Original 1649 Jubiläumsbier
Brauerei Bischofshof

Dortmunder beer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Half litre bottle poured in a Pilsner glass.

A: Thick white head, mild cloudiness and a light golden color.

S: Hoppy, light and airy.

T: Smooth and tasty. Not much of an aftertaste. Not much taste at all.

M: Light, watery.

O: Extremely light beer, not any of the complexities I was expecting from a Bavarian brewery. Not bad, but I'll try elsewhere. But then again, this is the first Helles I've had since I was IN Munich several months ago. Maybe I'll try it again sometime later.

An anniversary beer, commemorating the opening of the brewery. I’d guess this bottle was on the shelf for a while. Never have seen it before, or since.

Poured into an 0,3l stange, it's a straw gold color in the light, dark amber away from the light. A slim layer of creamy foam settles, leaving spindly arcs of lacing. the skim breaks up into clumps eventually after 15 minutes or so.

Honey, tea, florals, light dried orange peel in the aroma.

Sweet and malty, honey butter multigrain bread, some minor oxidation creeping in. Light bodied and easily quaffed. Carbonation is light and it's not at all fizzy. Would give it another try if the bottle was guaranteed fresh.

On-tap at Gourmet Haus Staudt

A: The pour is a mildly hazed golden straw color with a large white head.

S: This is pretty light on the nose. Mostly yeast with a touch of bread and floral hop notes. Not overly impressive, but good and "clean".

T: The flavor starts off with some pale, cracker malts and a touch of bread. There's a lot of floral notes that give the beer a bit of a honey character. Nice and crisp with a mild to moderate hop bitterness.

M: The beer is light on the tongue with a really nice and crisp carbonation.

D: Certainly worth the tick. Quite easy to drink and very enjoyable.

On tap at Gourmet Haus Staudt.

Golden with a tall frothy head that retains well. The body is hazy, though still translucent.

Doesn't have much of a nose. Bright, clean lager yeast and dry pale malt is all I pick up. At least it's clean.

Taste is quite good. Crackery pale malt, light honey sweetness, crisp breadiness. Exceptionally clean and light, the finish displays a mild hop bitterness that ends on a clean and crisp note.

Not the most exceptionally flavorful helles, but quite good. I'd drink it again.

This 500ml brown bottle comes at 5.4%abv.; BB 06/12/08, served chilled in a 500ml weizen glass.

A: coming in a light golden hue with slightly too lively carbonation and a 2cm-thick well-lasting white pillowy head.
S: the aroma upfront is pretty sweet - herbal jelly, honey-ish malts, sweet corn-ish graininess, aromatic grassy hops, sprinkled with scarce sourness typical of a lager bier. On the balance, the sweet edge is slightly too much and hampers the overall performance a bit.
T: like the nose, the taste comes quite sweet and slightly thin-bodied in terms of the grainy malts and lightly toasted bitter-sweet malts (with a semi-rich aroma more like the Moravian malts used in Czech lager), followed by the secondary entry of grassy hops and rather mild bitterness; rather straight-forwardly malty, not without a light sour touch that is essential for a lager bier, but overall not satisfying.
M&D: lightly carbonated, semi-smooth, and medium-bodied, this is a drinkable (albeit slightly thin) lager which is not as well-executed to be able preserve a more subtle complexity that should've come with the style. Just OK.

I was surprised to find this on-tap at Hollingshead's, so I decided to revisit a 12 month memory. From draft, it's fresher/the flavors aren't rusty. Grassy and hay flavors mix pleasently with the malt and the light delicate hops. It fit my bill by being sessionable and enjoyable.

16.9oz brown bottle. This fresh offering was poured into a tulip and had an easily managed loose white head. Traces of string lace left behind. A solid ant trail line of carbonation rises from the middle of the glass.

For the light color of this beer it sure does have a pretty hefty grain bill. Very unrefined dry grain type taste. A bit of lemony zest tries to give this another angle and I wished it had a bit more. Grain grain and more grain, Grassy hops are a bit of an afterthought. Lingering aftertaste and fairly sweet.

Notes: Ehhh I'll pass on this one. Really one sided and that one side is not all that well done. Unless of course sweet grainy laden beers sound interesting...then dig in.

1pt 9oz bottle given to me as a Christmas present from my brother. Freshness date of Jan 23, 2002 - yikes!

Pours a very slightly hazy yellowish gold, with 2" of sudsy white foam perched at the top. The head dropped in approx 2 minutes, leaving thin sheets of lace that quickly evaporated into isolated foam spots.

While I expected this to smell like I was entering the city limits of Skunkville, I was pleasantly surprised. The nose consists of mild grainy notes, a faint, slightly sour lemon-like scent, and, most dominant, though still mild, a honey-like sweetness. While not a beer with an aroma that makes you sit up and take notice, this smells fresher than I had any right to expect out of a 5 year old pale lager.

The taste is quite similar to the smell. It's a mostly mildly malty beer, though the understated, herbal-flavored hops provide a nice, well-balanced dryness that effectively contrasts the malts. This would probably make a pretty good warm weather beer (it's not bad in Spokane in February with the temperature in the low 20s, either).

Mouthfeel is soft and undemanding, as one would expect for this kind of beer. Definitely at the lighter-bodied end of the spectrum.

Not bad at all, and considerably better than I expected, especially after I saw the freshness date. While I am not an aficionado of the Helles style, and I would rank it behind Weihenstephaner Original, I would definitely try this again, especially if I could get one fresh.

Pours a clear yellow beer with an OK white head.

Smell is light and clean and mostly bread and a light floral hop aroma. Malt scents are minimal here and have no particular essence of their own.

Taste is dry and slightly malty with a faint roasted malt flavor. Mild hop flavor is mostly grassy with a faint lemony edge. The sweetness here is in the after taste.

Mouthfeel is good.

Quite a drinkable lager that is on the lighter side of the flavor range but it is certainly easy to drink.

! pt. 9 ounce bottle, purchased at New World beverage in NYC. $2.25. Best before 31/01/97

Pours a hazy pale yellow with a short lived, three finger, white head. Aroma is fruity sweet malts, yeast and sweet corn, a tinge of wet, green, leafy hops. Easy on the palate this is a sweet malty helles with a short dry finish, more like a fest bier to me. Mouthfeel is medium. To a fan of malty brews this is a tasty and drinkable.

Clear brassy look, deep yellowish orange, with a smallish, finely carbonated head. The head breaks up into little flecks of suds that stick around.

Sweet vegetal note to the nose at first, plus a mild herbal hop aroma, then something grainy and uninteresting.

Slight hop bitterness quickly gives way to a tea-like sweetness. Smooth but pedestrian malt flavors underneath. Medium to full-bodied mouthfeel, with decent carbonation. A bit of sweet fruit follows the malt and leads to a pleasant slightly dry finish. But the aftertaste blooms sweet again and unsatisfying. Later as it warms a bit of chocolate shows up, oddly, but it's just a whiff.

The flavors aren't all that special but it's smooth and balanced. Middling.

Appearance – This one is yellow in color and a bit hazy with a modest head.

Smell – The big, husky grain aroma is nice but a little off. It smells more like American malt liquor than German lager.

Taste – The grain tastes as it smells. I can pick up a bit of vegetable sweetness at the end, but otherwise this is all grain.

Mouthfeel – This one is medium-bodied and very lightly carbonated.

Drinkability – It has the lagered smoothness, but Germany (especially Bayern, Germany) can do a whole lot better.

Presentation: Standard looking 500ml tall brown glass bottle. My bottle looks like the one in the BA Database; a dark blue and gold V-shaped neck label that has the words ‘Original 1649’, whereas the main label has a more expanded description listing the brew as ‘Original “1649” Jubiläumsbier’ with the phrase ‘Das Bier, Das Uns Zu Freunden Macht’, this is the brew that celebrates the founding date of the Brewery. The back label states that the Original 1649 is brewed in accordance with the Rheinheitsgebot. No strength listed but a Best Before Date of 28.01.09.

Appearance: Clean golden body that is perfectly lucid with some orange hints and a few very small floaties. The creamy dirty white head builds at first but this soon rescinds to a thin ¼” white broken covering that leaves some ringed lacing. Average carbonation.

Nose: Massive grainy malts in the nose, some sweet malts but with a little balance from the Hops. Fruity aromas in the back end are incredibly pungent and inviting. Honey dew sweetness.

Taste: As with the nose there is an influx of grainy Malts that build quickly into a sweet husky middle. Finishes with a light sweet fruity ending and perfumed hops have a fresh luscious tinge. The finish is one of honey soaked grains with some cloying sweetness.

Mouthfeel: The grainy malt bill is very big and lends a depth to the body that really gives this brew a deep thick mouth. The fruity feel balances the sweetness somewhat but it has a thick honey feel in the finish.

Drinkability: Pretty easy at first but the grainy malts become a distraction and a tad too much. The crisp feel works at first but the sweet fruitiness in the back end soon becomes cloying though.

Overall: A tad too sweet for me in the long run, but not bad.