Labatt Blue Citra

When I first saw Labatt Blue Citra on the shelf, I knew it was only a matter of time until I tried it. Normally, Labatt is a brand I tend to shy away from. My reason for this has little to do with how it tastes, but more because of the memories associated with it. It was the beer from my early days of drinking that I not only lost some battles to, I lost the war.

To this day, I can’t look at Labatt Blue, Jack Daniels or Absolut Citron without feeling my stomach turn. Perhaps, one day that will change, but I have been thinking that for well over a decade and nothing has changed. However, when I first saw Labatt Blue Citra, a light, hoppy session lager, I surprisingly did not feel my stomach turn. I thought it had potential to be a nice, sessionable, reasonably priced summer beer. So for the first time in a very long time, I purchased a beer with the Labatt name on it.

The Citra & Mosaic hops featured in Labatt Blue Citra are light and most noticeable in the aroma. Zesty grapefruit, along with tropical fruit(particularly pineapple) come through along with bread dough, floral notes, herbal spice and grass. Once it hit my palate, the unfortunate memories of drinking Labatt Blue came flooding back. The familiar bready, grain malt sweetness comes through, and combined with the grassy, spicy finish should have made me nauseous. What was different though were the subtle notes of grapefruit & tropical fruit. They were a welcome addition to this familiar beer and I found myself enjoying them. I want to reinforce that the hops here are light but I do not feel like I needed more from a beer that was clearly brewed for a broader audience. The hops were just enough to make a familiar beer just different enough.

Labatt Blue Citra is not going to blow your mind. It is just a simple, easy drinking lager with a touch of hops. If you are a fan of Labatt Blue, I think you will like this beer. From the point of view of someone who typically avoids Labatt products at all costs, I found it to be a surprisingly enjoyable beer I would not mind drinking again when the weather gets warmer. I found that to be a pleasant surprise.


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Jack’s Abby Citra Brau Lager

I am always looking for a great value and Jack’s Abby always seems to deliver just that. Over the years, the Framingham, Massachusetts Brewery has become a personal favorite of mine. The main reasons for that are they consistently push the boundaries of creativity with their lagers and they are always priced reasonably. I honestly can’t recall a single beer from them I have not enjoyed. Granted, there are some of their beers I prefer more than others, but that is how I feel about every brewery. Jack’s Abby consistently makes solid beer at a great price and their latest offering, Citra Brau, reinforces that.

I keep mentioning that Jack’s Abby beer is always a great value, but Citra Brau is the first beer from them that actually gave me “sticker shock”. “Sticker shock" is something that happens to every beer enthusiast at one time or another. It usually occurs when you find yourself paying a bit more for a beer than you expected to. For Citra Brau, a dry-hopped citra lager, I had the complete opposite reaction. A 6-pack of 16 oz. cans is priced around 10 dollars. Once I tried it, I felt like I had found one of the best values currently on the market. 

Citra Brau certainly showcases the citra hop but Jack's Abby balances it beautifully with a fantastic lager backbone. The aroma is super dank, floral, grassy, grainy and very fruity.  The taste matches the nose and as I mentioned earlier it is beautifully balanced. Orange, lemon, peach, melon, resinous pine and grass hit initially before the slightly sweet, grainy, crackery malt profile comes into play. The finish is dry, peppery, crisp & clean. Nothing here is going to blow you away, but this is a really nice, easy drinking lager with just the right amount of hop flavor.

Clocking in at 5.5%, Citra Brau is sessionable and a beer I hope to see year-round from Jack's Abby, especially for the summer. Citra Brau has "lawnmower beer" written all over it. In the meantime, its very reasonable price point could make it a staple in my refrigerator for the foreseeable future. Once again, Jack's Abby delivers another solid beer.


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Jack's Abby Kiwi Rising

I love this time of year. The weather is crisp, the leaves are changing colors, Halloween is right around the corner and the best beer of the year is starting to hit shelves. It seems that multiple fantastic beers are coming out each week and my wallet can't take it. Last week alone, I stocked my refrigerator up with some amazing offerings like: Lawson's Sip of Sunshine, Stone Xocoveza, Oskar Blue's Death By Coconut, New Holland's Dragon's Milk, Grimm's Double Negative, and the beer I am talking about today, Jack's Abby's Kiwi Rising Double India Pale Lager. It has gotten to a point that it could take several minutes for me to decide what to drink. I know whatever it is, is going to be fantastic but that does not make it any easier.

The reason I want to talk about Kiwi Rising in this blog is that I want to tell you how great it is. Normally, I spend a lot of time telling you whether I think a beer is good or not. I am just going to start this blog off by telling you Kiwi Rising is amazing. Brewed with New Zealand hops and not Kiwi fruit, this beer is very hoppy(105 IBUs), easy to drink and wonderfully complex. I think it is safe to say it is my favorite offering from Jack's Abby. That truly says a lot because Jack's Abby makes some incredible beers. A few of the other beers I enjoy from them are: Mass Rising DIPL, Excess IPL, Framinghammer Baltic Porter, Cranberry Berliner, and Calyptra Session IPL. I am going to stop there because I feel that list could keep going and going and going. The point I am trying to get to is, no matter what you buy from them you are most likely going to get a great beer.

The reason I want to talk specifically about Kiwi Rising is that I simply want to spread the word about it. I have found that too many of my craft beer drinking friends have not tried it or even worse, haven’t heard of it. To someone who loves this particular beer I find both to be simply unacceptable. Each Fall, as soon as it hits shelves, I buy it and every year it delivers something special. The aroma is floral, to a point it is almost perfume-like. Big notes of citrus, tropical fruit, pine resin and bread dough all stand out nicely. The first sip matches the nose to an extent but the doughy malt really shines initially, really giving this DIPL a solid malt backbone. This is followed by pineapple, grapefruit, grass, orange, candied mango, lime and an herbal, piney, crisp finish. Kiwi Rising is dangerously easy to drink at 8.5%. You might find that the first one goes down very easy. Just take a moment to contemplate before reaching for the second.

Kiwi Rising is the perfect beer right now for our Bi-Polar October weather. For a hot day, it delivers a crisp, easy drinking hoppy lager. For a cooler night, it provides a full flavored beer that warms the soul. Basically, if you love a good hoppy beer, this is a must try. Make sure you hurry up though, this beer never stays around long.

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Jack's Abby & Søle Wicked Philthy IPL

When I think of reliable breweries, one of the first breweries I think of is Jack's Abby Craft Lagers. Jack's Abby consistently makes great lagers and on a regular basis can be found in my refrigerator. One of the things I admire most about Jack's Abby is the fact that they seemingly continue to find new ways to enhance their diverse catalog of beers. Each year, I look forward to the release of their Kiwi Rising Double IPL, their Framinghammer Baltic Porter and its barrel aged variants in particular. For this blog, I wanted to take a look at their latest IPL release which is a collaboration with Søle Artisan Ales, Wicked Philthy IPL.

Due to my love of Jack's Abby Kiwi Rising and Excess IPL, I was certain Wicked Philthy was going to be a winner. It poured a beautifully hazy golden-orange with a fluffy white head. A strong floral, almost perfume-like aroma practically jumped out of the glass. The nose also contained lots of grapefruit, malt breadiness, and tropical notes. My first sip was herbal, spicy at first, giving way to flavors of melon, grapefruit, bread, and grass before a pine, bitter, boozy, astringent finish. There are some nice things going on here but unfortunately overall, this beer is underwhelming. The herbal, earthy spice started things off nicely but seems to overshadow just about everything else. The tropical and citrus hop flavors are present as I mentioned earlier but unfortunately are not nearly as bold as they should be. They get lost in the shuffle between the spice and the finish, which is ridiculously bitter. The finish in particular is where things completely fell apart from me. After each sip, the astringent bitterness seemed to get stronger. I found myself laboring to get through the last few sips of this beer.

For the past few blogs, I seem to have started a streak of positive reviews. When I selected Wicked Philthy IPL for this blog, I thought that streak would continue. I also thought that things might start getting a little boring around here if I sang the praises of every beer I drank and wrote about.  Fortunately, things are not getting boring around here, the streak is now officially over. Unfortunately, this is a surprisingly disappointing offering from the normally reliable Jack's Abby.

Overall I would rate Wicked Philthy IPL a 2.5/5. It's not a terrible beer, it's just nowhere near as good as other Jack's Abby IPL offerings.

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Craft Beer Recommendations For Your Stubborn Macro Beer Drinking Family Member: From Your Pal, Sean

My Dad and I have a bit of a Thanksgiving tradition. He comes over and asks to try whatever beers I recommend from my refrigerator and I oblige. His sampling usually goes on for several hours. He calls it his “Trip Around the World.” At the end of it, he will pick his favorites, as well as tell me which ones he did not enjoy. He will then go home and the next beer he will buy on his own will still be Heineken, Corona or Guinness. While I have nothing against those beers, I still hold out hope that one day he will find a beer in my refrigerator that breaks this habit. One that is so good to him that it finds its way into his regular drinking rotation. I know I can't be alone in this. We probably all have a family member that regularly drinks macro beer when we wish they would find their way into the craft beer domain. So instead of reviewing beer this week, I am going to recommend what I consider several gateway beers that I use to try and steer people into craft beer. They are not crazy, complicated beers, they are just solid beers that are an excellent introduction to their respective style.

I mentioned earlier that my Dad likes Guinness. I gave him Left Hand Milk Stout Nitro for the first time and his mind was blown. Think of this as a slightly sweeter, more boozy version of Guinness Draught. At 6%, the booze is beautifully hidden behind semi-sweet chocolate and roasted malt. This is a perfect beer for the cooler months ahead. It's also super fun to pour...

(Sweet shirt, right?)

Saisons are not the easiest beer to give an inexperienced beer drinker. Some of them are too spicy. Some of them are a bit too funky. I have even had some that have tasted like I was drinking an ashtray. Brooklyn Brewery makes one of the best saisons I've had. It's a wonderful showcase for the sorachi ace hop. It has a beautifully light lemon note and a wonderful malt backbone. It's easy to drink and deceptively strong at 7.2%. If you know someone or are someone who absolutely despises saisons, try this one. You and/or they might be pleasantly surprised, I know I was.

Ithaca Apricot Wheat is a beer I had back for the first time in 2004. It was also one of the first fruited beers I tried. In my early days of craft beer drinking, I did my best to steer clear of fruit beers. I immediately enjoyed this one and to this day find a way to have a few. I actually got my wife into craft beer by having her try this beer. Because of that we actually served it at our wedding. It was a big hit with some people and too big of a hit to others. Simply put, this is a super easy drinking, fruit-forward beer. If you like apricot, you will probably like this.

Finally, I couldn't write this blog without touching upon something hoppy. Jack's Abby Calyptra Session India Pale Lager is perfect for your macro lager drinking friends. It has a wonderful lager backbone with a beautiful but not overwhelming tropical and citrus hop profile. At no point does it get too bitter. It is just an easy drinking 4.9%, and is perfect for a long, drawn out holiday celebration. This has also become a favorite of my father, I just can't seem to get him to remember the name. He just calls it “the purple can” and encourages me to bring it over when I visit. I have a fridge full of it for Thanksgiving, so I hope with repetition he finally remembers its name.

All of these beers are easy drinking and a beautiful example of their respective styles. Each one is extremely easy to drink. I just hope you err on the side of caution if you decide to have a session with the Sorachi Ace. I also hope that these recommendations help you, or help you get a friend or family member a bit more into craft beer.

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Thanks for reading and Happy Thanksgiving Sláinte!

Jack's Abby Hoponius Union

Pearl Jam, the Boston Red Sox and craft beer are three things I love. With the recent announcement of two Pearl Jam shows at Fenway Park, the excitement I feel at the moment is particularly overwhelming. To think, my favorite band is going to take the stage and deliver two performances on one of baseball's legendary fields is incredible. This is the same field that Red Sox heroes like Ted Williams, Carlton Fisk, David Ortiz, Curt Schilling and Dave Roberts delivered moments no Red Sox fan will ever forget. While starting a long list of great Red Sox moments sounds fun, it does not really work here. And while it is exciting, a concert on hallowed ground is not the only reason to travel to Boston this summer. With so much great beer coming out of Massachusetts that never finds its way to New York this seems like a summer vacation to top all summer vacations. But all of that will have to wait until August because a beer needs to get reviewed right now. To prove that this long-winded introduction is going somewhere, I decided a beer from Massachusetts that was readily available in my area would work perfectly for this review.  So I hopped in my car and headed to my local bottle shop looking for a beer I had yet to have. The beer I decided to go with is Hoponius Union from the always reliable Jack's Abby Craft Lagers. 

Hoponius Union India Pale Lager pours gold with light amount of sediment and a fluffy white head. The aroma is bursting with hops that provide beautiful grapefruit, citrus and tropical fruit notes. Basically there is nothing else in the aroma except bold hops. The flavor however is slightly different. The initial flavor is a burst of floral & citrus hops that fades quickly and then finishes with the bready, crisp, malty flavor of a lager. There is some subtle herbal hop bitterness in the finish as well that sticks around and continued to grow the further I got into the glass. That was my only real issue with this rather tasty lager. I think I would have preferred a crisp, clean finish instead of lingering hop bitterness. Without question if that was the case this beer would have been quite sessionable, even with a 6.7% ABV. But instead by the time my glass was empty I knew I had drank a quality beer but not one I would want a second glass of. 

Overall I would rate Jack's Abby Hoponius Union a 3/5. While not a preferred choice, this could make for a good beer on a crisp summer night under the lights at Fenway.



Rating Scale:
1 - Repugnant and undrinkable
2 - Acceptable but forgettable
3 - Good, worth a purchase
4 - Excellent, a step above the norm
5 - Truly exceptional　

To discuss this blog or all things beer follow me on Twitter & Untappd at @ACraftyLook
For more beer reviews go to: http://acraftylook.blogspot.com/

Thanks for reading. Sláinte!