Thursday, August 09, 2007

A Second Double Dose of Bear Republic

As mentioned a last week, the great Bear Republic has finally made its way to Houston and I couldn't be happier. This week I went out and I picked up two other big bottles to enjoy.
XP Pale Ale: This is Bear Republics Exceptional Pale Ale and its quite a good one. It weighs in at 5.4% abv and 55 IBU. It pours a nice bright orange color with a bright white foamy head. Notes of pine, grapefruit and citrus peel are all over the nose, with slight floral hints showing up. The mouth is effervescent, light body, with a slightly yeast note. Smooth and very well balanced, notes of pale malts show up as well. A little piney at times, but very nice. I'd give it an B+. As for the folks at BA, here's what they have to say.
Hop Rod Rye Ale: Made with 20% Rye Malt, weighing in at 7.5% abv and 90+IBU's this is a strong American Pale Ale. The beer pours a cloudy brown with a tan creamy head. Piney hops abound on the nose, malts, and bready notes show up as well. This beer has a really thick mouthfeel, with hoppy bitterness up front exploding into pine needles and flowing into a light sour bready note from the rye before finishing up in another strong wave of hop bitterness. I really enjoyed the ebbs and flows in the taste profile of this beer. Probably my favorite of the ones that I had, I'd give it a strong A-. The folks at BA tend to agree.
Well so far those are the 4 beers from BR that I have seen in my market. One thing is for sure, they do Pale Ales, and IPA's wonderfully well, but I'm eager to see what else they can do. Hopefully we'll get some more of their beers here, or else I may have to just travel to the West Coast (now that would be a shame).

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

That's it; I've been hearing about this stuff long enough. It's high time I went and picked some up for myself.