My hopes to get in maybe 12 beers for the Christmas rush have already likely run aground. I’ve been waylaid by a cold for the past week which would have kept me from being able to much of anything. That and trying to set up some new financing for the Beeronaut’s home base. But I shall push on with what I can come up with. In this case, here’s another beer sent for my consideration (full disclosure) by Louis Glunz Beer.
Begyle Brewing Co.’s Christmas Ale, from the community-supported brewery in Ravenswood, is a seasonal beer described on its label thus:
Our Christmas Ale is a spiced beer featuring bay leaves and cinnamon sticks. The spices are rounded out by a blend of European style malts and an American ale yeast. Best served along side family and friends, this beer reminds us that it is a wonderful life.
This is a 7% abv beer, sold in 22 oz. “bomber” bottles, so definitely intended for sharing.
I do caution that I believe spiced beers should be opened in or over the sink. In my experience, sometimes, tiny particles of the spice might linger in the bottle, and when the cap is popped, they become nucleation sites to start a gusher. But as it happened, this beer gave me no such problem, and opened cleanly, with the “pshhht” that gladdens a beer drinker’s heart.
I get a light spicy smell after popping the cap. Not so much cinnamon, more of a general spice, a bit more prominent than in an Anchor Our Special. The color is a ruby red to brown, with a thin layer of foam that persists after several minutes.
The taste is rather smooth. There’s kind of an English Old Ale base, but not very alcoholic at first. A lot of malt backs the spice up. Would not know much about the bay leaf: that’s the thing we have to take out after cooking with it. But it is a nice Christmas spice ale, only slightly similar to pumpkin pie spice. I also get a side note of red wine at the sides of my mouth.
This is very much a beer for this holiday season, as I suspect it might get a phenolic edge if it ages too long, the bane of malty beers. So buy enough for this year, and open it along with your main course.
