Shiner Bock

Shiner Bock
Spoetzl Brewery
Shiner, Texas

I have another conspiracy theory: this is two year past date Samuel Adams Octoberfest. Have you ever had an expired S.A. Oct? Well, I used to buy it for $4 or $5 a six pack at a local store and found it much better than the fresh stuff. The caramel and malt had formed a sort of sweet squash buttery taste that border-lined on butterscotch as opposed to the monkey-bite of hop bitterness that their Ocky has. That was at a year old and I'm just extrapolating this out to two years from fresh. Shiner basically makes a bock lite. The minimal scratch at the ingredients. More or less a macro bock! Not bad for a crappy bar beer but the only craft put into this was the work it took to make it a macro while calling it a crafter.


PS...like my Paulaner pilsner glass? I got it along with a Pilsner Urquell glass at a rummage sale for 10c a piece! Oh, you people in high stations don't know the great joy of small pleasures.

-Wörtwurst

Shiner Light

Shiner Light
Spoetzl Brewery
Shiner, Texas

The Bard voiced his disapproval today about "how fast" I pour my beers and the subsequent spill-overs that occur due to this quickening and he's right. However, I only have 30 seconds to pour the thing and when I don't pre-move the cap and I fumble with it then some hurrying will occur. I mean, do you want to see the grainy, blurry pour or the blurry, grainy head and the illegible cap art. Me, I kind of like the overflows and I'll tell you why: because stupidity no longer fazes me. Sure, I might bitch about it but it doesn't really prick the surface of my rubbery head, heart, or the remaining gelationous mass. Anyhow, I poured this mediocre lager as slow as possible. It's blase and we all expected that, right? Of course we did. Fuck this beer. Not in an angry bash in the walls kind of way but in a I'll never drink this again because it's a nothing beer way. Actually, it's not bad for a light beer but f- it anyway. Who wants to drink light beer? Also, doesn't smoked sausage sound good right about now?

Oh yeah, I started a new blog. It showcases obscure records that I have collected sporadically over the years. I'm currently back into it. If anything, it showcases my lack of a life which is just how I like it.

-Wörtwurst

Shiner Hefeweizen

Shiner Hefeweizen
Spoetzl Brewery
Shiner, Texas

Somebody's got a yeast infection and it ain't you or I. It's a geyser called Spoetzl. In other news you're not getting the bread, the beer and the chuffing horse with this one. No, what we have here is a white ale that approaches a low-level Belgian but without the candy puss and the refined palate. The lemon and orange are principles along with Captain Wheat and his merry grain-men. You can't really call this a failure because it's rather drinkable in a summer session sort of way, it's just not what you bargained for when you dialed up that dancing girl, Hefe Jo Hefe, with the quarter-sized eyeballs and other balls which we shall not mention here in this family-friendly forum. Do you get me? Good for what it isn't and not really what it is at all.

-Wörtwurst

Yuengling Black & Tan

Yuengling Black & Tan
D. G. Yuengling & Son, Inc.
Pottsville, Pennsylvania

I picked this stuff up when I was in Nashville last weekend. At $5.99 a sixer I didn't think I could lose. I've always wanted to try something from our oldest brewery and this brew doesn't disappoint. Now, it's not on par with some of the better craft porters but it delivers a solid dark semi-smokey and slightly fruity estered taste. I have a feeling that Yuengling's lager is on par with the Budweisers of the world and that it wouldn't be quite to my liking. But that's another posting and predicament to consider. Presently I'm soaking my cow tongue in creamy cocoa suds.

-Wörtwurst

Shiner Kosmos Reserve

Shiner Kosmos Reserve
Spoetzl Brewery
Shiner, Texas

You see, sometimes it's not only about the beer but also the intangibles. Kosmos Spoetzl, the original brewmaster and founder of the Shiner probably would gyrate his zombie head in defiance of the watered down recipes that are now being produced at his namesake brewery. I'm assuming that the recipes are watered down because if Kosmos was producing this sort of beer-fare he wouldn't be considered a pioneer in German-American brewing. I guess the same could be said about the other macros though, eh? Stuff it beer bigots. My point here is that at least they put out a cool package. Classic but modern just the same, the bottle promises so much and delivers just enough to keep the riotous craft beer public at bay. A step up from the normal macro with almost a kolsch sweetness to it and a saltpeter of hop essence in the buttressing. You might be disappointed with this limp-wrister but I came in low-balling the product and got a cool cap out of the deal, so I'm not complaining.

-Wörtwurst

Shiner Bohemian Black Lager

Shiner Bohemian Black Lager
Spoetzl Brewery
Shiner, Texas

Truly, in my own mastodonic way, there is a method to these reviews. Knock something over and then pick it up, I think they call it. Smash a window to create a job sayeth the communist. Exploration not for the sake of exploration but to spoil the path to somebody else's joyous find! Haha. No... really. I know we're chums and all here but I do this for the sake of doing it and nothing else. If not this I'd be writing something else. A novel, perhaps? Pfft! What kind of scourge do you take me for?!?! After all, Nietzsche summed it up best "It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what others say in a whole book." Here's your book and your black lager, ladder climber. Go make your bed with both. Take extra pillows because the king's thread count is neither enriched or sparsely spun but rather made to give you a middling respite from your labors (add an U if UR an American in old London Town). Not even Spoetzl de deutsche could ruin this one.

-Wörtwurst

Shiner Blonde

Shiner Blonde
Spoetzl Brewery
Shiner, Texas

Hey look, Spoetzl Brewery is celebrating 100 years of independent brewing deep down in the heart of Texas! Not so coincidentally they are also fermenting hundred year old granny Clampett panty broth into this weak limbed blonde. The connotation of Blonde and beer usually conjures up for the beer nerd the thought of "blonde ale" and for the real man: "F YEAH...PUSSY, BRO!" This is a combination of both but mostly the latter. A real lager-fest sans character, ingredients and the shinola that Shiner boasts of. I won't call this a weak lager, I think I'll reserve that for their Light offering which I will sample from their Family Sixer in the coming days, but it's minimal invasion surgery on both your taste buds and your testicles, assuming that you have some. I've been told by the Pliny intelligentsia that I have very little. If I mixed their sacred hop sperm with this beer egg I'm sure I could crack open a stiffly drinkable ale. As is it's just a beer.

-Wörtwurst

Rare VOS

Rare VOS
Brewery Ommegang
Cooperstown, New York

I've been known to mutter or exclaim on occasion, "OMGZ OMMEGANG" to myself and nobody in particular. Not because I particularly find Ommegang's brand of beer exceptional -- personally, I don't -- but because the letters are there and speech is like a Scrabble rack and you might as well opportunize (made up word) the idiolalla (a real word) in the living sphere because your mouth will be defunct in the beyond. What we have here is The Sweetness. Wild yeast, wheaty wispy grains and one puss-smacking sugar-coated hefe-mama. Not corpulent but bawdy with sensual whiskers that give it a faux girth which unfurl alongside the garter and the bodice in this carnal mouth-feeling out. Tighten up your merkin because the ides of spring are almost here cabernet drinker.

-Wörtwurst

Sunrise Wit

Sunrise Wit
Fletcher Street Brewing Co.
Alpena, Michigan

An ominously loud thunderstorm preceded my drinking of this bier when I meant to take a shower instead. Never talk on the phone or take shower during the thunderstorm, they say, and for once I listened. More ominous is that this tastes a bit like a lemon zester I concocted a few years ago but with not quite as much malt in the body. So either this beer sucks or my lemon wit wasn't as bad as I thought it was. Or it could just be that my little one has been under the weather and I won't get to see her this weekend and I'm very morose because of it. I'm just not feeling this one. Too wafery thin and scantily malted for my liking.

-Wörtwurst

Lumber Lager Red

Lumber Lager Red
Fletcher Street Brewing Co.
Alpena, Michigan

My first philosophers were poets, my first love was cheese curls and I was a teetoler between the ages of 18 and 27. You can see how this has lead me astray. Luckily, I discovered Kierkegaard, Doritos and benign paroxysmal position vertigo and haven't been the same since (basically I've become the old Monday Night Brewery label but sans the jumping joy). I do, however, still believe in the benefits of couch sleeping and prefer it over a bed. Luckily this isn't biography night at the local speakeasy. You're here for the beer and that wish will be obliged. This two time World Beer Expo Gold Medal Winner has me miffed. It has both lager and red ale qualities in bite and malt-feel but there is also a slight sweetness akin to a weak Belgian and the caramalt gives off an almost light smoke compliment to the nuttiness. I'd appreciate if this brewery would send me a taster 12 pack and let me get a better feel for this one and their other stock seeing as I never would have heard of them if not for the discount rack I found this one on. Well worth double the scant price tag it bore.

-Wörtwurst