Twin Leaf Brewing, Asheville NC

I'm hearing first week in March, is anyone else hearing anything different?

 

Yea, it is located on the famous South Slope of Asheville in amongst, Asheville Brewing, Hi-Wire, Green Man, Burial and Wicked Weed. I believe they're trying to be a true Brew/Pub.

 

The Grand Opening is tomorrow, while I'm sure folks have sampled their beer, friends and family, I haven't seen anyone post on it. If you give me a couple days I will let you know.

 

Heh, got side tracked giving a couple of tours over the weekend to different breweries, I um, didn't make it there. Had every intention of going but got slowed down by some good beer, good friends, and good talk. I will get there Wednesday, which is the plan at this time. Give you a report then. Try to figure out how to get the brewery listed on this forum, give an overall take. etc...

My head is still smarting, not enough water. Could have made it Friday Night but it was open to Breweries hi society only in our area. Talked to a couple of brewery owners Friday night who were at their opening private function. I'm not in that circle though

 

Ok, here you go. Stopped into Twin Leaf Today and sampled 3 of their main stay Beers and 1 of their seasonal offerings. I stayed away from all of the high ABV's because I wanted to focus on the Beers folks would generally order (oddly enough I skipped their IPA as it was a bit high on the ABV >7%).

Overall impression, the Bar area with the kettles all lined up in a row next to it, give you a feeling of freshness, of, I know where this came from, confidence. The Bar was crowded as it is newly opened but sadly, they only had 1 bartender who was a bit over whelmed as it took a good 10min to get to me, she even served several customers who arrived after me but again it was crowded (oh and I'm not small, I'm 6'2" 230lbs, kind of hard to miss).

The Beer: The first one I tried was, "Dark Matter Oatmeal Stout". Very bitter beer, in fact more so than their, "Uproot ESB Extra Special Bitter" which I sampled next. This beer wasn't very creamy, wasn't very stouty, was dark, and maybe Oatmeal was tossed in there somewhere. I can't help but feel they missed on this beer. I would rank it as a below average offering.

The next Beer I sampled was the "Uproot ESB Extra Special Bitter", which oddly enough wasn't all that bitter, at least compared to above. Much better beer. Deeply complex in flavor with a touch of sweetness. Drinkable (to me) ESB, I liked this beer and would put it above average as an offering.

Next was their "White Noise Belgium Style Wit". Again a very complex, deeply flavorful, strong Wheat beer. If you are into Strong flavorful Wheat Beers this is the beer for you. Makes German style Wheat Beers taste like Coors by comparison. I was surprised at how well they crafted this beer, but I'm not all that into Wheat Beers. Again an above average brew.

Finally, I had their seasonal, "Altitude Training Pale Ale". Talk about a puckering Hoppy Beer, behold this is one! Makes Hopslam taste like a Coors (sound familiar). Again a beer that is very deep into the Hoppy beer category, nothing mellow about this brew. It curls your toes.

And that is the rub about Twin Leaf Brewing (so far?). As I sat there and sampled their major offerings not high ABV's, I got to thinking, there isn't a single beer on the menu my wife would drink. Each of the beers pushed the envelope of the style they were trying to emulate, but left behind the huddled masses. There wasn't a, what I call, "fall back to" beer if you didn't like a particular offering or the way they represented that style of beer or if you were with non-craft beer aficionados. To me, that needs to be corrected. Twin Leaf Brewery can't just be for the beer geek, they're too big in volume judging by the size of their kettles. They will have to expand into beers the average beer person will drink or they will never take off like they want to, in my opinion.

Because of this, I would rate this brewery, using the scale here at BeerAdvocate a score of 86.

 

While I would in general agree with this statement, their Wit is in no way shape or form "approachable". It is a cutting edge, deep, extremely intense beer. If it were the first wheat beer I had ever tasted, I wouldn't ever taste another. Now for someone who loves Wheat beers, this beer is for you, it really takes it to another level. Their ESB would be very approachable, because of the sweetness in it, but the bitter changes it. I did like it, it was my favorite of the beers I had there.

Aside from the Stout, which again was a miss in my book, these beers were intense above average brews. I would really like to see this guy take a shot at a drinkable Lager or Ale. I fully believe he has the ability to brew the same deep intensity into a "boring" lager.

Again, it isn't that an establishment needs to cater to the masses, but what am I suppose to do with my wife? She suppose to go and watch me drink? Ya, that's pleasant. Heh, would love to here more reports about Twin Leaf and I look forward to more of their beers.

 

This is a valid reason as to why I don't like to post reviews on beers and breweries and why I haven't done so here on this forum to particular beers or places. My beer knowledge is limited. I drank a lot in Europe back in the late 80s and early 90's then went on an almost 20 year hiatus and only recently in the last couple of years become self aware of the craft brews. Therefore, I don't feel like I can give more than just a "my take" on what I taste. I can't tell you if a beer has a fine hint of butternut squash with a dollop of Juniper berry aroma. My pallet isn't that mature. I'm glad your friends enjoyed it. I really felt something there with their beers, a complexity in their ability to craft a brew, hence 3 above average scores out of 4.

As far as the overall grade I put on it, it would have been higher if they would have had 1 beer I deemed as drinkable by the uninformed beer swilling public. Who knows, to some that might raise the score.