A Salute to Saisons (2020-2021)

Haven’t had that beer in a very long time. Posts like this make me want to revisit the classic og American Saisons that helped me get into the style; Tank 7, Hennepin, Sofie, Cellar Door, etc.

 

I hear ya, Hennepin was one of my first craft beers ever back in 2004. I was blown away by the fact that THAT was a beer (in a good way, not in the New England IPA and pastry stout way).

 

Saison Saturday is tomorrow. It also happens to be Halloween. Unleash the Fantome's!!!

 

Ghoulschip here...close enough.

 

I’ve had it multiple times at CBC’s Great Pumpkin Festival. It’s good, just like all of Allagash’s other Coolship offerings.

I also have a Haunted House I saved for Halloween. Not a wild ale/sour/saison, but still Allagash, and still very good.

 

Drinking this saison while I prep the potato soup that my wife requested for Halloween night.
The saison features pale and wheat malt, and is hopped with mandarina bavaria and hallertau blanc hops. Canned in april, so it has some age on it, but still tastes great.

 

Going for the spooky theme... 2018 HF Phenomenology Of Spirit.

Boo!

 

I had a hard time finding Haunted House this year, I ended up having Allagash Moselle on Halloween/Saison Saturday. I had hoped that Moselle would have had a bit more of a Saison profile than a pale lager profile but it was still very good.

 

The most recent Keeping Together release, there hasn’t been a bad one yet out of the 6 different bottles (and one that already had a b2) in the first year!

 

I saw some yesterday at Pemberton Farms.

 

This weekend got away from me due to work, but drinking the Biere de Garde tonight. Thoughts on it in the "What Homebrew are you Drinking Now" thread. Got some work to do.

 

Nobody commented on that bit above from my earlier post.
It seems like beer consumers essentially don't want "saisons."

After noticing the fate of Allagash's, I went to a beer store with a huge selection and took a look to see how many beers they had from 2020 that were called "saison." Barring Allagash... on the endless shelves of beer, Dupont and Hennepin were essentially the only two to have the word saison on the front label / outside packaging. There were a couple more if you read the really fine print on the back etc.

 

I think you are mostly correct, I might soften that a bit and say they are interested in something different. Generally different skews to extreme but mostly its about always trying something new. While Allagash has moved its classic Saison to being non year round they have released quite a few Saisons recently. Cascara, Turmeric, Violet, Moselle (kind of), etc.. Allagash has pivoted very much towards variety as well as attempting to appeal to both the craft beer geek and the mainstream craft beer enthusiast. I find myself much more excited to visit Allagash these days because there are so many options. I'm not sure I love everything they are doing but everything is well crafted and when they do hit the mark they knock it out of the park.

The secondary problem is that Saison isn't in the mainstream enthusiasts vernacular. Idle Hands had to change their beer Proeme which was listed as a Saison to "Farmhouse Pale" listed as a Farmhouse Ale. People are able to key in on the words Pale and Ale which they understand. Perhaps that's what Allagash is going in a way, you throw in some blueberries or turmeric and you get people to focus on that rather than the word Saison when they buy it. Maybe next time they'll be willing to try a classic Saison.

You also have breweries like Amory's Tomb which makes Saisons across a spectrum. They have Estuarial which is very much a classic Saison. They have beers such as Satellite Architect which is more of a modern take with a light hopping (Mandarina Bavaria and Hallertau Blanc). Then they have beers like Astral Traveler which takes Satellite Architect as a base and more heavily hops it with Amarillo and Citra. Estuarial is great for people looking for classic Saisons, Satellite is just an overall fantastic beer, and Astral Traveler, well, it might as well be an IPA dressed up as a Saison. They also have mixed fermentation and foudre aged as well. Now the problem with both Allagash and Amory's Tomb approach is that while both might bring some people into the Saison fold you still potentially set them up to expect something else from a Saison when they encounter them in the future. Therein lies the problem with craft beer, it requires a bit of education and understanding to get what you want. We could talk about Cream Ales in this way as well. They are potentially exactly what many beer drinkers are looking for in a beer but no one will try them because "Cream Ale" is not what most people think it is. The complexity in craft is what draws most of us in but it also keeps many people out. I'd worry about this but I think there are much harder problems in educating people these days outside of craft...

 

These are all well thought out arguments, but they all speak to the need for this thread. Saisons can be wonderful thing, the average consumer just doesn't understand them.

Folks need to not just post the thing that they traded for or drove a couple hours for, or even just the classics, but the brewery next door's take on the style, and how they feel about it.

It's a pretty wide open style (could be hoppy, could be tart, could be neither, yeast character [esters and phenols] varies a lot, malt character is up in the air), with a lot of interpretation, but it's a lovable style. It's pretty much the cute pit-mix up for adoption (I've been looking for a dog recently)

 

Ehh, I dunno, I feel like there’s plenty of subtlety these days on the shelves. There’s a boatload of Pilsners on the shelves among other classic styles from breweries.

Last weekend I had a Munich Dunkel from Exhibit A and Schilling in my fridge, I have an Oktoberfest from Notch, I’m picking up Notch’s Schwarzbier and Standard too...

...I could also pick up Gretel, a German Pils from Idle Hands, there’s a new Vienna lager I saw at the store last weekend that I didn’t pick up simply because I already have too much beer already. Same with Small Change’s English Dark Mild I had to pass on. The list goes on and on.

Well, I could be explain the biological reason you have children, but I think you know that part already.