Beerland Doña Neta
Golden Road Brewing

Today is the ocCANsion of New Beer Sunday (Week 675) & I am taking the opportunity to further The CANQuest (tm)! I recently found this CAN during a day excursion to Ardmore. I am not a fan of Meg Gill or her show's format, but I am interested in what is happening in homebrewing.

From the CAN: "Bière de Garde with Tamarind"; "Recipe by Jessica Fiero of Colorado Springs, CO"; "Please recycle"; "Enjoy responsibly".

I Crack!ed it open, but I finally got myself under CANtrol & performed a slow, gentle Glug. Once decanted, an in-glass swirl raised just under three fingers of dense, foamy. rocky, tawny head with decent retention that left some decent lacing in its wake. Color was a hazy Golden-Amber (SRM = > 5, < 7). Oh well, I tried. Nose had both a light funkiness and an earthy mustiness as well as a light sweetness, kind of like maple syrup, but that is imprecise. Was that the tamarind? Mouthfeel was kind of thin, not quite water, but not much beyond it, either. The taste was extremely bready & doughy! This is how I have come to think of the style - a sweeter version of a Saison, which this definitely was. In addition to the bready doughiness, it also had an earthy, musty quality. Finish had an almost vinous dryness, like white grapes, but again, not precisely. I was still getting an odd bready, caramel-like sweetness in there and the mustiness of old newspapers was unabating. This was well outside of my forte, so I apologize if I misidentified anything. I would CANsider it more of a novelty for me, but if this is your thing, more power to you.

Just a bit of a haze in the amber brew, with plenty of foam in the narrow Saint-Martin glass. Pleasantly fruity, rather sweet. Mouthfeel is sudsy with carbonation melting on the tongue. Fairly heavy body.

The tamarind is an interesting flavor that is pretty dominant here. This doesn't have much Farmhouse character, in fact it's more of a fruit punch with an odd bitterish twang at the end. The very low bar for my standard with the stuff is Modelo Chelada Tamarindo Picante. It just needs a dose of chipotle chile. From the 12 oz can purchased at Liticker's in OB.

L: Pours a slightly hazy/muddy copper orange color with a medium white head that dissipates rather quickly and leaves just a finger of lacing.

S: Freshly made bread dough mixed with some slightly herbal notes and a little bit of citrus fruit.

T: Sweet and tart tropical fruit, mixed with bread dough, ends with some slightly herbal notes. Bitterness is a little off-putting.

F: Light to medium body, farily easy drinking.

O: It's not a bad beer but it also isn't an overly interesting beer.

 

a professionally made and very drinkable, but somewhat boring taking on the biere de garde style. its rich looking deep golden in color with a nice white head and an obvious bit of body. the smell is sort of like pancakes, not toasted but lightly cooked on the grain side, simple and pale, but with a little bit of character to it, likely some wheat. its also nice and flavorful like a fluffy muffin on the grain side, its dry and well carbonated, and has a faint herbal element, its clean and easy drinking, and is technically quite solid. its the yeast that lets me down, i always looks for this style to be at least partially yeast driven, but this one tastes a little too clean and even dumbed down to me, maybe a faint white wine note, but none of the rustic yeast character i like in a true biere de garde. i think in that regard, this is almost a generous use of the term, but the beer is well made, and it tastes good to me, simple, nice with some kimchi french fries of all things, indicating its likelihood to be a very versatile food beer. a little boring, but the quality is there!