Tabernash Weiss Beer
Left Hand Brewing Company

 

Basic weizen, perhaps a bit restrained for the mainstream crowd. It's not as I remember it from the early days. Basic slightly hazy golden body beneath a bright white head. The aroma is limited. The flavor is limited, and leans a bit towards bitterness - or is it just that it's lacking in malt? Phenolics are stunted as well. There's not much banana. ... more clove. It's OK, but far from great. I'd love a cold one from the ice at a backyard BBQ, but in the bar I'll reach for a fuller flavored hefe.

Plenty of sediment rolling around, and leaning towards amber in color. White lacing leaves behind plenty of dna, but overall for the style this one is pretty muddy.

Lots of dulled down lemon, and an actual malt backer that is thin and annoying. Some cloves try to battle through a caramel filler and get some attention. Stinging carbonation performs well with a nice lively bananna laden hefe but in this one its an annoying clash on the palate.

Balanced Hefe? well this one tries to be and it just turns into a really odd brew and not one I'll be hunting out. Retired? good. Left Hand brews are usually decent to above average so this is not the norm.

The good news is, a lot of these can probably guzzled in one session. Who knows, maybe I had an old batch, but the smell and taste was one of a scotch ale. A light scotch ale, but had some burnt spices going on, not much banana or orange as in most hefeweizens. No head what to speak of which hefe's are famous for. I was disappointed.

Either it's a very good American Wheat or a sub-par Hefeweizen. The lable states that it's a German Wheat, I expect better. Though it has a great barley / wheat malt balance, flavors, and textures, it leaves a little on the cereal-grain side. Light display of cloves, buble-gum, and esters, they should be bolder if trying to compete with great German Hefe's. Still, a nice soft texture and a very clean, lightly minty finish. A very nice beer, but expect a good American Wheat instead of a forgetable Hefeweizen.

The beer pours a hazy pale gold color with a thick frothy white head that slowly fades to lacing. The aroma is good. It has a sweet wheat and pale malt scent that boasts of cloves and banana; very enticing. The taste is great. It has a rich wheat malt flavor. It's quite yeasty and yields a nice banana/clove character. It goes down easy and finishes slightly sweet and fruity. The mouthfeel is awesome. It is a full bodied beer with adequate carbonation. This is a great tasting wheat beer. It is full of flavor and has an excellent aroma; a great drinker.

12 oz bottle. Bottled on 02/17/04.

Yikes, this bottle is almost 2 years old? They JUST got this in at the store I bought this from....crazy. Anyways, despite the subpar review it got from me, it actually didn't appear this bottle had declined too much. There weren't any off-flavors and it tasted pretty good.. I'll try and track down a fresh bottle and re-review.

Hazy pale gold color with a fizzy head and absolutely no lacing. Smells of strong cloves and some yeast to back it up. Thank God it tastes better than it looks & smells. Cloves, pale malts, yeast, spices, and some banana round out the palate of flavors. Not really my personal preference, but it doesn't taste bad. Easy enough going down and would be a decent summer brew I could imagine.

Pours a clouded sunny gold wheat beer with a puffy pillow of snow-white head. High Carbonation level and never dying head. This looks very good.

Smell is cloves and bananas and allspice with some faint Band-Aid and cinnamon.

Taste is very doughy and not sweet with lots of spicy HefeWeizen flavors. Banana and cloves are in a good balance without one wiping out the other. Band-Aid scent does not show up in the flavor. A bit of juicy fruit gum flavor is in here as a supporting flavor. After you drink it a while a mild sweetness shows up in the taste. Very nice flavor.

Mouthfeel is very creamy, good wheat beer body combines with a very fine bubble texture to a very pleasant effect.

Extremely pleasant drink experience here. Too bad there isn't a 4.25 score to give but I have already given this beer three 4.5s so I will balance it out a bit. A completely lovable HefeWeizen that I do recommend.

Pours a glowing cloudy, hazy yellow in color with a huge foamy white head that leaves some lacing in my glass, aroma of bananas with a hint of cloves. Spicy yeasty wheat flavors, light body and mouthfeel, crisp and clean finish, leaves a nice flavor in my mouth, a pretty good wheat.

This will be the last Tabernash I have as Left Hand is now fully divested of the Tabernash name. I believe this is coming out as Haystack wheat in it's new incarnation. I'm a bit sad over this. When Jeff Mendel started Tabernash down in Denargo market fresh from Germany with his german weiss yeast he really added something to the beer scene in Denver. He had a lot of personality, and great beers. I really enjoyed working with him to benefit Crone's disease.

Color of a ripe wheat field with a good 2 inch meringue that salutes and stands at attention. Smells of bananas, bandaids, dusty flour bins, old spice cabinet and shortbreads.

Tastes spicy, a little vegetal, banana slices, vanilla wafers, large carbonation bite wears out after a little bit. This has a quaffable mouthfeel. I always drink two at a time. This has suffered a little over time, probably an old bottle, although I think the beer has less character then it used to when it was in Denver. Thank you Tabernash for your years of service to my palate. I salute you.

Pours a slightly hazy medium gold with an OK head but better than average lace. Typical weisse smells. Tart with some clove, lemon banana etc. Taste is also a typical weisse, but for an American version its very nice. High carbonation and decent drinkability. Nothing special as weisse goes but a damn fine American version.

Cloudy, yeasty golden amber. The fast rising head (slurp!) is manilla in color and is soft and airy rather than firm and dense. It lasts for a while though, thanks to the generous amount of carbonation. This beer would look pretty good in a tall weizen glass as depicted on the label. A few token scraps of lace are the extent of the glass coverage.

One sniff is all it takes to let me know that I'm dealing with a hefe weizen rather than an American pale wheat ale. I can actually appreciate banana esters. The nose is otherwise soft and fruity with very little spice; clove or otherwise. Some amount of clove is noticed as the beer warms, but it's slight.

Tabernash Weiss Beer is surprisingly good. Surprising, that is, because I've tasted very few American versions of this style that manage to pull it off. Fruitysweet banana glides along on a solid, yet soft, wheaty base. While the beer isn't bursting at the seams with clove spice, it's definitely present.

I can also appreciate a pleasant wheaty tang to go along with the mild-moderate banana sweetness. The mouthfeel is medium in heft with a nice lushness about it. Any larger and it wouldn't fit the style and wouldn't be nearly as drinkable. The amount of carbonation is on the generous side. In the grand scheme of things, it works quite well and keeps the mouthfeel lively and interesting.

It's difficult not to have preconceived notions about some beer. For some reason, I wasn't expecting much from this particular offering. Tabernash Weiss Beer was a pleasant surprise and is one of the finest U.S. versions of the hefe weizen style that I've run across. Well done Left Hand, well done.

Purchased a six pack from Groton Market for $6.99.

Appearance: I poured this into my weiss glass, it was very effervescent, a large 3 finger white creamy head sat on top of a pale and somewhat hazy straw body of liquid.

Smell: Aroma is mostly composed of bubblegum and a bit of banana. Banana bubble yum ?

Taste: The yeast brings out huge fruit flavors here, with the wheat taking the back seat. Sweet but not cloying

Mouthfeel: Extremely carbonated which works for a beer this fruity, light to medium body.

Drinkability: A very refeshing beer, could be drank in session no doubt.

Overall: this was the last one of my six pack, I really enjoyed this brew and thought it was a terrific value. I will be picking up more of this for those hot summer days.

A decent beer. Nothing really wrong with it at all actually. Pours a murky yet somehow really bubbly consistency, light amber yellow color with a decent but quickly shrinking head. Smell is pretty nice actually, yeast, some sweet malts lingering, and a nice banana scent. Taste however is pretty one dimensional. I like a beer like this to be a little more complex. This one had some nice yeasty bread character to it and a nice banana taste, but some other fruity estery charachters I tend to look for weren't there. Like I said, nothing wrong with this beer, it tastes fine, but it doesn't really hold my interest for very long.

12oz bottle from I don't know who or where. Oops. Thanks for the opportunity anyways... Bottled on 2/17/04.

Poured into an imperial pint glass, formed a 1" bright white head over the clearish golden brew. Head fades faster than any I've ever seen before, literally disappears before your eyes, leaving a 1/8" coverage, and lacing is minimal to none. Aroma is wheaty, with a citrus tartness already apparent. Taste starts with a perceptible amount of wheat character, which is quickly overcome by tartness. Mouthfeel and drinkability are okay for the style, but I'm thinking this one would be better fresher. Have to try again later.

This is an extremely timid beer, and not a great example of the style. It was decently tasty, but not strong in any respect.

The beer pours a golden amber color more reminiscent of an Ur-weisse then a traditional hefe. At least it was still hazy. The nose was lightly fruity with a slight bitter hop twang.

The flavor was subtle. A slight hit of clove at the front was followed by a slightly citrus aftertaste. A bland hop flavor sits stoically in the mouth through the entire trip across the tongue.

Drinking this beer made me bored.

Clear golden yellow in color with a short 1/4" head that quickly disappears to a weak surface foam. The aroma was of wheat, grapefruit, and hidden banana tones. The flavor was dominated by a grainy wheat tone, as some vanilla, banana, and citrus were bringing up the rear. The bitterness levels were also quite mellow.

Mouthfeel was crisp at the start and finish. The wheat tone lasted briefly on the tongue. This didn't have the refreshing wheat beer experience I prefer. Not very impressive.

This may have been the noisiest head I've ever encountered, might as well have been rice crispies. Huge head but it disappears quickly. The body is hazy straw colored with lots of visible carbonation. The nose is unique, smelling of peppery banana as well as a tad lemony. The banana nose certainly translates to the taste as well, accompanying the strong malty presence. I feel spritzes of bitterness right at the transition to finish. The aftertaste is slightly lemony and just a tad dry. It ain't that bad.

Poured a golden clear yellow with a touch of orange until the yeast sediment started to mix up from the bottom of the bottle and made it very hazy. Small head with poor head retention. Nose has nice banana and clove aroma. Malt sweetness is upfront with banana and clove. Just a tiny bit of sourness. Sharp carbonation makes it very crisp and refreshing. Finishes dry with more banana. This is a good beer. Another fine offering from Left Hand/Tabernash.

Picked this up in a mixed six pack at the VBS in West Lafayette. I've never had any Tabernash/Left Hand products, so it's a new brewery for me. It pours a cloudy (unfiltered thank god) yellow/light golden color with a head that disappears too quickly for a Hefe. Smell is full of bannanas and a little bit of citrus. Taste is full of citrus. Large lemon notes with surprisingly little grassy flavor. A little bannana is detectable, though it is faint. Finishes very sour as well. Not a very assertive beer, it's mildly bland. BMC drinkers should have no problem with this one. It could be a decent crossover beer. Worth a try? yes. Worth a repeated buy? from me, no.