Bayernbiere Bought and Drunk

Surely there's at least one artisan donut place nearby where you live that has a banana-cream donut topped with bacon bits.... Thought the West Coast was full of that kind of stuff

 

Hahaha, if it is, I must be missing it. (I lie -- there's one a couple miles away.) Now, if we were talking about pairing fried chicken and your basic cake-style donut, well, guilty as charged.

 

You know, maybe you aren't too far off in your Lay's analogy; wasn't their slogan something like "Bet you can't eat just one?"

 

I'm not sure you want to go down the road of associating Schlenkerla with that pillar of finely crafted food, Lay's...

 

There is a two letter batch code on the bottle which is associated with a production date. If you are really curious you can contact Schlenkerla and inquire as to the bottling date for this particular bottle. @AlcahueteJ recently did this for a Schlenkerla beer.

Cheers!

 

I'm digging into the beers from the box and I'm trying the Herrenpils first. And it really is a nice pilsner. It's bready yet dry, as well as being bitter and hoppy. On top of this it's super clean. The breadiness is more pronounced I find than in Riegele's Herrenpils, though the two beers are similar when it comes to the hop flavor (Riegele's Herrenpils uses Hallertau varieties from what I've read, it would be interesting to know if the same varities are used in this beer or if other types are used). It really is a high quality pilsner in my book.

 

I continue with the Mahrs Ungespundet. At first whiff I'm caught off guard by a sulfur note, in that respect it reminds me of the sima I made last year (fermented with bread yeast) after having been stored for a little over a week. The sulfur subsides however and leaves a more bread-heavy smell behind. The flavor is somewhat yeasty as well, but also strongly bready and with a good bitterness backing it up along with some herbal hopiness.

I found this video to be quite interesting, especially the ingredients list at 2:33. Simply pilsner and Munich malt and Hallertauer Perle hops. Nothing fancy about the ingredients, but used in the right way and in the right amounts you have a really tasty beer.

 

Dang, how I love that whiff of low-concentration SO2 in Franconian lagers! Takes me right back to sitting in a Biergarten in the shade, knocking back a few Seidla of Kellerbier. And, yes, the simplicity of the grain (and hop) bill is impressive given the end result. Prost!

 

“Simply pilsner and Munich malt and Hallertauer Perle hops. Nothing fancy about the ingredients, but used in the right way and in the right amounts you have a really tasty beer.”

Yup, the brewing process is just as important (and sometimes I think more important) than the list of ingredients in making a quality beer.

I have a Kellerbier lagering in my lagering chamber right now. I can’t wait to taste this beer! It won’t be a Mahrs Ungespundet type beer exactly but not too dissimilar; my list of ingredients is a tad more involved but is does include the ones used in Mahrs Ungespundet of German Pilsner malt, German Munich malt and Perle hops (plus a German lager yeast strain).

Cheers!

 

No more excuses... "Ryanair Planning $15 Flights from the U.S. to Europe"

http://money.cnn.com/2015/03/17/new...x.html?SR=FBMoney031715cheapflighteu1130story

 

The large print giveth, the small print taketh away...

Guessing that the baggage fee is around 1,500 USD.

 

Charlz doesn't agree with you.

Aahh... the perspective of the uninitiated.

 

I was able to take advantage of a Lufthansa travel-agent special last year - $3 round trip fares to Europe. When all was said and done, it was about $650 with all the taxes. Still no charge for seats, 1st bag or bier onboard.... Saved me about $500 or so... Danke!!

 

I'm drinking an Altmuehltaler Hell right now that is simply perfect. This beer first popped up on my radar after it took first place in a blind tasting of 10 Bavarian Helli a few months back.

The aroma is exactly what I hope for in a helles. It has a perfect blend of malt/honey sweetness and delicate noble hop aroma. To die for! Drink this beer warm and enjoy the fumes!

Fairly light body (weighs in at 4.8% ABV), which is exactly what this flavor profile calls for. Dangerously drinkable.

At 9.99 Euro for a 10 liter case, this beer is a perfect example of how beautiful German industrial beer can be. I wish I could brew a helles of this caliber.

Check out the video on their parent company's website... makes me never want to leave Germany.
http://www.herrnbraeu.de/de/werbespots.html

 

I've been wondering about the bolded lately myself. I was always under the impression that lagers/pils were supposed to be consumed very cold, but I've been finding myself preferring to let them warm up a bit. I assumed that just made me an ignorant lager drinker (which I'm fine with -- wouldn't be the worst thing I've been called), but is it more common than I think to drink lager at slightly warmer temperatures? What's the usual temp when it's being poured from the wood?

 

Personally, I don't worry too much about beer serving temperature.... unless the beer is bad. Mediocre beer is best served cold. Bad beer is best served very cold.

I've been drinking my helli at room temperature because I currently don't have access to a big fridge or basement. I love drinking a beer like Altmuehltaler at room temp because it helps drive home the point of exactly how amazingly clean the beer is. There's absolutely nothing to hide behind in a warm helles.

Just to be clear, I'd also love this beer cold. In fact, I'd love this beer even if it punched my mom.

 

The most effective part of that commercial/video for me is seeing the brewery signs everywhere; Bavaria really is like that. On the bus, at the sports complex, in town, wherever you go...you see signage and support for your local brewery/breweries. Man, it makes me crave a Mass even to this day. (Your descriptions don't hurt either!). Prost!

 

I'm continuing to dig through the box of beers and it's time for Wagner's Lagerbier. It reminds me a great deal of a Swedish Export lager called Falcon Export which is brewed by Carlsberg Sweden. It has a similar type and balance of malty sweetness and bitterness and subtle herbal hop notes I find. The beer is distinctly amber, which I'm guessing is due to the use of Munich malts, which are also used for Falcon Export and it too has a slight amber tinge to it. This might not sound like a flattering comparison, being compared to a Swedish macro, but I really enjoy the flavors here, which are close to an Export-type lager I find (the gravity, 12.7% with an abv of 5.3% also makes it lean in this direction). Good stuff.

 

Patrik.

I took note of Lagebier Ungespundet on the label; I take it this is a Kellerbier.

Was the beer hazy at all? Did you note any flavor aspects from this beer being unfiltered?

Cheers!

Jack

 

The bottle had a small amount of sediment in it which I poured in, but not enough to make the beer hazy, unlike Mahrs Ungespundet. On the brewery website they make note of the fact that it is ungespundet, non-bunged, making it less carbonated and thus stomach friendly. But I don't think it's meant to be a kellerbier per se.