Rampart
Solid Ground Brewing

Nice attempt at a Helles. Good color, smell, taste and finish. Lacking ABV, at 4.8 it’s subpar to the Germans, but still excellent for locality drinking.

basic but also distinctive, cool to have these guys selling beer in idaho now, this is my first from them and i am hoping some of their more exotic sounding offerings also show up. its cool this has rice in it, i guess that lightens it some and sets it apart from more traditional examples of the style a little bit, but this still drinks like a helles. light in body but with quite a bit of grain character, blonde and not as immaculately clear as the best of these, but close. perhaps slightly less carbonated and heady than i want in the style, but its certainly not still or anything. aroma of fresh bread, dry crackers, and that dusty german note, along with a maybe slightly more robust than average hop presence, noble for sure, low alpha but not without a little bitterness apparent. the flavor is just like the nose, well balanced but definitely grain forward, nice water chemistry and mineral profile, and with a little spiciness on the swallow before its gone. the yeast is familiar and old world tasting, oddly slightly vinous to me at temperature, faintly sharp for a flash at the end, but clean overall. soft and kind of gentle feeling, not as punctuated by the carbonation as the best of these, but still easy drinking and refreshing. i guess a good intro beer from these guys, but not quite enough to get excited about. solid without being intriguing in any way, i dont think the rice does a whole lot in the flavor, but i enjoyed this quite well.