Czech Dark Lager
pFriem Family Brewers

 

 

This beer pours a translucent dark amber with a medium tan head that dissipates rather quickly. The aroma is roasted sweet malts, chocolate and caramel and bready grains. It has a light body and is easy drinking very solid beer. Purchased @ Safeway. BOD 1-4-2024. 25 IBUs Rated 4-14-2024

 

Poured from 16oz can into a dimpled mug. Canning date is super hard to read; maybe 8/12/24?

Appearance: rich, dark brown-amber hue with a totally haze-free body and a finger of frothy tan foam atop.

Smell: nice chocolate-malt aroma with a fair dose of caramel and toast. There’s also a biscuity malt character here that I’m not a huge fan of, but other than that it’s quite decent.

Taste: a bit less chocolatey than the aroma, with more of a toasty, caramelly, biscuity character. Again, the biscuit thing is not really my jam, but it does seem like a pretty good beer otherwise.

Mouthfeel: medium body with a decent carbonation and creaminess.

Overall: it’s a pretty solid Czech dark lager, although they’ve gone a direction with the flavor profile that is just not my favorite.

 

elite dark lager, especially from an american brewery, european good, and i think i liked it even better than their impressive czech lager they also had on when we visited thursday night. nice dark chocolate brown look to this under well over an inch of sort of nitro looking cream head, tan in color, all lathered up and lasting, there is a chance this came from one of their side pull faucets, but i didnt watch him pour it, would make sense though, texture in wonderful! it smells deeply earthy, wet soil, old wood, but also with some cozy cocoa and light smoke notes, dry and yeast driven along with the roast, not bitter, not into that black coffee realm some of these go to, more delicate than that, like brown ale meets european lager, exceptionally well composed and nuanced. pipe tobacco, baking chocolate, nutty malt, and light raisin in the flavor, layered but also cohesive, some doughy old world lager character giving this some real authenticity, and its smooth and long on the palate while also being dry. gentle and expansive feeling, lively but hearty too, drinkable as they come, and a wicked companion to the smoked trout they sling in here. cant get enough of this one, and am so looking forward to trying the canned version as well. i dont think there has been a more impressive lager brewery in the country over the last several years, these guys do it all! this one is tip top!

16oz can from Brewers Haven. Dark brown pour, creamy beige head. Aroma is roasty malts and chocolate. Taste offers mild sweetness, light bitterness and chocolate notes. Kind of dry.

Bought a 4-pint pack at Fred Meyer's. Pours a dark amber, decent slightly dirty head, decent lacing. Nose is malty with some wine fruit and a slight hop. Drinks for me a lot like Ayinger Oktoberfest, which is meant as a high compliment. I know dark lagers are doing the rounds on the East Coast breweries so it's nice to see pFriem who know the style well do their excellent take and make it available locally where it's still a rarity to find out of festbier season.

Sampling a cellar temp 16 oz can poured into my .5L dimple mug. Date stamp is 1/13/2023. The beer pours a clear dark cola brown color and slightly frothy beige head of 3 cm foams up and fades slowly to a sturdy surface covering. There is some scattered lattice when I take a sip.
Aroma is rich and malty with some roasted malts and dark chocolate mixing with a bit of toasted bread. These notes are very bold immediately from popping the top of the can. Not really too much of a hop profile on this beer and its nose.
First sip reveals a relatively light body with fine tingly carbonation. texture is pretty smooth and easy to drink.
Flavor is some roasted malts and toasted wheat bread and hints of dark chocolate. I get faint hints of a black tea hop note that does increase the bite on the finish. Beer drinks easy and my mug is empty pretty quickly. Never any hint of the ABV. Quite the tasty and visually appealing dark lager. Glad to have tried this one.

Tall pile of foam on the very dark brown brew in the Troubadour tulip. Lush and sudsy on the tongue. INviting aroma of cocoa and grain with a flowery note. Pleasant touch of sweetness at first. The dark roasted flavor is enlivened by the bitter chocolate finish. This seems like the ideal American version of the style, which is no great shakes anyway. A delicious robust lager with an elegant style. From the 16 oz can purchased at Elizabeth Station. Dated 01/13/23.

 

Can from New Seasons.

A dark brown with a light brown head with good retention and lacing. The nose is soft, toasty, bready, mildly sweet with light caramel and coffee like roast notes. Clean. The palate opens mildly sweet with toast, roast, bread, mild caramel flavors. Mild hops, lightly lemony, are present. A little less hop character than I typically care for. Drying, clean, mildly sweet on the finish with mild cream notes. Tasty.

On tap. This is great! On point for the style. Roasty, rich, flavorful. A tasty, clean lager. Pleasantly surprised. Hoping to try more from this brewery in the future!

Bottled 1/2022:
Medium brown body with a large light beige head that craters as it falls. A hint of cocoa combined with a spiced nut bread comes from the aroma. Taste strangely has a hint of smoke to it, with a darker bread vibe than the nose indicated. A bit of woody to nutty bitterness highlights the end of the taste.

Look: Dark chestnut brown on the pour and my gluggy one brings on a huge light beige head that retains well and slowly settles, leaving great lacing behind
Aroma: Freshly baked brown bread, light nutty notes, subtle earthy hops, and wafts of chocolate
Taste: Follows the nose extremely well but more accentuated. Layers of bready malt kick the party off and dance with light nutty notes and earthiness for a bit. Chocolate comes into play here and there throughout and closes with more brown bread
Mouthfeel: Full, very clean, medium-high carbonation, and a soft, clean, and slightly crisp finish
Overall: I’m digging this one a lot. As expected, these folks nail another somewhat obscure beer style and make a very tasty and well-made version of it. A ton of bready malt depth in play, plus subtle chocolate and nutty notes that incorporate well and with a killer mouthfeel to top it off. Delicious and recommended

Dark pour, medium head, fades away. We catch a nit of fruit in the aroma, along with stone fruit and dark chocolate, unusual for a lager, but a pleasant one. The taste is well balanced and refreshingly so. Don't think of this as a dark beer, it's a Euro lager with roasted malts, keeping the taste and with added dimensions.

 

500ml bottle

A pretty standard pour yields three fingers of tan head into my Willi glass, very pillowy and fluffy. Retention is pretty average, and the head steadily fades over a few minutes. Initial lacing looks great. Body is brown, nearly black. Looks pretty nice so far.

Nose is quite in your face, especially for a dark beer, aromatic as well. Mineral and burnt toast immediately hit you. Smells pretty dry and potentially bitter from the roasted malt. A touch of bready malt, but generally pretty stiff in that category. Maybe the slightest spiciness. There are some dark characteristics in here, but overall this leans heavily on its pilsner qualities, some of which you wouldn’t think would be noticeable among darker malts. I like this, but I wouldn’t mind a tad sweeter/breadier nose.

Flavor drinks pretty similar, but if my eyes were closed I could easily be convinced that this is just a regular pilsner at first. Heavy mineral, crisp, dry, light, neutral. Over time a little bit of that burnt toast comes through, with maybe a touch of toffee and some sweetness. I like this, but I’m going to how it develops more over time.

Carbonation is on the higher side. Body is somewhat light, but has a little weight to it. Bitterness low but present. Mostly dry, but some sweetness shows up, this is really well balanced. Very nice mouthfeel.

Drinkability is very high, this is tasty, light and balanced.

Appearance turned out…ok. Lacing was a little lazy and took quite a while to grab on.

The flavor continued to come out a little more over time, specifically the toffee and a little bit of sugar. This made the beer drink a little smoother and not as gritty as the nose. The nose and flavor ended up being on two different ends of the same spectrum, and while I liked the flavor a little bit more, I can’t necessarily say it was better quality wise, just preference. All and all a nice beer, certainly a little different from the norm.

Pint outdoors at Westside Taphouse in West Salem.. Warm evening.
Pours a nice clear Amber /brown. Small beige head.
Good brown bread malt aromas.. Some nuttiness.
Taste similar.. Sweet.. Small amount of grassy hop.
.Nice medium smooth mouth feel.
Real nice warm evening beer