100 Beers, 100 Days: Days 8 & 9
I didn’t make it to the Booze Barn this past week, and I’ve already drunk the good stuff available at the local groceries and that bar that used to be a Taco Mac, so this is an inadvertant cheap beer mini-series. It may not be the last of it; I’m sort of bad at planning ahead.
Moosehead claims to be the oldest independent brewery (i.e., not owned by Moslon or Labatt) in Canada. Susannah Oland, an immigrant to Nova Scotia from England, founded The Army and Navy brewery in 1867 with her brown October ale. A few years after that Susannah’s husband died, she sold the brewery and bought it back, the brewery burned down twice, and Susannah passed away herself in 1886. Her sons rebuilt, the brewery exploded, and the son who escaped that tragedy packed his things, moved to New Brunswick and rebuilt again with the help of his own sons. The brewery finally managed to thrive at this point. It grew, changed its name, added new styles to the lineup, overcame trade barriers that had confined it to the Maritimes, and eventually ended up where it is today: a large Canadian beer brand that isn’t Molson or Labatt and, among other products, makes a North American–style Pilsener that isn’t anything to write home about.
There isn’t much to say about the beer itself. It’s light, kind of watery and tastes like corn and grass. There’s nothing particularly offensive about it, but nothing to recommend it, either. Turning the page.
The most notable thing about Genesee is that it’s becoming the next PBR among hipsters. And really, it’s perfect for it: High Falls is among the ten largest breweries in the US but not one of the big three, the upstate New York location (I do not care how you define “upstate,” and neither do the Williamsburg hipsters who draw the line somewhere around 181st) gives it a similar ironicism as Pabst’s Milwaukee—a place where people bowl and eat greasy food and drink pale American beers because they enjoy it—and it’s a beer that, if you didn’t steal one out of your dad’s fridge in the basement when you were nine, it’s easy to make up a convincing lie that you did.
A cream ale is a lagered beer that uses top-fermeting yeast like an ale, like the German Kölsch or altbiers, but like an American lager is made more often for value over taste. The Genesee bottle claims it has the “flavor of a fine ale and the smoothness of a premium lager.” The style at least lives up to its name: though it’s a very light, clear yellow, it has a thick, creamy feel very unlike a Pilsener, and a little more going on taste-wise than a big-name lager. It tastes mostly of barley and corn, but it’s more sweet than bitter and has a little plum-like fruitiness. There’s a hint of hops, and it finishes with a lingering chemical aftertaste that only a $2 pint ever has. So yeah, it’s not real great. I’d take it over a Pabst, though.
In the queue to come I have some kind of high-gravity ale from Lithuania, a barleywine from Virgina and an IPA that I’m a little wary about from Sierra Nevada. Hopefully I’ll remember to go shopping tomorrow so I don’t end up drinking a Bud Lime by Tuesday.