Bottle Share: 4 Hands Pyrus Saison and Jester King El Cidra

So my buddy Franklin had a bottle of Three Floyds Blackheart to share, as well as a couple of other bottles, so he came over and we split some stuff. We started with the Blackheart (which I didn’t bother to review) but I did do tasting notes on paper for the two bottles of Lidney’s that we split. I’m basically transcribing verbatim below, with exact transcription in italics.

4 Hands Pyrus Saison

Pours yellow-orange with a thin white head that dissipates quickly. Aroma is super dry, with pear, notes of funk, perhaps some brettanomyces? Taste follows the nose very well.

At this point I just transcribed one word: salty so I suppose I was getting hints of saltiness on the back of the palate. Then: Extremely dry. Crisp. Green apples. Green apples can be a sign of acetaldehyde but here I think it’s more likely just a yeast ester. (Lots of things can add green apple flavor to a beer.)

Drinkable, good, not too complex.

Rating: B+

Onward and upward.

Jester King El Cidra

This is a dry-hopped and cedar-aged ale from Jester King. It sounded gimmicky to me, but Lidney typically doesn’t steer me wrong, and I quite liked Black Metal, the only other beer from the brewery. I ended up amazed at the quality.

Cloudy yellow-white. White head sticks around.

Smells of weirdly complex roasty, grapefruit/orange rind. Gourdy. Definite woody undertones. Taste follows the nose. Delicious.

This one had a really interesting spicy note that was really hard to place for certain. This was the first beer in awhile that I wish I had done a video for, because the process of me trying to find the particular flavors was probably really entertaining.

With yeast very bready. Fruity ester notes. More green apple? Hugely complex spice build. Allspice, nutmeg, cinnamon.

Rating:A, maybe even an A+

Schlitz (Video)

Chad sent me a can of Schlitz. I reviewed it. All in one take, no less. What else do I have to say?