The pickle beer shortages continue

I ran into another empty pickle beer shelf yesterday. This time it was at Willy Street Coop North and it was the Destihl's Dill Pickle Sour Beer that was apparently sold right out.

No More Oak Oppression: Bela by Destihl Brewery

This post marks the first Destihl review of a brew that isn't a part of their Wild Sour series. In fact, this may be the first bier of theirs that I've ever tasted that wasn't part of their Wild Sour series. It is possible that I have tasted something by them at the Great Taste, I suppose.

Bela is an imperial pilsner that comes in a half-litre bottle. I bought mine back in October, if memory serves, when it arrived on store shelves alongside a couple other of the brewery's offerings that were similarly bottled - Clarice Grand Cru and Tripel.

I forgot to mention that Bela is aged on oak spirals. Seeing this made me a bit apprehensive. While I like the flavors that oak aging imparts to beer, I do have my limits. Karben4's Oaktober Ale crossed those limits last year while Atom Smasher from Two Brothers was like having the barbarians at the gates. I suppose I was just worried that, since it was an imperial bier, everything would be amped up to eleven and that my tongue would suffer oak oppression.


Truth be known, I'm also a bit apprehensive about imperial pilsners. Excessive hoppiness aside, it's really the malt flavor that suffers when a brewer decides to embiggen the style. For me, a good pilsner will be dry and lack malt sweetness. The grains should come across as like crackers rather than bread or dough and be very crisp. Imperial pilsners, on the other hand, are usually rather sweet and taste more like an overly-hopped helles bock rather than a pils. Gone is the crispness and subtlety to be replaced by a honeyed, hoppy hammer blow.

Bela pours a lovely clear light yellow/straw color. My pilsner glass was put to good use here as it was topped with a large ecru crown that had an almost yellow tint. And there were lots of bubbles inside the bier movin' on up. A very pretty bier and a good example of glassware showcasing the visual aspects of a brew.

I was quite pleased that the oak on the nose was rather moderate. While it was the first thing I smelled, it did not overwhelm the other flavors which included a bit of cracker-like graininess and a fruity aroma which was like peach.

Destihl's website claims that Bela is 9.7% A.B.V. but my bottle said 10.2%. Considering this, I was impressed with the bier's medium body, lighter than I had expected. As with the aroma, the oak was unmistakable in the taste but it by no means hogged the spotlight. At 85 I.B.U.s a massive blast of spicy hoppiness was expected. It was like ODing on Saaz. Alas, there was no room for light, crackery flavors here and instead I tasted bread and a honey malt sweetness. The carbonation helped maintain a modicum of dryness and keep the malty sweetness from becoming cloying.

The malt flavors quickly faded on the finish leaving my tongue exposed to a very dry bitterness from the hops. Destihl notes that it uses "generous amounts of Czech Saaz hops" here. This is an understatement. Generally gradations of beer flavor intensity go from moderate to pronounced to assertive. The hops on the finish here were severe. Bela left behind a lot of Schaumhaftvermoegen and my glass was lined with webs of foam.

If you'll indulge some rules lawyering for a moment, Bela, to my taste, is not a pilsner. It's too sweet and lacks the crispness I expect from the style. Having said this, Bela is never cloying and it has a great, smooth mouthfeel. The alcohol is well-hidden with very minimal burn. And my arboreal fears proved unfounded as the oak was very mellow and complemented the malt perfectly. My only complaint is that the finish is too dry, too bitter. It didn't make Bela undrinkable by an stretch of the imagination but it did get me to take another sip rather quickly so that the luscious, smooth maltiness could assuage my tongue's distress.

Junk food pairing: With Bela being such a big beer, you'll need equally potent food to go with it. Start with processed cheese foods like dips made with Velveeta or its equivalent or sharp cheddar Easy Cheese on a hearty thick-cut potato chip or soft pretzel.

Every Sweet Has Its Sour: Here GOSE Nothin' by Destihl Brewery

The last time I drank a sour beer from Destihl, I felt like I was putting my mouth's life at risk. Counter Clockweisse had enough tartness to fell a horse. Since then I've been consuming comparatively tame beers and my tongue has been rather happy. But now the belle epoque is over and it's once more unto the breach, dear papillae.

Here GOSE Nothin' is another entry in the Wild Sour series from the downstate Illinois brewery. It's billed as a "Leipzig-style gose" with no frills, i.e. – no fruit, no exotic spices shat out by monkeys to be collected and processed by virgins, etc. This is a straight-up sour wheat beer with salt and coriander.

The beer pours a pretty golden hue. It was also, oddly enough, clear. Perhaps it was filtered. Or, more likely, I am simply ignorant on the matter of proteins in wheat beers. My glass was graced with a massive, firm white head and I was under the impression that a beer's head was related to proteins. Oh dear. I fear that I am out of my league on this matter. This beer was bubbly. I mean this stuff was effervescent in a champagne kind of way. In addition to the generous head, there were rather a lot of bubbles in the beer floating upwards and onwards.

Considering Destihl's reputation (in my mind) for deadly sour brews, I was surprised (and pleasantly so) that the first thing my nose caught was a green apple scent as opposed to a citrus one indicative of lactic bacteria. That came next in the form of a very lemony scent. All of these fruity smells made for a great nose that was fresh and piquant.

The taste was the reverse of the aroma. That lemon/citrus lacto tartness was immediate and prominent. Its astringency dominated the flavor although some green apple was in the background. As its appearance alluded to, Here Gose Nothin' is a very we'll-carbonated brew with all of those bubbles giving a nice bite. The style's signature ingredients, the coriander and salt, were both present but relegated to supporting roles. I could taste the coriander but it was a bit of spiciness tucked away in the back somewhere. Likewise, there was enough salt to hint at salinity but I had a hard time tasting its effect otherwise. As the beer warmed it took on a slightly funky sourness. Instead of being solely a lemon/citrus thing, a bit of that wet blanket seeped in.

As you'd expect from a gose, Here GOSE Nothin' has a light body. The lemon tartness lingered into the finish with the bite from the carbonation and the salinity moving up. Sadly, there was no Schaumhaftvermoegen left on my glass.

Here GOSE Nothin' is a very tart beer. Not lethally so but it certainly takes its sourness to heart. I really liked the bright, fresh citrus flavor provided by the lactic bacteria along with the slightly more muted green apple notes. Letting it warm slightly produces another layer of funky complexity with a moderate dose of barnyard. If hefty doses of brettanomyces aren't your thing but you're not above smaller ones, give this beer a go(se). I found the salt to be just about the right amount but wished there was more coriander. I like coriander and think it provides a nice counterpoint to all of the tartness.

Despite the spicy shortcoming, Here GOSE Nothin' is a bracing and refreshing detour from the heavier beers I've been drinking lately in anticipation of winter's arrival.

Junk food pairing: Pair your Here GOSE Nothin' with some chevda. I like the additional coriander it brings as well as the other wonderfully pungent spices.

The Curiously Sour Brew: Counter ClockWeisse by Destihl Brewery

Yet another Berliner Weisse. They just keep-a comin' and I can tell you there are still more in my basement. I am going to have to hurry because the time for light, fizzy, tart wheat beers is slowly coming to a close. In just a few days we're looking at lows in the 50's – that's 10-12°C, for you metric folks – which means it's almost time to switch to stouter brews in anticipation of the leaves turning and the onset of winter.

This time we have Counter ClockWeisse from Destihl, an installment in their Wild Sour series. Destihl hails from Bloomington, Illinois and I am fairly certain that I'd managed to avoid their beer until this summer when some of their cans caught my eye. This shouldn't be taken as discourtesy towards the brewery but rather it's the case that it has just flown under my radar. I suppose they don't have a reputation one way or another other that has really grabbed my attention. But now Destihl has it.

Counter ClockWeisse pours a moderate deep yellow and is surprisingly clear. Destihl took the appellation for the style, "Champagne of the North", to heart. My pour produced a big, pillowy white head that stuck around for a while. And there were bubbles galore going up the beer. A lovely brew, bright and sparkling – the complete opposite of the cloudy day I drank it.

As expected, a lemony tartness took pride of place on the nose with its attendant acidity. There was also some bread to be had and what I took to be saltiness. It was very odd to smell this last aroma. Not bad, by any means, but quite unexpected. Taking my first sip I was reminded of the first time I'd ever tasted a Berliner Weisse. This stuff was sour. Not just sour, but eye-closing, lip-puckering, sour. I thought that this is probably how a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster tastes. This was likely the most sour Berliner Weisse I've ever tasted. The tartness was a bit less lemony on the tongue than on the nose with the flavor being more generically citrus than a specific fruit. After a couple of sips the sour remained potent but my palate recovered a bit and was able to discern the fizziness and dryness from the carbonation as well as salinity and some grain.

Neck and neck with the salinity for the title of most curious flavor was a sweetness that was vaguely fruity but also a bit malty. This is a light-bodied beer and only 3% A.B.V. so the sweetness was surely a product of bacteria. Destihl says that it the beer undergoes "unique, spontaneous wild yeast and lactic fermentation". It was very peculiar. Tasty, but peculiar. This sweet flavor carried into the finish which also had some dryness from the carbonation plus a lingering citrus tartness. My glass was left with no Schaumhaftvermoegen.

Counter ClockWeisse has much that helps it stand out in the crowd. It's highly intense tartness, a curious salinity, and an unexpected sweetness all render it a unique entry in the world of the Berliner Weisse. I would also add the lack of hops in the finish. Normally a bit of spicy hop goodness can be had in the finish but I could discern none here. Overall I enjoyed Counter ClockWeisse. I really liked the sweet'n'salty thing against a backdrop of massive tartness. I do offer the caveat that this beer was basically my upper limit of sourness. With most Berliner Weisses I've had, you get an initial blast of sour that mellows as you drink to nicely tart. Here you get a sour flood of Biblical proportions which mellows to mere Three Mile Island overload.

Junk food pairing: Pair Counter ClockWeisse with cracklin. If you cannot get your hands on any, go for a big bag of pork rinds. Sit back and let the beer fight it out with the porky fat goodness on your tongue.