that he could find his niche in an uncharted beer market. Koch followed his German-American family tradition and became a brewer, creating the first batch of Samuel Adams Boston Lager® in his kitchen in 1984 from a family recipe. He insisted then, as he does now, that only the world’s finest ingredients will make the best beer, and that quality and flavor are the only standards worth pursuing. Jim wanted a beer brewed with American craftsmanship and pride.

New Albion Ale will be brewed, bottled and sold by The Boston Beer Company. All profits will go directly to Jack McAuliffe. The beer will be served at special events during the 2012 Great American Beer Festival (October 13), in Denver, CO and available nationwide beginning in January of 2013. New Albion Ale will be available in six-packs with a suggested retail price of $7.99.”

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DDH 4 Ways


Thursday, June 28, 2012 from 5:00pm until 9:00pm at El Segundo Brewing, Carnitas and DDH (Double Dry Hopped) Pale

El Segundo will be pouring 3 dry-hopped versions of Pale ale, alongside the base beer next Thursday.

Single-hop double dry-hops include:
-Citra
-Simcoe
-Nelson

Beach Mex Carnitas Tacos will be in the house and you can get the Dinner of Champions Package for $10. A flight of all four pales and (2) Carnitas Tacos

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Session # 64


The June Session (#64) comes to us from the Beer Babe and without further ado….
“What is the one beer style usually makes up the first position in the sample flight, but yet is usually the one that we never get really excited about? The Pale Ale.

While this style serves as the foundation to its big-hoppy-brother the India Pale Ale, lately “Pale Ale” has become a throwaway term. I hear bartenders and servers using it to describe everything from Pilsners to unfiltered wheat beers (I wish I was kidding).

Whether American (typically a bit hoppier) or English (a little more malty), these brews can be complex, interesting and tasty, and are all too often fast-forwarded through in a tasting or left as the “eh, guess I’ll have a pale ale” decision.

Your mission – if you choose to accept it – it so seek out and taste two different pale ales. Tell us what makes them special, what makes them forgettable, what makes them the same or what makes them different. Then, share it with us.”

Delving into the world of pale ale actually brought up more questions than answers as I drank, researched, wrote and then drank some more.

For this session, I started with Ballast Point and their (as I sip between keystrokes) pale ale. Which, to me, tastes more in the region helles / kolsch than pale ale. (1) It is quite grain forward and even it’s light orange to yellow color hints that the name on the label may be a misnomer.

QUESTION # 1
How can a brewery make an IPA like Sculpin and have a pale ale be nearly hop less?

Back in 2010, when I first had this pale (2), I rated it a 3 out of 5 on Ratebeer which is about where I would put it again in 2012 as long as I was rating it based on it’s kolschy-ness. Looking at the past review made me dig deeper into my recorded history with pales. I started into the stats of the matter and found that pales were my 4th most rated beer style. But that it was laughably behind the # 1. IPA. And wasn’t even close to DIPA’s and Imperial IPAs either. And it was barely holding off the hard chargin # 5 style, saison.

QUESTION # 2
Why is it so easy to find bombers of stouts and IPA’s and not pale ales?

So I finished off my Ballast Point and headed to the standard bearer of the style. The one with the familiar green label. Sierra Nevada. And the mild citrusy bitterness that I seem to always return to every 3 or 4 months. In my Ratebeer review (3), I said “…pale before pale had to be uber hoppy. Nice balance here. …. Flavor is simple. A great anytime beer.”

Drinking it again, I have to agree with my younger self. The beer hints at bitterness, subtley nods towards the citrus and is a near perfect bronze color. I would still pick this over Torpedo and Hoptimum any day of the week.

QUESTION # 3
Why do IPA’s get killer names like Hopportunity Knocks or Hoptimus Prime and pale ales either go unnamed or have much more staid monikers like Dales?

Lastly, I want to talk about a local brewer. El Segundo Brewing (4). Their 1st year anniversary batch was a DIPA but their bread and butter are pales. And they do a damn fine job with them whether they be Summit based, Citra or even with sage. Heck (5) one of their IPA’s is a wheat version which is hoppy, for sure, but I would consider it more a pale than an IPA.

Question # 4
Shouldn’t pale ales be part of a breweries regular line-up instead of an IPA?

In the end, the pale like other styles that are not in the “cool” clique at the moment can range from A to Z and deserves more than a cursory glance.

(1) Checking in Ratebeer, I find that it is not even labeled as a pale but rather a kolsch.
(2) Back when it was called Yellowtail
(3) Again in 2010, I must have drunk a lot of beer that year.
(4) Literally across the street from the now partially owned by Gene Simmons Rock and Brews. A great L.A. craft beer hang out.
(5) Must stop cursing.