Märican Biere Bought and Drunk...

Aw shucks.

 

Yeh, but I haven't had it in a couple years so I wanted to reacquaint to see if my opinion holds up. Just don't want to drop coin on a whole 12 pack.

 

I just grab a draft at whatever chain I'm at that has a crappy selection.

 

Understood -- remember the generation gap... I rarely get to any of those chains these days. All my dining is done (mostly) at home. Funny thing is, I probably eat better than any chain.

 

Ha, you probably do.

I don’t voluntarily go to them.

 

Thought I would report about the newest beer out of Nya Carnegiebryggeriet, the joint venture between Carlsberg and Brooklyn Brewery. This is their Luma Pils, 5% abv, 11.8% plato, pilsner malt and Saaz hops. The influence from Brooklyn brewery is unmistakable, if this was a Carlsberg Sweden product it would have been fruity like the rest of their lager beers, Danish and Swedish brands alike, but this beer is actually clean like a German lager beer. Yet it's not neutral smelling, quality German lager beers to me are clean but not neutral smelling, you can tell that they have been fermented but the aroma is pleasant, and this beer has that aroma to it. I would be happy to offer this beer up in a blind taste test of German pilsners from regional breweries as a wild card, and I think it would perform well.

Alot about this beer is similar to the brewery's flagship beer Kellerbier, at 5.9% abv and 14% plato with Mittelfrüh and Saaz for flavoring hops (it uses a Weihenstephaner yeast, so not a Carlsberg yeast). I had the Kellerbier before this one (with a Swedish lager inbetween) and you can tell that they are closely related. The Luma Pils has a good body from the elevated original gravity, a tasty mix of pale malt and bright hops with a refreshing bitterness (I imagine it's slightly above 30 IBUs).

Once again I have to applaud Brooklyn brewery for their part in bringing this brewery to Sweden, several years down the road I still consider it a worthy contribution to the Swedish beer market.

 

I had the SN Oktoberfest on draft last night. I don't think I'll be buying a six pack.

 

My bad, but please use names and not abbreviations other than say, BA, for Beer Advocate. What is common to one reader may not be common to another reader. For the sake of not becoming an inbred discussion group. Thanks!

 

Wait - I thought "BA = Barrel Aged."
No, I mean "Brewers Association".
Or is it "Ballantine Ale"?

It's not as easy as "AB", everyone knows that's "Anheuser Busch" ---- or "Arrogant Bastard".

 

Having another beer from Nya Carnegiebryggeriet. Their Bärzen, a Märzen beer at 6.1% abv. Perle hops, Vienna, light and dark Munich malt. The color is brown and looks like the homebrews I have made with a majority of Munich malt and no roasted malt. The aroma is malty and fresh. It's like smelling an open bag of Munich malt. The only other commercial beer I have had the same fresh Munich malt aroma from was a dark Christmas lager beer from a Swedish craft brewery. The aroma carries over into the flavor which is malt foward, but there is also a solid hop bitterness (I'm guessing it's 30 IBUs or so). The hop flavor is muted and not really distinct. There's no real sweetness and the finish is pretty dry, which is helped by the hop bitterness I'm thinking. I'm a bit surprised actually at how dry this beer is, I was expecting something on the sweeter side. It is also very clean tasting.

The malt bill is what really caught my eye since it's the kind of recipe I've been wanting to see from a commercial brewery, making use of Vienna and Munich base malts on their own without caramel or other roasted malts, and without pilsner malt as the base. I've experienced it in my homebrew experiments and it shows in this beer as well, these malts do have something unique to offer a beer if used on their own. I remember reading a blogpost by Brewdog which contained this quote:

I'm glad that Nya Carnegiebryggeriet went with the approach that they did since it provides something which is different and enjoyable. You can see the same less is more approach in their Luma Pils and Kellerbier: simple ingredients in a well made beer To conclude I think this is a well made and respectable Märzen type beer which is on the drier end of the spectrum. If you enjoy Weihenstephaner Festbier and wanted to change things up with a different and distinctive malt flavor this would be a good beer to have I think.

 

Any particular reason you dropped this review (and the other Nya Carnegiebryggeriet review) into the "Märican Biere Bought and Drunk" thread? Got me all excited thinking I might be able to find some of this in my area, but it's from Sweden, not "America."

 

Picked up a 6pk of the Trader Joe's Oktoberfest this weekend (the bottle/label is different than the pic shown on BA) and I thought it was great. Super clean, absolutely "drinkable", not cloying for an amber, and with a solid hop backbone (label says 25 IBU). The folks at Gordon Biersch do a bang up job with this brew, and at $5.99/6pk it's absolutely a fantastic value.

 

If you haven't tried the TJ's Winterfest, it's an even more delicious take on a German style. Soon to be the next TJ's seasonal... I hope. Seems like they're weeding out a lot of the Josephsbrau beers.

 

Two years ago I stumbled across a couple of rauchbiers at the Red Rock Brewing pub, one a draft and the other in a bottle. The draft was an extremely mild smoke beer with barely a hint. After a sampler and a dunkel, I requested the bottled version and the waiter finally obliged. Pay dirt! A true rauchbier in the USA!

Fast forward nearly two years, another cross-country roadtrip and passing through Salt Lake City again. I contacted Red Rock to inquire about the availability of the bottled, true Bamberg-style rauchbier, in October. I was put in touch with the head brewer who affirmed the brewing of the bottle version, Franconian Rauchbier, and set aside some bottles for me to pickup.

My first bottle left me unsettled, expecting a more complete body and taste. However, my second bottle was very fulfilling. I attribute this to road weariness and a proper pour for my bottle at home. The glass was laced throughout and retained a moderate head, beautiful bouquet of head and full mouth flavor and swallow. Very low carbonation or I just didn't notice it. This appears to be a rauchbier helles, maybe a bock or festbier style. The smokiness is probably midpoint on the "Schlenkerla smoke scale" (between the helles which is not a full rauchbier and the strong smoky Urbock).

 

During my Sept/Oct 2019 cross-country road trip I checked out some other German-influenced brewery pubs, in addition to Red Rock Brewing in Salt Lake City, here I also drank an excellent Munich dunkel and a very good Black Bier (Schwarzbier).

- Chili Line Brewing, Santa Fe, NM. All their beers use a base of Bamberg rauchbier malts, but it isn't very noticeable in the several beers I sampled. Having said that, the Schwarzbier was very tasty and true to style. The Smoketoberfest was light on the smoke but a good marzen. Many of their beers had various infused peppers with mixed results or not my thing. I was there too early but a real Bamberg style rauchbier was brewing up and the head brewer brought me a generous sample that showed great promise.

- Ska Brewing, Durango, CO. Oktoberfest German-Style Lager which was quite honestly the most honest märzen/festbier on the trip, sporting fullness and that little touch of spiciness found in good maibocks. The Steel Toe Stout was a slightly sweet, smooth stout, cross of a Guinness and a German black lager. They make several other great beers but did not have one my favorites this fall, Autumnal Mole Stout, maybe discontinued to make room for IPAs and Sours. Very nice pub/restaurant environment.

- Main Street Brewing (Mesa Cerveza), Cortez, CO. Solid line-up of German beers but it appears to trending towards a watered down collection as the ownership shifts from the Bavarian founder 25 years ago to the more recent ownership (~5 years ago?). Still a great pub/restaurant to visit. I liked the Black Mountain (Black Imperial Lager), schwartzbier yeah, but a strong one at 8%; the Mesa Cerveza Schnorzenboomer Dopplebock, another tasty but strong one; SlowPitch, wow, a real Scotch ale! Heavenly, slightly carbonated but only to heighten the senses. Great restaurant as well.

- Copenhagen Sausage Garden, Solvang, CA. Great sausages was the initial draw but come to find out they also offer several German draft and bottled beers. I drank two favorites, a Weltenburger Kloster Barock Dunkel (draft) and a Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier - Märzen (bottle). On-Tap and Bottle offerings included several from Weihenstephaner, Erdinger and Ayinger, plus others and some domestic craft brews.

- Firestone Walker (Buellton, CA and Paso Robles, CA locations). Solid brewery which manages to excel across many styles. The Buellton location had a very good Firestone Lager (helles), a notch above the average helles found stateside. I fell in love with the DBA (double barrel ale), an English pale ale, smooth, malty, full body. And the always excellent Nitro Merlin. But not much in the way of German styles (two years ago their hefeweiss was to die for). A few days later I stopped at the flagship location in Paso Robles where the bier menu broke me out into a big smile... at the top were two entries originating from Firestone Walker's Propagator location in Venice, CA, a Propagator Schwarzbier and the "Drip Torch," a Bamberg-style rauchbier. Geez, I am running out of cooler space now! Both were superb.

- Hofbrauhaus Las Vegas. Very good but pricey. The Hofbrau Dunkel was solid, the Nuremberger sausage platter and Bavarian style pretzel tasty and the musical troupe from Vienna very entertaining.

- Uinta Brewhouse Pub, Salt Lake City, UT. Baba Organic Black Lager, always great tasting even at 4%. I brought home two 6-packs of cans (for some reason distribution to Maryland of it and New Belgium's 1554 ceased about a year ago).

- Prost Brewing, Fort Collins, CO. This ended up being everything folks on the BA forums have said. For being located in an industrial/boutique alley/pedestrian street location Prost did very well in instilling a Bavarian pub/biergarden environment. Very welcoming, friendly. After a flight of very good samples we settled on the superb hefeweiss (best in USA! says my wife) and in chatting with the bartender found out there was a rauchbier, authentic Bamberg style. I was in heaven. Not to mention the catering tent, Günter's Bavarian Grill, serving up brats and German potato salad and spaetzle. Score! Spent about three hours there. Would have stayed longer but I wanted to check out Zwei Brewing and had stopped by New Belgium Brewing earlier (all in Fort Collins, CO). Initially I was a bit apprehensive about the Rum Barrel Rauchbier as many barrel beers end up with too much alcoholic taste but this one was barely noticeable and complemented the smokiness.

- Zwei Brewing, Fort Collins. This was an evening visit, we were tired and a bit saturated by then. The atmosphere was more mainstream bar and hipster (maybe I am not being fair now!), very crowded, but we managed to squirrel away a quiet space and sample a little. I went with the Rauchen Bock which was probably better than I remember. Most any other day it would have been heavenly. Worth another visit on a more relaxed timetable.

- Backpocket Brewing, Coralville, IA. Modern venue that served some German-style beers. A good standard helles (Gold Coin); the dunkel was missing the dark lager richness of my favorite Bavarian dunkels (Slingshot); a very good kolsch (Bottle Rocket); a German pils; and a bock (Wooden Nickel) which was peaty, not Bamberg smokey as implied by the description, but deserving enough for a full pour.

Many other pubs and brews were sampled and enjoyed along the way. I was surprised at the number of dark/black lagers and rauchbiers, up from prior years.

 

Chile Line's beers are up and down in quality. Might give them another try when in Santa Fe soon.