Professor Good Ales

Here at PGA we have had regular links to A Tempest in a Tankard, a website we highly recommend. Because of the crisis we have permission to post the whole article. Please visit A Tempest in a Tankard, where Franz will have more articles during this crisis.

Written by Franz Hofer for A Tempest in a Tankard

Never in recent memory has the phrase “support your local brewery” meant more than it does now.

I published an article in the local newspaper a week ago about the inaugural Oklahoma Craft Beer Awards. It began like this:

“Oklahoma may have been a craft beer desert a decade ago, but the beer scene has exploded in the past seven years. The Sooner State is now home to over sixty breweries, and just about every city has a brewpub or three.”

In retrospect, it seems I had begun to take craft beer for granted. I can find literally dozens more brands and styles now than when we moved to Oklahoma. Our town, Stillwater, has a brewery. When we go to OKC or Tulsa, we can easily spend an afternoon visiting new breweries and old favourites. And I’m set whenever I visit family and friends in Vancouver.

What a difference a week makes.

Continue reading “BEER AND PANDEMICS 101: SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BREWERY”

 “Really, Ken, a failed company?” Actually Studebaker survived, now part of Worthington Industries. They simply don’t make cars anymore, which hooks right back into my main point here…

 

 I know Studebaker no longer makes cars, a fact I have never been happy with. However, I may never have met my first love on 4 wheels: a 61 Studebaker car I bought for $25 and took me 100,000 miles before rust and burning oil issues took Harvey away, if they had stayed in the car business. A 7 year old car for $25? Eventually Harvey went to automotive heaven where oil changes happen every day and no rust dare enter those chrome hubcap gates.
 I didn’t name the car. My ex-girlfriend’s friend did.
 Studebaker as a car and truck builder survived, often barely, though tough times, like craft brewing will be going through now. Yes, there are Studebaker-related lessons for tough times, like during Corona, for the small professional brewer to heed. I will bring it back around to just beer.

Continue reading “A Beer-y Good Story: How Studebaker Might Help Craft Beer in the Days of COVID-19”

Profiled by Ken Carman

Hazy golden yellow with almost no head. This head fades quickly probably due to sour, peanut butter, raspberries. Very tiny bubbles. Yellow in color. Clarity low due to haze.
Aroma:lactobacillus dominant, no peanut, hint of raspberries at best. Slightest sour. No malt or hop aroma. No hops.
Mouthfeel: medium carbonation, slightly carbonic. Medium body. Tingles and tangles up the tongue with the sour combined with carbonic carbonation.
Flavor: lacto first, lacto dominant. Almost no peanut butter, almost no raspberries, lacto aftertaste. Everything takes the most backseat in the theater to the lacto. As it warms I got a hint of peanut: like it sltightly touches the tongue then goes away.
The mouthfeel is solid with a medium body, but any sense of that body otherwise vanished with lacto. Carbonation a very light tingle and quite low.
The balance here is off. If one seeks a solid lacto dominant beer this might be it, but the rest is lost. Please back off on lacto, find the fruit, find the peanut butter. The malt is there, but even that is severely subservient to the lacto. No hops.

3.9 BA
3.74 Untappd
3.83 Rate Beer

3.5

Welcome to the PGA beer rating system: one beer “Don’t bother.” Two: Eh, if someone gives it to you, drink. Three: very good, go ahead and seek it out, but be aware there is at least one problem. Four: seek it out. Five: pretty much “perfecto.”

_____________________Beer HERE

Profiled by Maria Devan

Golden amber color with an eggshell white head of foam that fell clinging leaving some bubbles and a light film.

Nose is grassy hops with a touch of mint and a sweet breeze from honey. Light lemon backing to these hops give a delightful nose. Clean, no diacetyl. No acetaldehyde, no fruity esters from yeast.

Malt is a sweetened cracker without any fruity scents of its own to offer. Drinks with moderate carbonation and surprisingly bready flavor. The taste of honey permeates but doesn’t dominate. Moderately strong carbonation and a balanced bitterness to leave some of that sweet honey flavor behind. Delightful beer. This beer will pair with my Mexican style lamb chops and cumin rice.

4

Welcome to the PGA beer rating system: one beer “Don’t bother.” Two: Eh, if someone gives it to you, drink. Three: very good, go ahead and seek it out, but be aware there is at least one problem. Four: seek it out. Five: pretty much “perfecto.”

___________________________Beer HERE

Profiled by Ken Carman

Perfect clarity, golden quaff. Head is slightly off white and fades very fast into sides of the glass. Tiniest of bubbles. Yellow highlights in pure gold.
Mouthfeel is off dry with light carbonation. There’s the slightest harshness that clings to the roof of the mouth, like a bittering hop that popped through.
Aroma is vanilla and a slight sour. I do get slight cocoa nibs, orange peel, no cinnamon in the nose, no pecans. Balance in aroma differs from flavor.
To be honest the flavor is this is somewhat annoying. Unlike aroma orange peel is dominant: so much so, combined with vanilla, I get no malt, almost nothing else. Carbonation is medium and carbonic. It has a hint of a bite. Aftertaste is slight sour with orange peel, as well as in the finish. Very slightly dry, unlike King Cake. I have had King Cake. I have had the BEST King Cake: sour dough, not the coffee cake version. I think this was an attempt at the sour dough version of King Cake. An attempt. Not all that successful.
If I ordered this I’d probably give it to someone else after half a glass then order something I’d like better. It simply doesn’t quite work. The ale is indistinct, not that much of a base for what’s supposed to be King Cake. That would be OK if the King Cake were really King-ish. Missed that mark. A King Cake would be sweeter and the flavors more balanced. Same for aroma, except that balance is different.
The secret here would be in having it finish a little more sweet, balance out the spices, the nuts, and maybe just a hint more of the ale. Otherwise the only “death” here is the concept this is King Cake-ish at all.

untappd 3.5
BA 84%
RB 3.74

3.2

Welcome to the PGA beer rating system: one beer “Don’t bother.” Two: Eh, if someone gives it to you, drink. Three: very good, go ahead and seek it out, but be aware there is at least one problem. Four: seek it out. Five: pretty much “perfecto.”

__________________Beer HERE