Unchained #25: Vienna Lager
Summit Brewing Company

12oz can, review is from notes

pretty looking beer, pours up clear with a big foamy head, golden-amber color. smell and taste is all clean, crisp grain and spicy floral/herbal hops

This beer pours a darker amber color. The head is 2 finger, white, and frothy. The retention is average.
The nose is fairly weak. Slight sweetness to the nose.
Taste - hmmmmm. Well, I do get an interesting flavor profile. I get a sweetness up front. There's a slight bitterness on the back.
Moderate mouthfeel. There is a lingering carbonation feel.
I do like it, it is a good beer.

Summit beers are always difficult to find near me, so when I see something new (especially a favorite style) I can't pass it up. The Unchained Series being limited edition, I was a little concerned about freshness, but the 12 oz. can has an Enjoy By date of 11/25/17 -- just under the wire.

Poured into my short Becher glass.

L -- Great, clear, amber-orange color with a dense, long-lasting, off-white head that leaves great lacing. Can't get more perfect.

S -- Light bread and yeast, light caramel (within parameters to-style), spicy to earthy hops.

T -- Spicy, herbal hops right up front, very light bready malts making up the backbone and becoming more prominent in the finish, but the spicy, herbal hops dominate the aftertaste.

F -- Mouthfeel is soft and smooth with a light creamy character and dry, clean finish. Body is light-medium.

O -- This is a very well-made beer and an easy drinker, but I'd be more impressed with it if the flavor balance of hops to malts was reversed. That said, the traditional German hop character is very nice and doesn't stunt my palate like a lot of the newer German hops.

Brewers Notes:
"Brewer Tom Mondor Wanted a Vienna-Style Lager, So He Went Ahead and Made One, Dang It

The cool thing about the Summit Unchained Series is that it allows Summit brewers to make whatever the heck beer they want. The not-so-cool thing? Brewer Tom Mondor brewed his first three years ago — Unchained 17: Fresh Harvest IPA — and he’s been waiting ever since to make another. Eight brewers, three Unchained beers per year, carry the two… ugh, math stinks, and waiting does, too.

Fortunately, Mondor’s wait is over, and so is yours. Summit Unchained 25: Vienna-Style Lager is almost here.

Inspired by Mondor’s past travels through Germany, Unchained 25 features balanced bitterness and spicy and herbal aromas from Hallertau Mittlefruh and German Perle hops. You may remember the Hallertau variety from our Unchained 20: Sticke Alt release, but the German Perle hops are brand new to Summit.

Additionally, Weyermann Barke Vienna and CaraFoam malts provide nutty notes of toast, biscuit, and caramel, plus very little residual sweetness. If you tried our most recent Double IPA release, you just might recognize the Barke Vienna malt.

Topping everything off is an authentic Munich lager yeast that we’ve used previously in Keller Pils and this year’s Maibock. Which are both awesome, obviously.

But with all these authentic and traditional German ingredients, you might wonder why the beer is named after Vienna, a city in Austria. Which is not the same country as Germany. (We checked.)

“Vienna Lagers are a bit of a forgotten style,” says Mondor. “First brewed in the early 19th century in Austria, the style was created by an Austrian brewer who applied English roasting techniques to German malts.” Vienna Lagers were popular around the region for a few years, but the slightly darker, roastier lager hasn’t been mass-produced there since its early years. It did, however, gain a more permanent foothold in Mexico when Austrian brewers began emigrating in the 1860s.

“The Vienna-Style Lagers still brewed in Mexico today aren’t terribly representative of the original,” Mondor says, “as many are made with adjuncts like corn or rice.” In fact, few true examples of the style exist. “My goal was to use good ingredients, good processes, and good quality assurance to make a good beer.”

Careful to follow traditional methods, Mondor’s Vienna-Style Lager is decoction-brewed — a continental European brewing method that involves boiling a portion of the mash and then mixing it back in to achieve different temperature rests in the main mash. In addition, the beer was lagered, or stored, at near-freezing temperatures for weeks to help mature and develop the flavors.

“Really,” says Mondor, “in the end I just wanted to make one because I can’t find many.”"


Poured from 12oz can into glass. Best By Date of 11/25/17.
Dark amber body, Bright white head settles to interrupted cap and ring. Moderate lacing.
Bready malt aroma. Bready, grassy taste with slight nutty sweetness.
Medium, smooth mouth feel.
Solid, balanced lager.

From a 12oz can:

Appearance: Clear amber-brownish, good head.

Smell: Bready with fruit and grass note.

Taste: Moderate breadiness then a kind of bread with fruit jam note. Finishes bready and grassy.

Overall: I'm not too big on vienna lagers, but this was on discount so I bought a 6 pack. Nice bready lager with enough fruit notes to make it more interesting.

 

Into a willibecher from a can. Lots of light caramel malts as well as some bread, but not as much as I was hoping for; modest herbal and floral hops, carbonation is a little on the high side, quite sweet but finishes fairly dry.

 

This beer pours a very rich amber with a medium sized head. The aroma is fresh and simple, with toffe malts, nuttiness, fresh woodsy hops, mint, evergreen, and maple. The flavor is very fresh and clean, driven by toffee and browned toast malts, with mild and subtle hop accents of cedar, pine, mint, and black tea. The mouthfeel is very soft and creamy, with a medium body. Overall this is a really excellent beer - great soft texture, utterly fresh and clean tasting, just a great example of the style.

 

Aroma is mostly caramel and fairly sweethe overall. The taste is much less sweet and the biscuit and toast notes compliment the caramel. Dry and floral finish.

 

 

 

 

Poured from a 12 oz. can into a Summit pint glass.

Appearance: Pours a deep amber orange. Moderate amount of bubbles and a solid finger of off white head that settles into a thin patchy layer.

Smell: A toasty and fairly sweet malt driven aroma with a scent of caramel and biscuit. Malt scent of caramel, biscuit, cracker, toast, and grains along with yeast. Hints of grassy hops. A solid bready aroma.

Taste: Like it smells, a bready and slightly sweet malt driven taste with notes of caramel and biscuit. Bready malt notes of biscuit, caramel, toast, grains, and cracker with some yeast. Light grassy hop bitterness. A pretty nice taste.

Mouthfeel: Light to medium bodied with a moderate level of carbonation. Crisp and very smooth.

Overall: A pretty good take on a Vienna style Lager. Nice crisp caramel and biscuit malt notes.

Caramel copper color. Off white head. Lace.

Nice biscuit and caramel malts. A bit of toasted malts as well. Earthy and floral. Soft with a touch of bitterness. Smooth and easy drinking.

This is a very flavorful vienna, done to style, and is incredibly drinkable. Well done and worth a try!

Quite dark for a Vienna Lager. Dark amber with a dense head that settles slowly. Heavy lacing is left down the glass. Aroma of German malt and noble hops. Smells like something that could of come from Europe, only fresh. Clean taste, wisp of sweet, lightly toasted, crisp hop flavors, well balanced. Light body and expertly carbonated. This goes does extremely well. Not crushable like a helles. Nice beer for the transition from summer to fall.

Malty, slightly sweet, almost roasted, aroma. Hints of caramel, a little spice. Deep amber, tall, thick, creamy, slightly off-white head. Feel is smooth, creamy at first, then a bit thin on the finish. Multifaceted and complex flavors: caramel, toasted bread, hints of a mineral taste, hops add bittering to the finish.