Bananarama

My good friend Greg is an enabler; every time he goes on a trip, he returns with several beers for me to try that neither of us have heard of. Some are horrendous (more on that in a future post; "Beers I Have Endured" is a feature I may bring to the blog), most are great and some are simply amazing. Greg is my favorite enabler.

While at his house last night, Greg presented me with a beer that could have been worrisome were it not for the fact that I'll try anything: the UK's Wells Brewery Banana Bread Ale.
(yes, that's the bottle for the pic on a table that includes my own tabletop gaming passion, Warmachine...not all dorks drink Mountain Dew all night; some of us drink beer)

My brain screamed out in terror: another fruit beer! Say it ain't so! From Cerise to Apricot Ale, fruit beers, with a few exceptions, tend to resemble alco-pops and wine spritzers more than fine balances between fruit and beer (Dogfish Head's Aprihop, Magic Hat's #9 and Unibroue's Ephemere are some of my favorite exceptions to that rule; Pyramid's Aprihop, Hilton Head's Blueberry Wheat and AB's Wild Blue Blueberry Lager are the worst adherents). But being of warped mind and tolerant body, I decided to dive in and give it a shot.

I am glad I did.

Wells offering pours like a loaf of homemade banana bread; golden brown, capped in a creamy fluff. Carbonation like the flecks of banana throughout. Lacing down the sides of the glass like the bits of sticky sweetness that hangs on to the pan. Looked tantalizing enough, and thankfully, none of that electric purple color you get in other fruit beers. Subtle like a Brit, this beer.

Blindfold me and I would swear this was a slice of banana bread. Banana taffy, sticky sweet, reaches out of the glass first. The beer bottle claims that organic bananas are used in every batch and I don't doubt it. Right behind that is caramel-toffee from lovely malts and even a walnut aroma from the interplay between malt and yeast. Not much in the way of beery aromas; the bananas dominate. But traditional British-style bready aromas work wonderfully with the bananas to fool any nose into convincing its accompanying palate into expecting bread instead of beer.

And fooled my palate was. Big bold banana taste, slight caramel, roasted nuts and toffee fill out the flavors in this beer. The banana is the star without a doubt. Maybe it's that bananas are more subtle and less powerfully-sweet (like berries or cherries can be), but I found that is wasn't overpowering. Like the aroma, my tongue swore (as it too often does) that this wasn't a beer at all.

My only criticism of this beer is that it is a bit of a one-trick pony; it's all banana bread and very little beer. It lacks the complexity of a truly world-class fruit beer. As a novelty, though, it's really well-done and I'd drink more than one on a night; it's not every day you drink a beer that makes you swear it's something else. If you don't like bananas or banana bread, I sure hoped you stopped reading at the title of the post! But if you want to try a nicely done, unique beer, give Banana Bread Ale a shot. What it lacks in intricacy it makes up for in tastes we all love from grandma's kitchen. In Yorkshire.

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Not Just Your Average Fruit Beer

As some of the ATK regulars know, contributor Sopor was recently hired as a brewer at the Mt. Pleasant Brewing Company in Mt Pleasant, Michigan. We are, of course, thrilled that one of our own is officially in the big leagues.

Sopor graciously supplies me with some of their beers so that we can review them. I promised him to be objective; if a beer needs work, it needs work, and it yields a better product. If a beer is truly great, then they can run with it (not that my reviews mean much...). Sopor is also going to post some pieces and pictures about days in the life of a real brewer. That will be some great insight and I look forward to his posts.

At any rate, one of the beers he dropped off the other day is Mt. Pleasant Brewing Company's Coal Stokers Blackberry Ale, with real blackberry juice added to the brew. Let's begin!

Sopor's beer poured a hazy amber into my pint glass. It added a purple hue to that lovely amber and yielded a bit of a purplish-white head that settled quickly.

Coal Stokers had a nice berry aroma over the top of everything; not too much, and not so scant that it was supressed. What was nice about the aroma with this beer s that th sweet berry wasn't all-powerful, like those horrid imitation blueberry beers. This was balanced by a solid malt backbone. The malty roastiness and sweetness really shined along with the berry.

Pleasantly, this beer was balanced between berry and malt as I drank it. There is a touch of sweetness to this beer; the fruit character is evident, but like the aroma, it's not overwhelming. The beer is also slightly tart. I got malt and roast first, followed by a run of fruit flavor: blackberry jam and juice and even raspberry notes. I didn't get a hop presence at all, and I honestly would have liked some for just a little variation on the taste. Maybe a West Coast hop for some citrus or a German hop for some earthy/spicy flavors to add some complexity. This was a medium-bodied beer, a little watery-thin, with moderate amounts of carbonation. The carbonation was enough to let you know it's beer without being too scrubby-bubbles about it or without being, as some fruit beers are, tragically flat.

All in all, this is a really nice fruit beer. It is unmistakably the kind of fruit it says it is, but it's not cloying and actually tastes very natural. I did not get a sense that this is artificial or extract-like. There are so many fruit beers that are over-the-top in their fruit flavors (see my review about Founder's Cerise), but this one struck a decent balance. I gave a bottle to one of my neighbors, who shared it with his wife who normally dislikes beer. They really liked this beer and are interested in getting more. It pleased both the beer crowd and the non-beer crowd.

Great effort from the Mt. Pleasant Brewing folks! I liked it as much as Sammy A's Cherry Wheat (though with all honesty, one of the best fruit beers ever brewed is DFH's Aprihop).

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A Pale Comparison To The Original

Last week in my beer news roundup, I mentioned Founders Brewing Company has recently released Cerise, a pale ale with loads of Traverse City-grown cherries in every batch. This week, I had the opportunity to try some on tap at my favorite local watering hole, Brannigan Brothers. Cerise is the replacement for the recently discontinued Rubaeus, a raspberry beer, which had a broad following and was a very balanced fruit beer. Rubaeus fans have been grousing, and unfortunately, Cerise doesn't do much to satisfy their concerns. It doesn't help when Cerise is French for Cherry. Are we still pissed at the French?
My lovely waitress handed me a full pint of a hazy, dark pink beer. It appeared quite effervescent but had virtually no head. As I drank, it left lacing, but it did retain that thin foam cap.

The beer's aroma was predominantly sour cherries with hints of malt behind it. It is impossible to mistake this beer for anything other than cherry. A hint of "christmas spices" (think: mulled cider) hang out behind all that cherry.

My problem with the taste is that while I am sure Founders is being honest when they say they use 30 gallons of cherries in every batch, something in the taste just doesn't quite seem natural. It's so cherry that it seems contrived. As the aroma, sour cherry is the dominant flavor. It finished like a cherry pie where someone forgot to add the sugar: pucker-tart. It's very flavorful, but is missing the malt and hop profile to confirm that this is a beer and not an alco-pop. It also finishes with a hint of a lambic-like yeasty funk, which is about the best part of the beer.

Ceris is medium bodied with a syrupy quality. The carbonation separates it from a wine cooler, really.

I have to say I was disappointed in this beer. I love Founders; it's my favorite in-state brewery. But this just left me lacking. I liked (and many other people liked) Rubaeus because while you could taste the raspberry, there was a big malt profile and hop character that reminded you it was a beer. Rubaeus was a marriage between raspberries and a solid ale. Ceris? Cherry juice with alcohol in it. Sure to please people who otherwise won't drink beer, Ceris could be a "gateway" beer for someone looking for an intro to the world beyond mixed drinks and Miller. But for ATK regulars? Stick with a cherry wheat if you must.

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