Day 12: Hammer Pilsner

A rearing horse with a wild mane, a bold, brutish name...I was waiting to get smacked between the eyes. More of a love tap. If it's a hammer, it's inflatable.

Not that it was all that bad. Decent pil that was a bit spoiled by a metallic tang. I liked the carbonation, which was light but persistent.

I'm starting to realize why they sell boring beer in giant amounts. You have to drink a lot of it to start enjoying yourself. 1 Bud? Blah. 2 Buds? Meh. 3 Buds? It's growing on me. 4 Buds? What is that music, it sounds awesome. 8 Buds? I'm awesome!

You get the idea.

But I'm really not much of a fan of going past a mild buzz, so that's not my scene. I'd much rather have one or two high quality, high flavour drinks - even if I have to pay more for each one. It's cheaper than mass consumption, more fun (at least for me) and produces far less in the way of consequences.

This beer did not turn me off, but my crank sure didn't get turned. Nudged a little, maybe. 2 steins.

 

Day 11: Ottakringer  Wiener Original

Right off the bat, anything this colour called a "wiener" beer? Caution. Not sure I want to drink the wiener beer. Maybe this advent calendar has been lulling me into a sense of complacency just so it can punk me by getting me to down the brown wiener water.

But it frothed up so nicely. Not a thick head, but relatively tall. And there was character. Some genuine maltiness and a little more hop than the calendar has recently provided.  A little caramel and vanilla, slightly, almost imperceptibly floral.

Of note: my experience with "interesting" beers is that I almost always start out too cold and end up enjoying them more as they warm up. Not so with the Ottakringer. Keep this wiener cold. As it warms up, the weiner starts to develop a funny after taste. Maybe that has to do with being in an aluminum can for a while. But that makes sense. Wieners should not be in cans. Wieners should be free. Cold and free. Four steins.

Day 10: Konigsbacher Spezial Export

Hey, that's the way it was spelled on the can.

You know what? This is a lager. Clean, clear and light-tasting. No surprising flavours, but a surprising aspect that definitely added to the experience.

The carbonation was light, but it didn't stop. I mean it, the bubbles just kept going. I slowed way down just to see if they would last and they absolutely did. What this did was keep just a thin but fresh head on this beer, sip after sip. It was a pleasant surprise each time. Perhaps it made a canned beer seem just a little more fresh, a little more draught-like.

I don't know if this was a fluke or if this was what the "z" in "spezial" was referring to, but I enjoyed this beer and definitely wished I had more. 4 steins!

 

Day 9: Gerstel Hefeweizen

The good: There's a buxom serving girl on the can and she's holding six steins full of beer :)

The bad: This is yet another hefeweizen

The ugly: Completely indistinguishable from the hefeweizen from day 8. Seriously, I just should have reviewed them together. I guess the suggestive (though crudely drawn or rendered) can made me feel like this one deserved a post of its own.

So I don't want to trash this beer too much. It was okay. I won't describe it since you can just read the previous review. I do want to go after the folks who put this calendar together. Why the hell even put two hefeweizens in a row, let alone two hefeweizens that could, like identical twins, take tests for each other with the teacher none the wiser?

Not exactly an isolated incident, either. While there were differences, beers 3 through 6 were awfully similar (and nothing spectacular) as well. Makes me feel as though they're just dressing up the same doll with different clothes.

In order not to punish this brew specifically, I award two steins. But the calendar as a whole is teetering on the brink of zero steins, as in I don't think I'm very excited about ever purchasing another one of these again.

I like variety. I dislike conformity. I celebrate diversity. Jesus Christ! If I wanted something bland that didn't stray too far from a stilted median, I could have stayed in the Mormon church!

 

Day 8: Eibauer Hefeweizen Hell

Hefeweizen, of course, means a wheat ale. "Hell" would be the equivalent of "light". Not so sure about that second part.

Cloudy and yeasty like any hef, I'd say this was actually very middle of the road as far as colour and robustness, at least for a wheat ale.

Tasted slightly floral with a hint of cloves. Add the yeast component and it was a little like a mildly spicy loaf of bread. Not bad, but not especially inspiring for someone who isn't really inclined towards hefeweizens.

It was interesting, at least. I found myself taking a long time to drink it as I sipped and tried in vain to place some flavour components that were teasing my palate.

Glad I tried it, probably won't go out of my way to repeat the experience, unless I can get some to have with some sort of spiced, baked desert. I have a feeling there's a pairing out there somewhere that is ideal for this stuff. Two steins.

 

Day 7: Germania Premium Strong

Finally.

Poured thick and golden, not much head or carbonation, little to no hop aroma, hints of vanilla and something woody. 7.9% ABV.

Rich tasting, with toffee and vanilla notes. Lingering aftertaste that amplified those flavours. I want to say the woodiness was an oak taste. That might be true or it might be that because this beer reminds me of an Innis & Gunn without the smokiness, I'm looking for the same oak notes.

Good stuff. I've mentioned before that I like Innis & Gunn. I suspect that if I could get this Germania brew in a bottle or on tap somewhere I might like it even better.

I took the top half of this down fairly quickly, then decided to savour it in the hot tub. The time it took me to get out there allowed the beer to warm a bit, and that was a good thing. I decided to go all the way with a warming experiment and actually submerged most of the glass in the warm water to heat things up a few degrees. Wow. Should have done that right off the start. If I had another can of this, I wouldn't even refrigerate it. The flavours both intensified and blended, and the finish smoothed even further.

Excellent beer. Abundantly flavourful though there was nothing exotic about said flavour. 8 steins!

       

Day 6: Fohrenburger Unser Bier

There's a unicorn on the can. +1 This is the first beer I've ever had from Austria. +1more. It actually tastes like it has something going on. + another 1

I found a website that claims this is a special anniversary beer made special by the "best" raw ingredients and glacial water. I suspect that there's a little bit more of a complex hop profile going on than in the last few beers I've reviewed, and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that this beer was close to officially qualifying as a pilsener.

It poured slightly cloudy, but that cleared up quickly. Not a lot of carbonation, and what head there was disappeared after the first couple of drinks. Very clean tasting, with hops clearly present but not crossing into bitter territory at all. The hops are the harmony rather than the melody here. Slightly more floral than citrus.

I'll admit that the pleasantness of the first sips were aided by the fact that I earned this beer (and the next one I'm going to drink...hey, it's Friday) by playing basketball for an hour and a half. Almost any beer is going to taste good after that. But this one stayed interesting all the way down. Nothing is blowing me away, but there is just enough complexity going on to make me think about what I'm drinking every time I take a sip. That's the way it should be. Very clean aftertaste.

And it's Austrian. If pressed, I'd say it was more Von Trapp than Schwarzenegger, even though I don't know what the hell I mean by that.

But if it was Schwarzenegger, it would be this one. (That's him on the left)

I would actually buy this stuff. It rockets to the #2 spot so far on this calendar. Four steins! With an edelweiss garnish!

   

Day 5: Zahringer Premium German Lager

*Sigh* Another disappointment. It took me a long time to finish this one because I just didn't care. The Bud Light crowd might go for this. But if you're a part of the Bud Light crowd, a BL can be obtained with far less treasure and effort.

What did it taste like? Watered down Coors. Seriously. That is exactly how it tasted. I'm so frustrated with this calendar right now. These are the malaise days, people. If I'm ranking the brews by day, from best to worst, it would be 1, 4, 5, 3, 2. Number 1 was good. Really good. I miss it.

I did absolutely nothing to earn this beer, and I'm glad. Would it have tasted better if I'd run 10K first? Absolutely...it's beer! Is it better than no beer? Way better! Would I ever purchase it with other options available? Not a chance. What should I have done with this beer? Sipped it, seen it for what it was, crammed a chicken on top of it and let my barbecue work a little magic.

Like I said, a disappointment. Not even a bitter disappointment, since some hop bitterness would have improved the situation.

1 stein, for being beer rather than Sprite.

Day 4: Becker's Premium Pils

Since I don't speak German, I can't really tell where this comes from, except that it's some sort of subsidiary of Karlsberg Brauerei.

This is another example of a beer that tastes a lot like most of the beer you've ever had. Clear, light colour, fragrant head and easy to drink. Definitely a pilsner, definitely inoffensive, but nothing inspiring going on here. A lot like the last beer, it would be a great thing to serve to a bunch of people because it would be decent and not put anybody off.

No adventure, no challenge, but it just might be right up your alley. I preferred it to yesterday's Slovenian beer. There was a crispness to it that made me think I might really like it on a hot day rather than at the end of a cool fall day while sitting in the hot tub trying to answer deep existential questions. That calls for dark, complex, high abv content.

I'm starting to think this calendar has been mis-titled. Maybe it should be something like "Beer Advent Calendar for Boring People Who Like Different Looking Cans And Probably Don't Like Spicy Foods or Vegetables or Sushi or Anything Interesting...Pairs Well With Easy Mac."

So show me something, calendar. You started off tasty, got a little weird, and now it seems like you're just not trying.

It wasn't bad. I could drink a lot of these. But I don't have a lot of these, I only have one, so I want it to be more interesting. Three steins.

As to how I earned this beer? I'm told that I can't reveal that in any sort of detail. But I definitely earned it.

Day 3: Pivo Union Lager

I just drank a beer from Slovenia! And it tasted like...um...beer. Warning: there's not going to be much more to this review, because there's not much more to this beer.

From the sounds of things, this must be a popular brew as it is celebrating 150 years in production. It's the kind of ubiquitous lager one finds at sporting events, and I'm sure it works just fine in that sort of setting. You know, where you don't want to think about your beer or be challenged by it. You hear the guy with the tray at the end of the bleachers yell, "Co-old BEER!", you pass money down the row and beer travels back to you. You sit there and watch the game and drink your beer and life is good.

This beer is like Budweiser or Canadian or Kokanee or whatever else they serve in mass, cheap quantities. It may have a touch more bitterness and complexity than those brews, but it also lacks their smoothness.

So...kinda boring. I'd drink this by default and have no problem doing it, but I wouldn't drink it by choice. 2 steins.

I earned this beer by taking to a treadmill on one of my breaks at work. 1 mile by sprinting 30 seconds and walking 1 minute, then another mile at my regular (slow) pace.

Day 2: Durlacher Hoff Weissbier Hefeweissbier Dunkel

Okay, so I now know that a "dunkel" is a dark beer, so that part didn't surprise me. But as soon as I saw "hef" in there, I figured I was also dealing with a beverage made from wheat rather than barley, which was, in fact the case. Intriguing, since I'd never before had a hefeweizen that wasn't quite light in both colour and flavour, often accompanied by fruity or even spicy additives.

Intrigue progressed to excitement as I poured the beer. Definitely dark, but cloudy as wheat beers often are, and with a head that was foamy if thin and short-lived. I did not know what to make of the smell, as I've never smelled anything quite like it.

Excitement, unfortunately, turned mostly to disappointment here. I enjoyed the novelty of this beer, but that's about it. And I should mention that I'm really not a fan of hefs in general. There are some that I've enjoyed in the right setting, but given other options, I'm usually heading for barley-based beverages. It tasted thin and sort of, well, lifeless. There was a toasty quality that was nice, but it was put off by a yeasty, bready note that made sense (wheat beer) but didn't really work. Maybe wheats just shouldn't be roasted this much. Maybe they need the citrus and coriander that often accompany them. Maybe this stuff tastes absolutely amazing on tap and just doesn't translate well to an aluminum can.

At any rate, I'm glad I tasted it, but I don't want any more. No steins :(

Day 1: St. Marienthaler Klosterbräu dunkel

...or more simply put, the St. M Dunkel



Poured nice and frothy, with a head that disappeared quickly. I don't know what I was expecting, necessarily, but it wasn't something this dark. I've since learned that "dunkel" is German for dark, at least as far as beers go. It might mean the same thing more broadly, but I'm way more interested in what it means in relation to beer.

Not much in the way of a bouquet. I was sniffing and waiting for the familiar aromas that come with stouts or porters, but it just wasn't there. I took a sip, expecting a flavour like one might find in a dark, bitter ale.

It wasn't like that at all. Malty and fresh with a very nice mixture of caramel and coffee notes. I was thinking this thing would fit right in with many of the ales I had in English pubs last month. But it's a lager. There was a lightness and, I don't know, clean?...quality to it. This beer doesn't wow you with complexity or strong flavours, but it is extremely drinkable. I very much wish I had a few more of them right now.

I'm hesitant to start this calendar off with such a high rating, but I liked this beer a lot. 6 tankards! Wait, no...6 steins!