My other first love: Erdinger Weissbier

Ah, how well do I remember when I first laced my lips with the silky texture of this golden nectar. I was a but a young lad, entirely witless and inexperienced, or at least slight more so than I am today. I enjoyed those days living in Munich, at 14 years not quite of legal drinking age - the kind of detail that did not matter all that much at that time and and in that place (it may still matter very little there today). We would be going out in the early evening on our bicycles and occasionally ending up at the local beer garden, where we would indulge in a half Mass (i.e., half of 1L standard Bavarian measure) of Erdinger Weissbier. Next to Schneider Weisse, this was then my favorite  "passion cerevisiae". Never mind that we would normally have at most two of those and then make our way home intoxicated more by the fun of being out there than by the amber nectar, peddling along the amazing web of bicycle paths that criss-cross Munich. It seems all a little strange when I think about it from today's vantage point. Beer is considered an alcohol in the world where I now live, not a food or a youthful indulgence, and my appetite for beer has evolved from sheepish desire into voracious craving. No longer does drinking a beer involve the adventure of a bicycle trip to the beer garden and the occasional appropriation of an empty Masskrug. Instead, I pack my motorbike full of empties from Beau's and make the 45 minutes trip across the linguistic border to Ontario to get my hands on as much Lug Tread as I can manage to pack without compromising the strength of the side cases.

This beer has a much lighter appearance than its twin sister Schneider Weisse, and its flavours are white bread, rye bread, and sour dough bread. What a delight for the bread lover. Also, the rich wheat and yeast texture of this beer makes for an incredible mouthfeel that could be compared to downing a pint of oil. The hop notes are subtle and slightly spicy, as are the fruit notes, just enough of both to balance the overall palate without taking you out of the bread bakery. What a trip down memory lane this was, and personally quite gratifying to see where the roots of my love for beer lie. To give this beer a stage that is worthy of its stature, I chose to have it prance on the shore of Lac des Deux Montagnes near Montreal, where the backdrop reminds a little of a Bavarian lakeside.

Blanche de Chambly et al. at Fort Chambly

This weekend, I attended what is arguably the most enjoyable beer festival in the Montreal area - the Festival Bières et Saveurs in Chambly. Many moons ago the event was called La Festibière, it then went bankrupt and then was resurrected as the current moniker. The location in Chambly at the historic fort always makes for a fine outing, and it is the key meeting of francophone brewers in Quebec always taking place on Labour Day weekend. Lucky as I sometimes am, I went there together with a friend who works in a high level position for an important supplier of yeast to many Quebec breweries, and so you can probably imagine that we had a good time talking with and imbibing at the stands of the company's clients.

Before I write more about the festival, though, I'd like to feature a beer that has been pushing at the top of my list for quite some time, but I needed to wait for the right time to take its picture: The Blanche de Chambly from Unibroue. Given that the label of this Belgian witbier features a picture of the old fort in Chambly, it was clearly a must to photograph this blonde in front of the fort. Chambly is not only an old outpost of the French colonial army, but also the founding village of Unibroue, a venerable brewery that was among the first generation of craft brewers in Quebec. They were bought up by Sleeman around the turn of the millennium, and are now part of Sapporo after the Japanese giant gobbled up Sleeman. Same old story here - while a few of the Unibroue beers did not change, many brands were discontinued after the takeover, new ones of inferior quality and targeted at the masses were introduced, and the head brewer left to work at Chimay in Belgium because he couldn't stand the weather of constantly having to cut cost.

The Blanche de Chambly is a fine Belgian witbier - one that I have enjoyed on many occasions in the past and would recommend to anyone with a head for wheat beer. Its bread flavours are absolutely delicious, and it has only a hint of coriander that actually pleases because it blends in with the sour yeast notes rather than dominating them. It is those same sour falvours and some very gentle hops that combine to cut the back palate nicely without upsetting the party on your tongue. And while I had opted to have the Midget Extinguisher for this photo shoot, the Blanche also comes in a mighty 750 ml bottle that I would normally prefer for a proper thirst extinguishing job. But since were were going to attend the beer festival immediately after, I opted for the midget version in anticipation of a long and thirst-quenching afternoon.

The festival itself was its usual ambient affair - lots of easy going folks - large and small, young and old, sober and wasted, etc., merrily mingling without a care for that nasty thing called the world going on outside the wire fence. I wonder whether they were trying to keep us in like sheep in a pen or shelter us from that to which we would have to return inevitably. Either way, I enjoyed the views and the mood of this location on the Richelieu river and sampled some fine beers about which I can only report what I managed to write down in the haze of an evolving buzz. I also did not take any photos because you were either served your libations in a hideous plastic cup or poured a highly variable 4 ounces into your own glass. Neither is the kind of presentation I would enjoy photographing, I assure you , and I am not prepared to compromise the standards of this blog so soon again after my sins in the misery of Saputo stadium

One beer I tried was from our friends at Les Troi Mousquetaires - an Oktoberfest style. Talk about a meal in a glass - strong in alcohol, rich in mouthfeel,  and so malty in character that a spoon would probably stand upright on its own in this beer. The intense alcohol flavours helped me over the egde a little bit sooner than anticipated, but I certainly did not mind! I also had the Helles (German style pale lager) from Hopfenstark, a brewery just north-east of Montreal in L'Assomption. I always liked the name of this brewery, which loosely translates into English as "strong as hops". But this beer did not please all that much, I have to say. It did not have much balance, starting off extremely sweet and then slamming some strong bitterness onto your tongue, laced with a peculiar alcohol flavour that seemed to belong into an after-dinner candy, not a beer.

The Black Mama from Broadway Pub Shawinigan was a stand-out in my admittedly hazy recollections. This was a Schwarzbier style - German black lager - that was nice all around, with a rich malty palate and a well balanced hop character that cut the back dry like a knife. Jean Chretien, no wonder you love this town so much! The pale ale (Corte-Real) from La Microbrasserie le Naufrageur in Carleton sur Mer was not as outstanding, but enjoyable nevertheless. I had wanted to try their beer about a year ago on a motorbike trip to Gaspesie, but Hurricane Irene cancelled those plans and made my rear end feel rather cut after two days of hard-core riding. This beer had plenty of caramel flavours, a nose of old hops, and a lingering malt back palate that needed some fresh hops bitterness to do to this beer what Irene did to me.

Last, I was treated with an out-of-this-world generosity by the main man at the stand of Brasseur de Montreal. I truly enjoyed the Stout Cacao they had on their menu - not a regular beer they sell, but truly a fine effort that tasted like a chilled hot chocolate. Having stated my enjoyment of this beer, I do wish it had a back palate with more assertive hoppiness to cut dry the sweet cocoa flavours. There were several others that I tried, but by that time I had discontinued taking notes ...

Trois Mousquetaires Kellerbier in a cellar

We already know the Three Musketeers from an earlier post in which I reviewed their Schlicke Alt, and today we present another entry in the category "somewhat obscure German beer styles brassée au Quebec". This beer is a Kellerbier - literally cellar beer. The style originates from the Franconia region in Germany, and while this region is part of Bavaria, making up its norther part, the people there do not consider themselves Bavarian and speak their on dialects. They are on par with the Bavarians, however, when it comes to beer drinking. The name of the region and the people derives from the Franks, one of several Germanic tribes that settled what is now Germany in and around the 2nd to 4th century A.D. They are the original French people, if you wish, and they make such delicacies as Lebkuchen (a heavenly style of gingerbread) and Rauchbier. They are also known for their wine making and the famous Bocksbeutel bottles in which the wine is sold. During late July, the city of Kulmbach in Upper Franconia hosts a Bierfest that could be considered a better Oktoberfest than the more famous one in Munich. As you might expect, Franconia is also famous for beer brewing, with a small brewery in just about every village, and locals are known to go on beer hikes that take them through forests and mountains with pit-stops at local brewpubs along the way. Now that's my kind of hiking!

Moving on to the beer, I decided that a Kellerbier should be photographed in locations that evoke basements and cellars - see below. The style itself should be unfiltered and malty, with low carbonation and an amber colour. Our sample from Les Trois Mousquetaires meets some of those standards quite well, even as I thought the beer's appearance was a little too dark. But malty this beer was, indeed, with plenty of dark grain bitterness and tart malt acidity on the front and middle palates. The lupulus bitterness soon takes over, even as I thought the blend of grain and hops was not quite successful. I did wonder why they branded this cellar dweller as a "golden lager,"  since the colour was far from golden and in any event, the (appropriately) cloudy appearance dulled any sense of golden-ness.

The beer in my basement, where it belongs among its brethren:

Lvivske Premium Lager: A sign of hope?

Tonight I drank a beer from the Ukraine, and this post must go out tonight because tomorrow, the famous Ukrainian football club Dynamo Kiev is playing against my club, Borussia Mönchengladbach, in a Champions League qualifying match. Dynamo destroyed us in the first leg 3:1 in Mönchengladbach - thanks to some callous tactics, crafty skills, a well-organized defense, and two goals that were rather lucky. No matter, and while there seems little to play for in the return match for Borussia, anything is possible in football. I remember Dynamo Kiev from the 1970s with the great Oleg Blochin, who was coaching the Ukrainian side during this year's European Championship. It has been just about that long ago since Borussia has had any significant success, but the faithful stay loyal and it would be no shame to go out against Dynamo!

The beer I had is not from Kiev, but from Lviv, the main city in Western Ukraine, which the part of the country from which my wife's family came to Canada in the early parts of the 20th century and where Ukrainian rather than Russian is the main language. For a number of reasons, including my wife's heritage, I have a soft spot for Ukraine, and Lvivske Premium Lager is the first Ukrainian beer I have ever tasted. Unfortunately, being here in Canada means I only get those brands that have been gobbled up by large multinational breweries, this one belonging to the Carlsberg Group - not a good omen. Lvivske had a slightly skunky nose, which was not a big surprise given the green bottle, and a very pale golden colour that is visible in in the refraction of the background of the picture below. While the bubbles in the bottle (one even came out and stayed for some 20 seconds after the initial pouring) signal good malt quality, the head was quite fizzy and did not last very long. Taste-wise, the malt flavours were very dry, with some white bread notes up front and a middle palate that had gone AWOL. The mouthfeel was thin, and there were some faint grassy hops flavours. The back palate was clean, but with a lingering bitterness that made me think of ashtray. Overall, I take this as a signal that everything is not lost yet. While Lviv is not Kiev, Lvivske represents Ukraine, stirring in me the slight of fancy that the unsatisfactory character of this beer foreshadows the impossible!

A nice detail from the label and the bottle cap:

Pennsylvania on Tröegs beer by bike

Hey beer friends - it's been a few days, but I was out on a motorbike trip to Pennsylvania - 3 days, just over 2000 km, and roads like rollercoasters and switchback trails. But the beers - well let me tell you that it is very difficult to taste your way through the local beer scene there when you are traveling by motorbike because for reasons that defy even the the most bizarre Republican logic (and we met a few right wing dogs down there, I assure you), you can ride your motorbike without a helmet but you cannot buy beer other than in a government licensed outlet and only in cases of 24. I had heard about this mind-boggling regulation before and read that it has been the bane of the local craft brewing scene. How can you get people to try something new and different to find a new favorite if they must purchase at least 24? What if it is swill or swine's spit? What if the brewer is a charlatan and laced your amber nectar with cheap corn or rice adjuncts? What if you simply have no clue what good beer tastes like and cannot handle something that does not taste like dirty sweat from a redneck's armpit? Tough shit, if you live in Pennsylvania, and shit just as tough if not tougher if you are a new local brewer trying to make friends.

Thanks to the good people who make large side cases for big motorbikes, we had enough room to a buy a case of 24 from the Tröegs Brewing Company in Hershey, PA. We bought this because they offered an "Anthology" sampler case, including a 6-pack of four different brands. One odd thing about the name of this brewery is the use of the Umlaut. Technically speaking, if you have the ö already in the name, you do not need the e any more because oe is equivalent to ö. What is it anyway with marketers who think that including an Umlaut in the name of a brand - beer or other - lends some exotic allure or wild mystique to a product? And never mind people trying to pronounce these vowels.

Anyhow, given that we rode our mules from morning until nightfall, there was not much opportunity for me take photos of these beers in a glass during daylight, and not having a glass with me did not help either. So please accept my apologies for not showing any pics of beer in a glass - all 24 were killed off on two nights of trying to fill up on fluids and electrolytes after the day's ride. We did manage to gulp down a beer (from the bottle) immediately after our purchase in the parking lot of the beer store, given that we had been on the road for some 7 hours on a hot day already. This first one was the Dreamweaver Wheat Ale, and it hit the spot. Of the four beers in this case, this was easily the top pick. It was a relatively authentic Bavarian style Wheat, with some yeast sediment in the bottle, satisfying bread flavours, and a rich palate with just enough hops to sweep the rear-end clean. The other three were less impressive, even if it was clear that they were made with quality ingredients. The Pale Ale was probably the second of the bunch - a nice beer with an assertive hop bitterness and lots of flowery hop aroma and flavour. The Hopback Amber Ale combined those qualities with a nice burnt toast and dark caramel grain body. Finally, the Sunshine Pils was the weakest - very disappointing to me because Pils is certainly one of my favourite styles. The beer was not bad, but it did not taste like a Pils - too much flowery hops notes, not enough malt sweetness, no velvet mouthfeel, and a poor balance between sweet and bitter. Overall, I also thought a weakness of those latter three beers as a family was that they all had a very similar hops character that varied only in intensity, but not in taste.

Here are some photos from the trip, and details from the delightful packaging imagery.

A fine label doing justice to the abundant hops aromas and flavours.

The Anthology Sampler Case art work:

The bottle cap:

Details from the sampler case art work (great stuff):

Mexican Sin: Corona Extra

Forgive me, fellow beer lovers, for I have sinned. Attending a soccer game between the Montreal Impact and the San Jose Earthquakes on Saturday, and sitting (or rather, standing) in the section for the local Ultras, my participation in the chants and screaming made me thirsty, so I needed a beer. A professional sporting event in Canada is not the best place for a thirsty beer snob, because inevitably, you will have to make do with the swill made by one larger brewer or the piss brewed by another. In addition, you have to compromise your snobbishness at a cost that makes you want to fart with derision into the general direction of those responsible for the price gouging.

My sin, then is that I chose to drink a Corona Extra in a can of Midget Extinguisher size. My alternative would have been Coors Light, and so I think that I managed to pick the lesser of two evils. The serving staff even tried to push a piece of lime, which I simply ignored and left behind because I hate foreign objects in my beer! To deepen my shame, I had to drink the Corona either out of the can or pour it into a plastic cup. Since I wanted to show the colour of the beer, I had to stoop even lower and commit this final dirty beer deed. One small saving grace here is that because the beer came in the can, I was able to avoid the potential damage to beer caused by exposure to sunlight (it creates skunkiness), which inevitably happens to Corona in its normal clear glass bottle.

And if you think my suffering stopped here, think again. Not having my camera equipment with me, I had to take the photos with my cell phone. I despise those little stinking pieces of technological shit that so many people use to trumpet their private conversation in public or that ring in places and/or at times when personal attention to others or a common experience with them is asked for. When cameras were built into those little annoying machines, I thought "hey, maybe there is something useful to be gained," But the quality of the pictures my cell phone takes is so abysmal, that I can only revert to my old dictum: If you want to take photos, use a camera, not a telephone! Please forgive the poor quality of the pictures below and understand that the main reason I am posting this is because I am obligated to confess my sins.

The ultimate humiliation was drinking this beer - and my apologies go out to all those other beers that I have featured on this blog in the past because they do not deserve to be put into the same category as today's feature. I once read in a beer book that a particular product tasted like wet card board, and I think I finally know what this means. This beer tasted like little else other than sweetish adjunct, with little discernable bitterness or hops flavors - only a hint of hey or grass. Thank God that the Impact won the game 3:1 and there were 3 red cards to help divert my attention away from the beer. For once, having one beer did not make me want to have another. Let my sins be forgiven!

Bohemian Pilsner

I have talked previous about Pilsner beer, but that Pilsner has been the German type, not the original style developed in the town of Plzeň in Bohemia, in what is today the Czech Republic. The town is called Pilsen in German, as that part of the Czech Republic used to be German speaking for many centuries. The original Bohemian Pilsner beers have a darker, more golden colour than their German counterparts and malt flavours that drip a hint of caramel on thoroughly wholesome and nourishing bread tastes. On my visit to Plzeň during the mid-1990s, I much enjoyed my visit to the original Plzeňský Prazdroj brewery, brewer of the famous Pilsner Urquell that is also available in North-America, leaving a trail of saliva on the floor all the way to the tasting room, where we were served a pint fresh from the lager tanks. Plzeň also has a vast network of underground tunnels, which the ingenious people there used to store and transport beer, making sure that none of the good citizens ever stayed thirsty for too long during times of siege.

My featured beers today are intended to equally treat both modern nations of the former Czechoslovakia. Sadly, Pilsner Urquell is no longer available in Quebec, and so the next most famous Bohemian Pilsner had to fill in to represent the Czech Republic. Czechvar is what this beer is nowadays called, but its original name is Budweiser Budvar, brewed in the town of České Budějovice. This is also a town that used to be part of German speaking lands - its German name is Budweis - and Budweiser was a traditional style of brewing beer. The (in-) famous American beer Budweiser brewed by Anheuser-Busch is named after this very style of beer. Over the years, AB have asserted their corporate muscle to prevent the good people of the Budweiser Brewery (Budějovický Pivovar - hence Budvar) to use the Budweiser brand name in North America and other places. The name Czechvar therefore seems like modern tragedy to me. But make no mistake: drinking a Czechvar is like eating Filet Mignon, while drinking American Budweiser is like eating entrails boiled in smelly socks. This beer has all the characteristic of those German malts that I would kill for, bringing in some toffee to balance the raw bread flavours with a light toast character. The hops are assertive, with slight floral aromas and subtly lingering bitterness. The back of the palate is not dry, but mingles sweet and bitter like Romeo and Juliet (and just as tragically).

Our second entry is from Slovakia, the Golden Pheasant lager, which used to be made by the Zlatý Bažant Brewery in Hurbanovo (formerly Stará Ďala). The brand is now part of the Heineken portfolio, and I imagine that it is likely a result of this global acquisition that this beer cannot live up to Czechvar or other Bohemian standards in terms of enjoyment (unlike the Slovakian national soccer team, who qualified at the expense of the Czech Republic surprised with good results at  the 2010 World Cup). While the malt palate of this beer is still quite pleasant and features similar caramel notes, it is nowhere as rich as Czechvar and has less viscosity in its mouthfeel. The hops bitterness is more subtle than Czechvar yet still no-nonsense (especially compared to the North-American Budweiser and its ilk), but there are no floral aromas to speak of. This beer is nothing special, even though I still wanted more after finishing the 500ml bottle.

Bottle detail: