I finally have a chance to dip into the fridge or cellar, and enjoy some beers that I bought myself, for no other reason than they looking interesting, and because I still hold out hope of having had a beer from every brewer in this area. That’s a goal, though, that keeps moving further away from my starting point.
The first bottle I grabbed turned out to be further away from my “local” beat. Breese, Illinois, about 45 mile due east of St. Louis, is home to Excel Bottling & Brewing. They may not be the oldest brewer in the state, but they’re definitely the oldest company that is brewing beer now. The company was started in 1936 be Edwin and Catherine Meier, using funds, their web site says, from a reward Edward earned for catching a bank robber. They now proclaim themselves as one of the few remaining “mom and pop” soda makers in the country, with a full line of original brands made with cane sugar and still sold in returnable bottles. They’re also regional bottlers for nostalgia brands like Frostie Root Beer and Ski fruit sodas.
While serving the “nostalgia soda” segment, they decided to get into making beer in 2012, hiring Rod Burguiere, a former Stone brewer from California They now produce a full line of regular beers, seasonal, special releases and draft kegs. After a coming out at GuysDrinkingBeer’s 2015 “South of 80” Chicago Craft Beer Week event, Excel can now be found in local stores.
So I sat on the patio Sunday evening and popped the top on a stubby of Excel’s Flash Bang Hoppy American Wheat Ale. It’s described as an unfiltered wheat ale brewed and then dryhopped with Citra, and Amarillo. And it on a Bronze medal in the American Wheat Beer category at the World Beer Cup.
The bottle pours a big fluffy hefeweizen head. From that head, my nose picks up the spiciness of wheat malt and some mostly bitter American hops, with perhaps just a hint of mango in the nose.
The taste starts with a bit of lemon or other citrus. Not a lot of exotic hop character flavor, but certainly some bitterness lingers in the back of my palate. Haziness in the glass is indeed close to a hefeweizen, but is none of the bubblegum or other esters. The appearance is probably more attractive than my cloudy evening photo suggests.
This is a well-balanced beer that may not be a mouth burning hop bomb. Put it on the American Wheat spectrum between Goose Island 312 and Three Floyds’ Gumballhead. I think it would pair well with any main course, but I’m mainly thinking of baked fish. Its 4.6% abc won’t overwhelm your ability to enjoy food, but its hop bitterness with add some zest to a pale white meat, or a creamy cheese.
