Last night it was Call of Cthulhu brought to you by Schlenkerla.
I shall be running The Mirror Collection at Gamehole Con and this was an initial run through. Overall, it went well, though I learned a couple things about plot progression for next time. And the rauchbier was excellent.
Seen yesterday, 25 June 2025:
Just in time for the summer solstice. Uff da! We're still 3 months out from Oktoberfest and horny deer running out in the middle of the road.
On the bright side, I tried this which I thought it was great.
I was quite surprised to run into this brew at my local bottle shop. The last time I was there I bought up their remaining stash of Dovetail's Rauchbier. On my way out, I stopped to ask the guy behind the counter what they'd be getting next from the venerable Chicago brewery and wouldn't it be nice if it was the Grodziskie. He replied that it would be a much less smoky brau, their Pils.
On a recent return visit I did indeed see the Pils in the cooler. But also this, Summer Hopfenlager, which is a hoppy lager for the lazy, hazy days of summer. While I might have run into mention of it at the Dovetail website, I had never seen it in the wild and so I grabbed a 4-pack. It wasn't until I got home that I actually read the label which noted traditional brewing methods - yay! - and modern hops - uff da! Oh boy. What was I getting into here?
The nouveau hops in the recipe were Vista and Strata. Strata rang a bell but Vista only registered bad memories of the much-maligned OS from Microsoft. While I knew that I'd have fruity flavors on my hands, I avoided researching them on the interwebs so as not to prejudice things or set any expectations. I wanted to drink this stuff and taste what I could taste instead of tasting what some hop dealer's webpage told me I should be tasting.
Beyond the hops, I wasn't sure what kind of brau we were looking at here. Was it their Old Country Helles given a New World hop makeover? Or perhaps it was more of a Landbier, some kind of bespoke lager brewed to accommodate a modern hopping regimen. Whatever it was to be, I expected a pale lager of some sort. And for my sins they gave me one.
Is it me or does the label have a Pet Sounds kind of thing going for it?
My tasting was done outside shortly after I had mowed the lawn which seemed wholly appropriate.
As the weather has gotten warmer, my beer choices have gotten heller.
It's been a long time since I've had Schell's. It seems like there are only a couple varieties on shelves here in Madison these days, unfortunately. But I'll take what I can get.
The folks at Weihenstephaner must decoct this stuff 3 or 4 times because it is Maillard Himmel. Simply delicious! I can only image how much more tasty it must be fresh from the Keller.
Has it really been nine and a half years since I've had a wood aged beer, Heart of Oak by Leine's? Bourbon barrel aged brews don't count as I think the idea is to infuse your beer with a spirit rather than a strictly arboreal flavor. While I'm on the subject, kudos to Lakefront for Wendy, a doppelbock which utilized bourbon-soaked oak chips that imparted a more subtle bourbon taste that complemented rather than overwhelmed the beer.
Plain, unspirited/unwined barrel/wood aged beers are hard to come by. Even more rare than Rauchbier. It's not exactly a mega popular flavor and dealing with wood must be a pain. You don't want any microbial thingies on your chips, staves, logs or whatever that would give your brew an off taste. Wood is a major flavor in wine so why isn't it in beer? And, as barrel aging goes, why is oak so popular?
When I saw this wood aged beer sans bourbon, a collaboration between Goldfinger and Revolution, I just had to try it. Goldfinger is a great brewery that combines care and tradition to make very tasty lagers. While Revolution dances with many an IPA, they brew other beers more to my taste. For example, not only did they throw my favorite grain, rye, into a stout, they also put some neat Repo Man artwork on the label.
The Oakriginal can doesn't say exactly how this beer got its oak flavor. Was it aged in oak barrels? Were oak chips involved? Did the brewmasters head to the woods with Husqvarna in hand, cut down a random oak, and throw some of the resulting cordwood into the fermenter? Now that I look closer, I see that Creative Oak is listed on the label and this California company's website notes the work of their master coopers.
The can does note, though, that "single forest French oak" was used. If horizontal lagering tanks weren't enough, this is definitely getting into hoity-toity wine territory. French oak apparently has more tannins than American oak which perhaps explains its use in winemaking. In addition to bitterness, oak has a clovey, vanillay, and, well, woody taste. How will these flavors fare in a Helles?
My pour produced a big, white head that I could hear. The bubbles churned away in a micromaelstrom like they do in soda, my cat's pleading meows for dinner were barely heard above the din. As with any Helles, the beer was a lovely yellow but had a slight haze which I presume was protein whatever you call it as Goldfinger's lagers have always been clear as day as is conventional. Maybe something is imparted by wood that gives a touch of cloudiness. There were a few bubbles here and there inside. My first sniff caught a luscious bready scent followed by wood, and then grassy hops.
My first sip revealed a medium-light body with the perfect fizz. Those Maillard reactions done good as I tasted that precious toasty bread flavor along with those grassy hops. A fine Helles indeed. Then I tasted the oak underneath it all. It was rather mellow but it added a smoothness that took the edge off the hops a shade, I think. Plus I like the flavor of oak so it had that going for it as well.
On the finish, the malt and oak flavors had one final flourish and then quickly faded as the hops, now with a herbal, almost minty, taste, made things fairly dry and slightly less bitter.
Goldfinger makes great beers so I was totally unsurprised that this was a mighty tasty Helles. The oak was subtle but easily discernible and its taste accented the grain flavor very well. Same with the hops. The oak gave flavors unlike the ones hops do yet they played nicely together. An excellent brew.
Junk food pairing: Pair Oakriginal Lager with Jays Hot Stuff potato chips. Their earthy flavors complement the oak while the Helles with soothe the burn.
I am trying to recall how I heard about Bräu Buddies. Either I read about it in Lakefront's newsletter or I stumbled upon it on one of my periodic strolls through their website checking on what the year-round pale lager is these days. East Side Dark and Riverwest Stein have stood the test of time, I suppose, while the pale lager spot seems to change every year or 2. (Probably less frequently, truth be told.) Klisch Pilsner, a Czech-style pilsner, which was, I believe, one of the brewery's first brews, went the way of the dodo. I think it was replaced by Lakefront Pils, a German-style pilsner. From there it gets murky.
Did Bierzeit, a wonderful Kölsch that seemed to be in the Lakefront line-up all-too briefly, come next? What a shame. I felt a bit spoiled for choice for a little while there between it and Kid Kölsch.
Did Lakefront Lager come next? A "Premium Lager", I avoided it because I associate those words with Miller/Bud clone type brews. The pale lager annual spot is now taken by Dive Beer which appears to be another Miller/Bud type American lager. Oof.
Looking at the list of beers no longer made at the Lakefront site, I feel sad that Cherry Lager and Holiday Spice are long gone. Wisconsinite was tasty; why did it have to die? Boo!
Oh well.
So somehow I stumbled upon the existence of Bräu Buddies, a collaboration between Lakefront and Hofbräu München. Described as a "rustic, German-style lager" and having been brewed with Melanoidin malts, I just had to try it. And so I snagged a six-pack.
Similar to my procrastination in taking notes for that hibiscus kombucha, I went through at least a six-pack before I ever busted out a pad of paper and pen. I was just too busy slaking my thirst. But eventually I did take some notes and took a photo or two.
The brew was light yellow to gold, depending on which part of the glass I was looking at. Clear as day and topped by a white head that lasted an average amount of time, I spied a few bubbles inside. It looked mighty purdy. A Helles? A Landbier? I dunno but I do know that the aroma was marvelous with a luscious breadiness no doubt from that Melanoidin malt while the hops gave a grassy scent.
Taking a sip, I was entranced the beer's medium-light body which held untold depths of toasty-bready-biscuity malt goodness. Not particularly sweet, the Maillard-inflected flavor was joined by grassy/herbal tasting hops. Not too strong but a bit more than enough to balance the malts. There are Saphir hops in here but I never caught anything fruity. Maybe something a little something floral in the aroma but I never tasted the tangerine that websites assure me are part of the Saphir flavor arsenal.
The breadiness lingered on the finish a bit while the hops, having taken on a more spicy note, gently faded in to add moderate bitterness and slightly less dryness.
This, this should be Lakefront's year-round pale lager. With its high melanoidin payload, Bräu Buddies hits the spot with a rich malt taste that I couldn't get enough of which explains why I've purchased multiple six-packs of it. I am feeling spoiled for choice again as this beer is a fine complement to New Glarus' Two Women, another rustic/country pale lager full of mouthwatering Maillard temptation.
Alas, I suspect Bräu Buddies' days are numbered and it will be consigned to the Lakefront Beer Graveyard before summer. What a bummer.
Junk food pairing: Bräu Buddies' label features a pretzel and this is a fine idea to accompany a can of the stuff. I suggest a bag of Rold Gold Selects Flamin’ Hot® Honey Mustard twists.
I recently sampled this brew:
Funkytown is a black-owned brewery in Chicago and this beer appears to be available only in Chicagoland.
The can notes that it was brewed with steam beer yeast along with a combo of Motueka and Tettnang hops. Motueka is a variety from New Zealand and they gave a citrus flavor to the brew that was lemon-lime, to my taste.
I thought it was good. The fruity flavors weren't overpowering and the result was a very refreshing brew on a hot spring day.
Since I'd never heard of Funkytown, I checked out their website. I was happy to see some nods to the brewery's hometown in beer names - Summertime Chi and Gym Shoe Weather. How about Dibs Doppelbock for a late winter seasonal? Bungalow Brown Ale?
...aged beer.
This is tasty stuff. It's nice to see a helles(?) given a twist that doesn't involve fruity-tasting hops.
The imperial pilsner is having a micro-moment, it seems.
New Glarus recently released one and now Lake Louie has their own take.
A bit less potent than New Glarus', a rich, biscuity malt foundation sounds tasty.
Upon hearing that New Glarus was to release an imperial pilsner, my mind immediately said, "I've had one of those before!" and I recalled thinking that the ostensible pils was really just a helles bock given an "imperial" moniker for marketing cachet. Wasn't it from 3 Floyds? Then I recalled that Point had brewed one for their Whole Hog series but I never reviewed it. Going back through my blog, I realized it was, in fact, an imperial helles from Southern Tier that seemed to me better described as a helles bock.
I also discovered that Lakefront brewed an imperial pilsner as the 9th entry in their My Turn series, Pilo. Furthermore, Chicago's 5 Rabbit Cervecería brewed one as well called Super Pils. (R.I.P. 5 Rabbit.)
New Glarus' brewmaster, Dan Carey, discussed the beer on the latest episode of New Glarus Brewing Podcast W/Dan Carey which I listened to with great interest and, by the time it came for me to sample one, I had forgotten everything he said about it except that it wasn't a big version of their regular strength pilsner, Pilsner. The label doesn't say what variety pilsener this is an imperial take on, though. It does say, however, that there are German and Czech malts in the recipe along with a trio of German hops: Diamant, Hersbrucker, and Spalt.
While I still feel that imperial pilsners are just helles bocks trying to get above their raisin', I chose this brew over New Glarus' other new beer, Tailwagger, as it is spring, the season for pale bocks.
Imperial Pilsner is of a slightly darker yellow than your typical German pils yet not quite the golden color of a helles bock. There was a smattering of bubbles inside that floated up to the big head of pure white foam. The aroma was very pilsnery with cracker, bread, and hay/grass to be had.
My first sip had a medium dose of fizz to it and revealed a medium-heavy body, the first real sign of the imperial here. That variety of grains in the recipe yielded a rich bready flavor (after decoction) [Mmm...decoction...] along with some honeyed malt sweetness. My tongue was pleased to also taste a bit more than enough grassy-herbal hops to balance out the big malty taste. The bready sweetness lingered on the finish for a bit until the hops, having taken on a spicier flavor, really dried things out and gave a firm dose of bitterness.
My sampling began with Imperial Pilsner right out of the refrigerator. At the nice cold temperature, sweetness was moderated and this stuff went down easily, not unlike a regular pils. As the liquid warmed, the honeyed sweetness became stronger and the beer became more bock-like. I scrambled to down the stuff before it became cloying and soon enough I had an empty glass before me as my head buzzed. I also found that I was a bit peckish.
I suppose that it was the extra hops that gave this brew a pilsner quality to distinguish it from a run of the mill helles doppelbock and I really appreciated the extra bitterness they gave to the cause to counter all that malt and the very dry finish. And that bready malt flavor was simply savory and delicious.
Imperial Pilsner is a fine spring beer but go easy on it and/or share your can with a friend or loved one.
Junk food pairing: Pair your Imperial Pilsner with a bag of Herr's Carolina Reaper Cheese Curls. Actually, with this beer's potency, get multiple bags. They have a rich cheesy taste and the chili dust adds a firm, though not deadly, heat to complement the hearty hops.
The other day I had a conversation with a friend of mine about bread. We discussed the art and science of making it and both of us admitted to lacking the requisite abilities to make a good loaf of the Staff of Life. At one point I opined that rye bread is the tastiest and my friend agreed. Knowing that I had fellow ryeophile was heartening.
My love of the grain borders on the monomaniacal though I am developing a love for buckwheat. Regardless, I seek out rye bread and Gardetto's rye chips, was near ecstatic upon discovering that Origin Breads here in Madison offers a Sourdough Rye Dark Chocolate Brownie, and still lament years after the fact that Nabisco discontinued their rye Triscuits and that Snyder's did the same with their Pumpernickel & Onion pretzels. Plus I buy any beer with rye that isn't an IPA.
My M.O. was on full display back in January at the Binny's in Schaumburg - this was the stop where I found that Viking beer from Old Irving Brewing - when I spied Pipeworks' rye lager. What luck! A couple months previously at a Binny's I had found Phase Three's Rye Lager and then I find another. Gambrinus was truly smiling down upon me.
With two varieties of Rauchbier, a Helles, and that Pastrami on Rye beer with both rye and smoked malts, the venerable Chicago brewery was already a favorite but a rye lager put Pipeworks into my even gooder graces. They understand that beer is, metaphysically speaking, about fermenting sugars culled from grains and not about hops that taste like tropical fruits.
I had my first Capital Maibock of the season over the weekend and it was tasty. As best as I can recall, this was the first microbrew I ever tasted ergo it will always have a special place in my liver and I endeavor to have some every spring.
It's a shame that the Steve's Liquor out on Junction Road is on the far west side instead of the more fashionable east side where I live. This is because that store is a reliable source of the elixir that is rauchbier. They always have Schlenkerla's Helles available, if nothing else, and are happy to stock rauchbiers from whomever may distribute them to Madison and not just Schlenkerla. Last year I recall going in and finding they had a rather nice selection of Schlenkerla's smoky brews.
On a more recent stop, I found some of Dovetail's Rauchbier which only has to make the trip from Chicago and not across the ocean from Bamberg. (Though I didn't see the Fastenbier on my this visit. But, it's not too late as it's still Lent.) I tasted it several years ago when I took a trek out to Ravenswood and stopped in at the brewery. Sadly, I had never seen it on a Madison shelf until now and had somehow always missed it on my various stops at Binny's.
It has been the Mr. Snuffleupagus of brews. The Dovetail website declares it's Rauchbier season and the Binny's website says, "Oh yeah, we've got some." Yet it's nowhere to be seen when I am wandering the aisles. It's as if another rauchhead always buys that last 4-pack just before I walk in the door so I just miss it by mere seconds.
And thusly I was thrilled to see it here in Madison.
My recollection of having drunk it several years back does not extend beyond "Ooh! This stuff is amber and tasty." so there was this sense of tasting it for the first time all over again.
The big tan head of loose foam that topped my pour lasted a goodly amount of time so you are able to see it in my photograph. The beer was clear and had a deep amber hue. Lots of bubbles were to be seen inside. Oh mama, did I smell the smoke! Others seem to describe every rauchbier they encounter as smelling and tasting like bacon. Yet no one seems to describe smoked beef brisket as smelling or tasting like bacon. Who among us thinks smoked cheddar has any bacon-like qualities? Does anyone add smoked paprika to their food thinking it will add the aroma and flavor of bacon?
It's just this beer piety that most people accept and generally ends further attempts to really dig into what the malt is laying down for your palate.
Here the smokiness is distinctly unbaconlike and more akin to smoked Swiss cheese. There was also plum in the aroma as well as a herbal hoppiness.
This stuff had a really nice fizziness and a big dose of rauch caressed my tongue into a smoky bliss. I also tasted a bit of caramel, though this was not a particularly sweet brew, some mild stone fruit, and a bit of bread. Oh, and those herbal hops added a nice bit of balance.
The smokiness lingered on the finish a bit before a wave of hops came in to provide what I thought was a moderate bitterness and slightly more dryness. This is not a particularly hoppy beer but there was enough to balance all those malt flavors and I liked how they came in and washed the smoke away.
Sehr schön! The smoky taste was the star of the show here with a clean, sharp flavor not dulled by sweetness. My hypothesis is that sweetness makes for a heavier taste that mimics fat in some way and gives rise to comparisons to bacon. Without the sweetness, the smoke flavor is cleaner and more woody and leans towards the fuliginous.
And thus ends my hypothesizing for today.
But, in truth, I loved all the malty flavors, especially that bit of bread. I wouldn't have minded a little more hoppiness but, as it is, they offered balance and a nice herbal-spicy flavor. The bitterness was nice on the finish too. Just a great mix of flavors.
Junk food pairing: Bleu cheese is the perfect pairing for your Rauchbier and I recommend grabbing a bag of Buffalo Blue Cheese Combos. The spicy heat complements the hops while the creamy, earthy taste of the cheese brings out new, albeit subtle, dimensions to the smoke.
Years ago my annual trek to Chicago TARDIS down in lovely Lombard, Illinois meant a visit at Binny's where I'd eagerly snatch up some Hoss, a rye Märzeny kind of brew from Denver's Great Divide. At some point, that beer, quite unsurprisingly, stopped gracing Binny's shelves in the fall when I was there. This made me sad because this autumnal pilgrimage had become a tradition and Hoss was (is?) a great beer. Oh well. All good things and whatnot. As time wore on, I became inured to being rye lager-less as the winter solstice approached.
Until this year.
Chicagoland has many a brewery which can make perusing the local beer shelves at Binny's something of a chore because a lot of breweries means a lot of IPAs. As in a number that feels like it approaches infinity. There's a mesmerizing quality to scanning the shelves as the letters fly by...I-P-A. Soon every beer looks to be an IPA. And so it was last month. Until I ran across Phase Three's Rye Lager. Could it really be? The IPAs beneath and above and to either side beckoned me.
"Come taste of our faux tropical fruit..."
I felt like Captain Picard in that Star Trek: The Next Generation episode where he's being tortured.
"There are four-packs of rye lager!" I roared back in defiance of the Citra siren calls.
Shaking off my hypnotic haze, I found that indeed there were four-packs of rye lager staring back at me from the shelf. I already had two Rauchbiers, a Dovetail flavor I'd never had, plus multiple brews from abroad. Did I really need more beer?
Yes!
Phase Three is a brewery in Lake Zurich, Illinois, a northwestern suburb of Chicago. I have no doubt seen their brews before but don't recall ever having tasted any of them. Without meaning to sound overly cynical, I admit to tempering my expectations. There were a lot of Phase Three IPAs on the shelf too so could they pull off a decent lager?
Luck was on my side and I managed to capture one of my pours where there is some head. My glass was happy to have a lot of the light tan foam and, thankfully, it stuck around a while. The brew was a lovely clear amber and I saw a fair number of bubbles inside. No haze; a good start. My luck continued as I took a whiff and smelled grains: a bit of bread, at first, and then some earthy rye. A berry-like fruitiness followed as did some herbal hoppiness.
A medium-light body held a firm fizziness. My initial sips were malt madness with bready and doughy flavors complemented by that earthy-spicy rye goodness. The hops stayed below the fray but I could taste their herbal tentacles weaving themselves between and among all those malt flavors. The rye and a touch of malty sweetness lingered on the finish but eventually ceded to the hops which took on a deliciously spicy aspect. Fizz and hops united for a mellow dryness accompanied by a gentle bitter bite .
What a wonderful surprise. I had my doubts about what appeared to be another IPA factory dipping its toes into the lager waters but Phase Three meant business. For me, this was an easy drinker despite being 6.6% A.B.V. and I had a hard time sitting there with a rye lager in front of me and not pouring it down my maw. The rye flavor was great and benefited from the beer not being particularly sweet. Plus the hops complemented the malt flavors perfectly and I appreciated how they orchestrated a refreshingly zesty finish.
I hope Phase Three brews this again next year so that rye lager returns as an autumn tradition.
Junk food pairing: Pair P3's Rye Lager with a big bag of Mike's Hot Honey potato chips from Utz. (Utz's Mike's Hot Honey potato chips?) The mild sweetness from the honey and potatoes will complement the rye perfectly. These chips don't burn like the fires of Hell but that little bit of heat goes well with the hops and really accentuates their peppery taste on the finish.
Rauchbier? Let me tell you about Rauchbier.
Christmas came early at Binny's last month as I walked out into the chilly Downers Grove air with not one but two Rauchbiers. (And a rye lager. And a couple intriguing Polish brews.) I felt what I imagine a new father feels like after his first child is born - all giddy and elated. But, instead of the pride of having sired offspring, I felt the satisfaction that I would be able to enjoy the autumn nights with a luscious, smoky companion.
Sadly, the first Rauchbier that I tasted from my stash was a disappointment - just too much fizz. So I looked to Pipeworks to rectify the situation. Their Oaked Smoked Helles Lager had proven to be excellent and I felt that the (presumably) beech wood version would be as well.
It's funny to me how my perception of Pipeworks has changed over the years. When I first became aware of them I sought out their fruited Berliner Weisses. And then they seemed to go all unicorn IPA on me. I was once at a party with a bunch of brewers from a local brewery - the grunt type of brewer, not the brewmasters who get all the glory - who were a fair bit younger than me. Pipeworks came up and they all bent over backwards to praise, if not worship, their unicorn IPAs. It was as if the hops used in their beers were unique to the brewery and no other had the Precious. I couldn't help but think "What the hell is wrong with kids these days?"
But now Pipeworks has this Pastrami on Rye beer that is infused with rye goodness and seasoned with spices not normally found in beer. It's like a gruit and a Jewish deli made the beast with two backs and had a delectably toothsome child. Then this fall I discovered that they have not one but two different Rauchbiers, each brewed with a malt that was smoked with different variety of wood. Pipeworks deserves tons of credit for escaping the gimmick trap that holds many a craft brewery tied to a routine of brewing barely distinguishable IPAs. I no longer think of unicorns when I think of Pipeworks which is a testament to their willingness to brew with ingredients I prefer over fruity hops and their ability to make quality beers.
A medium-light body was adorned with a firm, but not overwhelming, fizziness.
Whew!
I mean, was there ever any doubt?
Upon my first sip, waves of ambrosial smokiness caressed my tongue. They weren't tsunamis nor were they mild spilling waves. They hit that nice Goldilocks mid-point. (Though, truth be told, I wouldn't have minded if it had been even smokier.) A bit of bread joined the fray along with grassy hops. On the finish, all the malty goodness slowly faded - smoke tends to leave my palette more slowly than sweetness - letting the hops come to the fore with a more spicy flavor. This, along with the fizz, made for a moderate dryness with slightly less bitterness.
Pipeworks really came through here. Although less bready/Maillardy than Schlenkerla's Helles, this and its oaken sister are excellent Rauchbiers. Luscious smoke and the fizz/hop combo provide balance and a nice, dry finish. Fine brews indeed.
Junk food pairing: As with the oaked smoked stuff, this smoked Helles pairs well with potato chips, especially the All Dressed or Cheese & Onion varieties.
I met some folks down at Wisconsin Brewing Company (or is that Lake Louie?) yesterday and was looking forward to trying out a couple newish beers. First was Move Ukraine, a pilsner made with sunflower seeds and some of my purchase would be donated to the titular charity to help Ukrainians rebuild homes destroyed during the war. The other was Dock Haus Gold, a Vienna lager.
Unfortunately, neither was available. Their Untappd page is woefully out of date.
Instead, I tried their Oktoberfest which, I am happy to say, seemed less sweet than in years past. I also saw a new beer or one that was new to me, at any rate: Monk's 47 Amber.
After viewing the description, it wasn't immediately apparent to me what differentiated this from their Badger Club amber lager or the late Dock Haus Gold. Cuz you know I'm all about Vienna and red and amber lagers these days.
Although rather generic and unspecific, it was not a bad description. Monk's 47 is not a super rich malt bomb, but certainly wasn't watery. It did have a pleasing malt flavor and just enough hops for balance. Went down easy.
As I noted in my review of Lazy Monk's coffee dark lager, I was up in Eau Claire recently. Despite being quite a bit farther north than usual, it was still hotter than a June bride in a featherbed. I limited my outdoor activities to the morning and night to avoid the temperatures that were in the 90s.
"But," I reasoned, "a lot of neat things happen indoors. Babies are born indoors at hospitals and people make babies while on comfy beds in places like hotel rooms. Movies are shown in big, air-conditioned rooms. Another thing is beer. It is commonly brewed inside."
Our hotel was out by Oakwood Mall and I think I saw tumbleweeds blowing around the parking lot. That place is dead! But just a short drive west was K Point Brewing. Having been gifted a 4-pack of their tasty Rauchbier earlier this year, I decided to head over there and check out the place. Not only would there be beer on offer, but another tasty beverage as well, coffee.
K Point is what I'd guess you'd call a nanobrewery and it's a block off Highway 93 on Eau Claire's south side. It was rather odd to see how much stuff has sprung up along 93 between the interstate and Hamilton Avenue over the years since I lived in the area. The brewery is in a joint called The Coffee Grounds and, upon pulling into their parking lot, I saw no mention of K Point.
Walking in, I saw a café to the left, a seating area and beer coolers back and to the right, and a middle that looked like what I envision a Williams Sonoma store to look like: filled with kitchenware, local jams, and artisanal foods like craft baking mixes that you can mix in one of the fancy mixing bowls and bake in one of the moderately expensive loaf pans on offer.
I eventually made my way to the coolers and found the beer. There was a variety of brands on offer besides K Point (including, oddly enough, Madison's Working Draft Beer) but I stuck with the house brews. I noticed that there were 4-packs missing a can or 2 and was pleased to discover that people weren't stuffing the odd can into their pocket or purse but rather the K Point folks are happy to have you mix and match their beers as you like. Want a sampler pack of 4 different beers? Go for it.
K Point doesn't have a tasting room, per se. There was a sign saying that, if you need a brew to quench your thirst, just flag down someone and they'll pour it for you. This low profile reminded me of some comments by brewmaster Tom Breneman that he made in an email to me regarding his approach to brewing. It dawned on me that K Point is a labor of love, not an attempt to set the craft beer world on fire. They're not out to cater to trends and be the next The Brewing Projekt but rather to brew beers Tom and whomever else has a say in the matter likes and to be content with a small audience.
This is an ethos I can get behind and I did. I got a mix pack with some of their Red Lager as well as some Vienna Lager.
I kinda sorta know a teensy bit about what a Vienna lager should look, smell, and taste like but a red lager? Not sure about that one. Wisconsin loves amber lagers so I wondered if, perhaps, it was simply a different name for the same kind of beer as Capital's Wisconsin Amber, Lakefront's Riverwest Stein, or Lake Louie's Badger Club. Or maybe it was some kind of Irish thing. I tend to think of Irish ales as also being called red ales so why not an Irish lager being a red lager?
In the end, I just assumed this stuff would be like the amber lagers that are found from the Lake Superior shore to the Illinois border. You know, amber-ish in color, medium-bodied, lots of caramel aroma and flavor, moderate hops, and fairly sweet, malty taste.
I started with the Vienna lager. Because...because...well, the style is more appealing, I guess.
It was amber, clear, and poured with a nice head. Plus there were some bubbles inside. After I had poured myself a glass and was furiously writing down notes on how it looked, I noticed that I could smell the beer even though it was a foot away from my nose and I was smelling caramel. I like those scents at a distance. It builds anticipation, makes it seem like you've got a real fresh beer on your hands. When I put my nose to it, there was also bread and grass to be had.
A nice fizz greeted my tongue along with a greatly desired but somewhat unexpected Maillardy bread taste. That caramel was present but was tempered and not particularly sweet. I found it medium-bodied but it leaned towards the lighter end of the scale, probably because of the good fizz as well as the relative paucity of malt sweetness.
Just a bit of that caramel lingered on the finish before a lovely, firm dose of hop bitterness washed over my tongue. This made for some really nice spiciness and a rather dry finish.
The red lager looked a lot like its Vienna counterpart, although it was decidedly darker. Like a deep, ruby-laced amber. And, since rubies are red, it seems that "red lager" was an appropriate moniker. A big, frothy head was tan whereas the Vienna's was lighter, more like barely off-white. The aroma was similar too with caramel and grass coming through.
My first sip revealed a good fizz adding a bit of zip in a smooth, medium-bodied beer that did not lean towards the lighter side. The caramel sweetness was much more pronounced here and accompanied by faint stone fruit and a weird astringency. It was a bit like drinking a stronger Belgian ale, though the can said 5.7% A.B.V.
On the finish, the caramel sweetness lingered before some muscular peppery hops kicked in offering a nice dryness to contrast with the caramel and a goodly amount of bitterness.
The Red Lager was definitely along the lines of the American amber lager as I had hypothesized. It would have been fine except for that astringency. It really tasted like it had twice the alcohol in it than was claimed on the can.
And so the Vienna Lager was the clear winner here. In my correspondence with K Point's brewer Tom Breneman, he said that was into more traditional styles - "if you know what a dunkel or Vienna lager is supposed to taste like, that's what I'm shooting for," he remarked.
I think he hit the nail on the head here. Simply as a lager, he did a really nice job considering that he brews just a few barrels at a time and surely has a fairly basic brewhouse. (Or maybe not.) Both of these beers had the expected clarity and tasted "clean", i.e. - none of the fruity yeast flavors. But he coaxed some great toasty bread flavors out of the malt for the Vienna lager and kept the sweetness minimal for just a wonderful brew. I also enjoyed the hop levels in each beer. They balanced the malt flavors very well and made for a brisk, refreshing finish.
Junk food pairing: Pair your K Point amber/red lagers with some tortilla chips and a fine salsa from Eau Claire's Chip Magnet. The Wildly Delicious variety has a bit of heat but won't prevent your tongue from appreciating the fine beer.
If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where this beer was born, and what my lousy drive to the store was like, and how the brewers and Stalzy's came up with this beer, and all that Chris Drosner kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.
Stalzy's Deli & Bakery is about a mile from my house as the crow flies. They cure their own meats, ferment their own cabbage, and bake their own bread. It's one of the great comfort food joints of Madison for me, especially since Ella's closed, as their menu with corned beef sandwiches and matzo ball soup brings back warm childhood memories of restaurants in Chicago. Stalzy's has never advertised itself as a Jewish deli but they certainly make overtures to it with the aforementioned matzo ball soup, challah bread, and lox.
But instead of knish, kreplach, or kugel, we get the ubiquitous Wisconsin fish fry. Ooh! I do believe they make their own Russian dressing too. Good stuff and essential when you bring home some of their corned beef or pastrami to make your reubens at home.
Delta Beer Lab is a bit further afield. It reminds me of Stalzy's in that it doesn't seem to be a hip and trendy place. More stalwarty. There's no cachet in being seen eating a corned beef sandwich. Similarly, Delta is ensconced on the south side of Madison and the far side of the Beltline, a long way from all of those thirsty Epic employees on the isthmus. I've never heard anything bad about them but I've also never heard of their beers really making a big splash.
A friend brought some of their coffee brown ale on a camping trip a few years back and it was wonderful to sip it next to the fire. I've reviewed a couple of their brews here and give them a lot of credit for making an unfruited gose. They're no phonies, just not downtown trend makers either.
So these two joints got together somehow and someone came up with the brilliant idea of making a rye lager. I miss heading to Chicago in the fall and grabbing some Hoss from Great Divide, a rye Oktoberfest. Perhaps it's available again but I haven't seen it in years. I love rye and I love lagers. I love how they tend to emphasize the grain tastes instead of the Hawaiian Punch ones likes IPAs do these days.
I bought a 4-pack of Make Rye Not War on the same trip as the one I bought Donna's Pickle Beer which brought me perilously close to being able to mix up my own Pastrami on Rye beer that Pipeworks does. Or did.
My pour of Stalzy's Rye produced a nice head of off-white, loose foam. It lasted only a little while. The beer was clear and of a deep copper/amber color. There was a smattering of bubbles inside. Taking a whiff, I smelled the titular grain along with a faint bit of caramel. Also faint was a stone fruit smell. There was something like black pepper in there too.
My tongue was greeted by a very nice fizziness, comfortably nested midway between the extreme effervescence of a Berliner Weisse and the meek carbonation of an English Mild. The body was medium-lightish and had a distinct bready taste, which I would have been disappointed to not find considering this is a "collaboration" with a bakery. I put collaboration in quotation marks because I simply disbelieve the notion that anyone from Stalzy's did anything more on brewday beyond drink beer and watch the brewer ply his or her trade. The taste was rounded out with a prominent rye spiciness, a touch of that caramel, and black pepper.
On the finish, my tongue was left with a lingering rye taste that was joined by black pepper notes as the hops came in to clear the palate of grain flavors and make way for an ending of medium dryness and bitterness.
I'll admit going in that I was a bit anxious about this beer because I don't know that I've ever had a lager from Delta Beer Lab. Breweries that do 99% ales and then turn around and do a lager usually make something rather bad. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know pilsners are trendy but they take more skill than just hopping the living fuck out them.
But Make Rye Not War turned out to be absolutely fantastic. The rye flavor was given pride of place and I simply loved loved loved! the sharp spicy grain taste. And the beer wasn't very sweet. A bit of caramel, yes, but more like bread. I just wanted to bust out in a Saint John's dance, I was so happy. The grainy goodness was complemented perfectly by that black pepper taste. It's a flavor that's present in one of my favorite brews, Eliot Ness from Great Lakes Brewing. I have always wondered how that flavor is brought about and just assume it's the hops and the way they're cooked. Perhaps you can get hops with a Noble taste to go from something herbal towards black pepper by putting it in the brew kettle at a specific time or some such thing.
Unlike more recent rye brews I've tried (see here and here), there doesn't appear to be any caraway in Make Rye Not War which I don't mind as I am an unseeded rye kind of guy. Sadly, I highly suspect this is a one-off and it'll never be brewed again. A real shame as it's a great brew. I'd kill (figuratively) for a smoked version of this. Throw in a little smoked malt and I think you'd have something very close to the Platonic ideal of beer.
Junk food pairing: I say keep the deli theme going with your Make Rye Not War by pairing it with a bag of dill pickle potato chips.
What is the next smallest prefix after pico? That may be an accurate description of the trend that is pickle beers.
I tried one from Noon Whistle last autumn, which I rather liked, and have seen one from Destihl on shelves here in Madison, although I now see 2 versions on their webpage - the regular and the spicy. What is it with Illinois breweries and pickle beers? If I recall correctly, there were a few at the Great Taste of the Midwest last year but I didn't sample any such brews. I merely recall hearing tell of them on that den of iniquity that is Twitter.
On a recent venture out to Brennan's in search of new/fresh beer from Jack's Abby and anything by Dovetail that is not brewed year-round, I stumbled across Donna's Pickle Beer. (As near as I can tell, Jack's Abby has left the state and Dovetail only delivers non-annuals to select joints around town.) I believe that it is now easier to find a pickle beer in this town than it is a smoked beer. Surely this is one of the seven seals and it is now broken.
Donna's Pickle Beer is brewed by Pilot Project Brewing, a brewery that, I presume, provides space for others to come on in and brew. It apparently originated in Chicago but now also has an incubator in Milwaukee. Donna's is the brainchild of Scott Baird and Joshua Jancewicz and is named after Jancewicz's mother. Donna the beer is made with the "original brine recipe" of Donna the woman.
While there is definitely a high gimmickry factor at play here, Donna's stands out because it's an American lager and not a sour ale like the other pickle beers I've seen and tasted. In addition, dill pickles don't taste like tropical fruit so it gets points from me for that.
Why yes, I did garnish my pickle beer with a pickle. But I also did some tasting without a spear of flavor intensity. I wish I'd had slices so I could have perched them atop the rim. And, now that I think about it, I should have put a toothpick through the spear and rested it so that some of the pickle was visible above the head. Well, I guess I didn't want to block the garden gnome's face too much.
My pour produced a lovely, loose head of white foam that went away quickly. Reminded me of soda. The beer of pickle was exactly what you'd expect from an "American lager" which I now take to mean a Bud/Miller/Coors clone-like thingy: clear, yellow, and fizzy. You know what it smells like when you put your nose above a jar of pickles and take a sniff? This stuff smelled like that. I don't think that having the pickle spear in there changed the aroma very much. It made it bolder but not really different qualitatively.
The beer had a light body and - quelle surprise! - tasted like pickle brine. Enough saltiness to enhance the flavor but not enough to make it salty like a Dead Sea(TM) Gose. I couldn't discern the grain but I suspect it made the beer a bit fuller tasting than it would have been otherwise. I also couldn't taste anything really tangy. They didn't try to compensate for the vinegar's absence and left something just savory. The finish too was pickle briny. Maybe a trace of the Noble hops that the ad copy says are in there but just a trace of something spicy.
As with the aroma, having a pickle in the beer seemed merely to enhance what was already there and not change the flavor to something different. The unadulterated version of this stuff was light with a moderate dill pickle brine taste. It wasn't faint but it also wasn't like drinking out of a pickle jar either. Adding a spear just make it more briney, more pungent.
I thoroughly enjoyed Donna's Pickle Beer. Being mostly of German and Slavic stock, I am all over dill pickles. Without garnish, this beer is light and refreshing with enough pickle taste to let you know that it's there but not so much that you think you've been involved in an accident at the Vlasic factory.
Junk food pairing: Grab a six-pack of Donna's Pickle Beer and then a bag of Old Dutch Spicy Dill Pickle potato chips to drown in dilly gluttony.
