Perle Monsch Ale
Rock Bottom Restaurant & Brewery

Lightly foggy lemony amber beneath a slim, French vanilla colored cap of creamy foam. The head lasted only minutes, but made up for it by leaving a solid, thin, hazy sheet of lace with thicker rings indicating each mouthful. A fine looking Kolsch.

The nose was too underpowered to be impressive. I know that beer of this style usually isn't aromarific, but something other than mild lemon peel would have been nice. Warming didn't help much at all; partly because the beer was farther and farther away with each passing minute.

I chose the cask version over the tap version because the latter (simply called Monsch Ale) was supposed to be less Perle hoppy. Easy call, that. This one was moderately hoppy for a kolsch with plenty of herbal and lemon citrus notes. It was lightly pale malty sweet, lightly bitter and lightly tart all at once.

I'm not sure if wheat malt is a traditional ingredient in beer of this style. Actually, I'm not even sure that I've added this particular beer under the correct style. The chalkboard inside the front door describes it as 'a pale wheat in the style of Koln (Cologne)'. I'll have to get that cleared up with wdmrock. [edit: it's a kolsch]

Although PMA was definitely better than average beer, it did lack a certain depth of flavor and became a little grainy as it sat. The body/mouthfeel was on the medium side of light and was soft and impressively smooth due to the low level of cask carbonation.

Perle Monsch Ale is the latest in a succession of wheat ales at my local Rock Bottom. It strikes me as a great summertime brew rather than a 'chill in the air sipper', but then most wheats (and most kolschs for that matter) favor the light, easy drinking end of the spectrum. A good effort, but not an outstanding one.