Stella Lager

Stella Lager
Al Ahram Beverages Company (Heineken)

0,33l

4,5%

My friend Ramses managed to bring me this exotic baby from Egypt. From what I understand he had to do secret handshakes in back alleys to procure something alcoholic in that country. Ramses: Thank you!

It's also gonna be my last entry this terrible year... I can only hope that 2017 will be better. Whether this brew is a matching beer for the end of the year remains to be seen. 

Ratebeer gives this an overall score of 3.... which is possibly the lowest I have seen in a while. But hey... I drink almost everything for you, dear readers!

So this beautiful can is golden and blue and depicts a white-blue star on blue background. 

To match the festivity of new years eve I chose my stylish tasting glass. 

It pours with at first not much carbonation but then evolves to forming a nice head. It is of golden color and seems not fully filtered as it is not totally crystal clear.

The aroma is surprisingly floral and fruity with hints of raspberry and peppery spices... nice aroma so far. Let's see whether the taste holds what the aroma promises.

After a nice floral start, it turns into a surprisingly mellow but spicy yet pretty bland experience taste wise. The alcohol is recognizable in the aftertaste which is something I am not too fond of. Now there are some promises with this brew but in the end the attempt to appeal to the mass is -like so often- its downfall.

Still something I'd drink in a pub... which is something I wouldn't say about just every brew.

Thanks Ramses!

Prost!

DMW

P.S.: HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Golden Monk

Golden Monk
AleBrowar
Brewed at Browar Gościszewo

0,5l
7,2%

So this beauty has been given to me as a present by my friend Marek Starosta whom I met at my first Larp and who proved a grand help! Thank you Marek!

Now the description of the brew is all in Polish and sadly my Polish isn't especially grand. I stole the following description from Ratebeer:

COMMERCIAL DESCRIPTION
Although it’s not proper for a monk to admit – the power of magic numbers does work on me. That’s why, together with my brothers, we made an double effort with our 10th beer. We brew it with care and we made a strong, aromatic saison IPA…
Ingredients:

 malt – pale ale, wheat, Abbey, melanoidin, Acidulated; 

hop– Citra, Palisade, Willamette, Centennial; 

yeast Safbrew T-58; 

Candy Sugar Dark; 

water;

Ratebeer seems to like it and I am sure so will I. It does have 7,2% and I have a meeting later on about WoD Berlin but hey... I'm a big boy, right.. I mean... RIGHT?

Now I am not sure whether this description means that there is dark candy sugar added... something I would not be a big fan of, or if it simply means that the color of the brew is of dark candy...

Judging from the homepage I fear it means there is sugar added. I will be surprised to see how sugar goes along with an IPA.

Marek chose this because of my love for IPA and because I played a monk at the larp.... technically a friar but close!

I really love it when my friends bring me beers to write about! 

The bottle looks nice and has a fancy label, depicting a monk... or friar ;), holding a golden St. Andrew's cross. It is called a Saison IPA and the back holds a list of the ingredients... I ehm think as it is in Polish. 

The site calls for it to be drunk from a tulip so I cleaned my old Radeberger tulip... it wasn't used in a while.

Awwww the cap shows a ripped off hand with thumbs up.. so cute! Even the lil bone can be seen!

It pours without any foam and even with all kinds of tricks, I couldn't manage to get any head to develop. 

The color is darkish... a brown yellow - like cola mixed with orange juice. It isn't filtered.

The aroma is VERY nice. Floral tones with yeasty goodness intertwined, Fresh hay with soft nutmeg spice tones and a hint of pepper and candy.

Now let's see what the monk can offer...

It starts surprisingly sour, mixes with nice grapefruit and soft yeast notes and ends crisp with a very pleasant dark hoppish aftertaste (the one all IPAs should have).

I can see now why they added sugar to take the edge of the sour tones, alas the sourness still is the predominant factor. The alcohol content can't be tasted which is a huge plus.

All in all this really surprised me. I ended expecting something overly sweet but got something grapefruity sour-bitter.

The mix of the tart notes with the hoppish bitterness is something I can't recall to ever have tasted in this way and that is something that truly makes this brew special. I could go with a bit higher carbonation and maybe some foam but hey, that's the German in me. 

I wonder what this would have been like without the sugar....

THANK YOU Marek!

Prost!

DMW