Instead of running around New York City trying to find specific spring beers, I decided to keep it simple and pick up seven beers at two of my favorite haunts: Noble Grains on the Upper East Side and Astoria Bier and Cheese in Queens.  All of the beers should be easy to find using BeerMenus if you’re interested in trying any for yourself.  Keep in mind that my patented “How Spring Is It?” rating doesn’t necessarily reflect how I much I actually like the beer.  The rating system is more about whether I feel the beer matches the characteristics of spring rather than how good it is.  And now without further ado, let the 1st Annual Splendid Spring Seasonal Beer Reviews commence!

Rouge Brewing: Dead Guy Ale

Ashland, Oregon

Style: Maibock

ABV: 6.5%

Price: $3.50

So here I am talking about seasonal beers and the first beer I talk about is actually a year-round offering.  The irony isn’t lost on me, but the fact of the matter is that there aren’t a ton of maibocks readily available.  I was surprised when I did my initial search for maibocks and Dead Guy popped up because it’s a beer that I see all over the place.  I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it in the past, but never stopped to think about what style of beer it’s actually considered.

Rogue Brewing is a classic of the American craft beer industry.  Founded in 1988, their beer can be found all across the US. Their styles run from the standards like their Shakespeare Oatmeal Stout and 7 Hop IPA to the offbeat Voodoo Doughnut Pretzel, Raspberry and Chocolate Ale and Beard Beer, which uses yeast cultivated from the head brewer’s beard.  While I’ve never been a big fan of spicy beers, their Chipotle Ale is one of my favorite beers with a bit of heat.

Dead Guy pours a deep amber with a quickly dissipating head.  The initial smells of sweet malt and honey are a great indicator of what’s to come.  Really smooth with a medium body, you get some of those sweeter flavors combined with a slight herbal hoppiness and roastiness. Everything blends together so you’re left with a well balanced beer.

How Spring Is It? 8/10

That mix between sweet and roasty with herbal, earthy and hoppy screams spring to me.  At 6.5% ABV, it’ll leave you with a nice warm feeling, but not enough to make you want to hibernate.  While it’s on the darker side of the spectrum, Dead Guy does a great job of melding the flavors of two different seasons into a transitional beer.

Southern Tier Brewing: Where The Helles Summer

New York

ABV: 4.6%

Style: Helles Lager

Price: $2.49

Southern Tier Brewing is a fantastic reminder of the size of New York State. In the western part of the state, it would take a solid six and a half hours to drive there from NYC.  I could do a beer run in Boston and be back well before I could make it to Southern Tier.  It’s a shame, because I really enjoy their beers and would love to visit.  Thankfully, however, their offerings are readily available.

You can’t talk about Southern Tier without mentioning Pumking.  One of my personal favorite pumpkin beers, they now even offer a version aged in rum barrels which is brilliant.  Their Choklat Oranj is a revelation if you’ve never experienced the joy of pairing oranges with chocolate and their hoppy beers, like 2X IPA and Tangier are consistently great.  So I understandably had high hopes for Where the Helles Summer.

If you ask people to describe the look, taste and smell of beer, they’ll likely give you a description of a pale lager: light, mild sweetness, noticeable grains and barely any bitterness.  Where the Helles Summer fits this description perfectly.  It’s toastier than your average light lager, but super crisp and smooth with a bit of a spicy finish.  This is definitely a beer I would recommend to a friend who just drinks American Adjunct Lagers (Bud, Coors, Miller, etc.) and wants to start branching out into craft beers.  While it has more flavor than its big brewery counterparts, Where the Helles Summer would be familiar enough as to not scare those drinkers away.

How Spring Is It? 3/10

Drinking this, I’m thinking it’s already summer.  Light, crisp and refreshing, WTHS is more suited for a BBQ in July than an April afternoon.  While tasty, there’s nothing transitional about it.

Trinity Brewing: Menacing Kumquat

Colorado Springs, CO

ABV: 6.5%

Style: Saison

Price: $8.69

The rugged Rockies dominate my conception of Colorado, so the idea of delicate saisons from that environment fascinates me. Menacing Kumquat was my first beer from Trinity Brewing, but they put out a number of farmhouse and wild ales so I’ll be sure to pick some more up in the future.  While definitely the priciest beer of my sampling, beers with brettanomyces (a wild yeast that help give saisons their funk) are usually on the pricier side because of the additional expenses needed to make them.

I’m going to be honest, I didn’t know much about kumquats before I had this beer. My good friend Jacob once described a beer as having a distinct kumquat flavor and I just politely nodded and tried not to giggle.  Turns out, they’re a citrus fruit that are in season during the winter.  Mostly grown in California and Florida, kumquats are about the size of an olive and are pretty unique in that you eat them whole.  The flesh of the kumquat is tart but the rind is fairly sweet so they have an excellent balance.  It just so happens that they’re also a wonderful addition to beer.

Golden, hazy and effervescent, Menancing Kumquat hits you right away with a funky citrus and sour aroma.  The taste matches the aroma almost note for note, except there’s hardly any sourness in the beer itself.  The brett shines through and is complemented with the subtle sweet citrus from the kumquats.  Citra hops add to the citrus flavor and help create an astonishingly balanced beer.  Is it a classic saison?  Not really.  It reminds me more of the New England style of juicy, citrusy IPAs.  Is it amazingly delicious?  Yes.  Yes it is.

How Spring Is It?  5/10

Menacing Kumquat was hands down the best beer of this group.  Hell, it’s up there as one of the top beers I’ve had all year. But does it remind me of spring?  Eh. Citrus flavors always make me think of summer.  Even though kumquats are a winter harvested fruit, they add a brightness to the beer that make it uncharacteristic of spring.  The brett makes the citrus more subdued and helps give an earthier quality, but it’s still pretty prevalent.  With that said, however, I’d be happy to drink it on whatever day of the year it’s given to me.

Brewery Ommegang: Glimmerglass

Cooperstown, New York

Style: Saison

ABV: 5.4%

Price: $2.29

Ommegang rocks.  Their beers are easily obtainable, relatively cheap and do a great job of representing classic Belgian styles.  If you want to learn more about some different styles, or just want to have a fun night, pick up a Hennepin (Farmhouse Saison), Abbey Ale (Dubbel), Tripel Perfection (Tripel) and a Three Philosophers (Quad).  You’ll get a great overview of the nuances of each style, not to mention a pretty big buzz, especially if you’re drinking all of them on your own, which I do not endorse.  Ommegang has also teamed up with HBO to put out a series of beers for Game of Thrones.  There are currently 6 of them, the latest being Seven Kingdoms, a hoppy wheat ale.  I haven’t had all of them, but it’s a pretty clever tie-in and most of them have been worth the purchase.  My personal favorite was their Three-Eyed Raven which was a dark saison and had a really interesting mix between roasted malts and classic saison flavors.

Saisons have become a personal favorite of mine and Glimmerglass is a great example of the style.  It pours a gorgeous golden color and has a thick, frothy head.  Spices like clove come through in the aroma with the addition of some yeast, orange and hay.  Besides some mild sweetness, Glimmerglass tastes just like it smells.  The beer itself is light and crisp with a dry, peppery finish and it’s a real treat to drink.

How Spring Is It?  6/10

Before this research, I never really thought of saisons as spring beers because many of them have such a refreshing, wheat beer quality to them.  Glimmerglass, however, does a wonderful job of tempering those qualities with its noticeable sweet and spicy character.  It’s just too light in color, mouthfeel and ABV for a chilly, late April afternoon drinking session.  Once spring edges closer to summer though, this will be a great choice.

Captain Lawrence Brewing: Meltwater

Elmsford, NY

Style: IPL

ABV: 5.9%

Price: $2.49

It’s hard to keep track of all the solid breweries within 45 minutes of NYC.  From their Freschester Pale Ale and Seeking Alpha Triple IPA to Rosso E Marrone (a Flanders Oud Bruin) and Golden Delicious (a tripel aged in apple brandy barrels), Captain Lawrence cranks out a nice variety of well-crafted beers.

In essence, IPLs are hoppier and higher ABV lagers.  As the name implies, they are brewed using lager yeast instead of the yeast used to make ales.  Lager yeast is bottom fermenting (as opposed to the top fermenting yeast of ales) and can withstand much cooler temperatures than other strains.  What in the blue hell does this mean?  Well, lager yeast converts sugar into alcohol at a much lower rate which leaves the final product much crisper, cleaner and clearer.  These attributes of a lager help hops really show their character.  Combine this base with the potent hops that dominate US IPAs as opposed to the more subtle European hops, and you have a super crisp and mellow hoppy beer.  IPLs are still in their infancy and not everyone recognizes them as a stand-alone style.  Regardless, they are a unique and tasty take on IPAs.

Meltwater offers a nice citrusy and hoppy aroma with just a bit of honey and maltiness.  Tasting it, I found the same balance between hops and malts with a bit of bitterness on the backend.  I didn’t, however, get that crispness that I was expecting.  While smooth, Meltwater felt more medium-heavy bodied and more reminiscent of an IPA than an IPL.

How Spring Is It? 5/10

I’m not going to lie, I was disappointed.  I loved the balance between the brighter hops and bready, sweet malts (a contrast that has spring written all over it), but something just felt off to me.  That clean crispness simply wasn’t present.  Without that characteristic, Meltwater lost some of its charm and doesn’t do the best job of melding winter and summer styles.

Tröegs Brewing: Cultivator

Hershey, PA

Style: Maibock

ABV: 6.9

Price:  $2.49

Probably best known for their Nugget Nectar or Mad Elf (both of which are only brewed once a year), Troegs has a varied year-round lineup which ranges from their Troegenator Double Bock to DreamWeaver Wheat.  Troegenator holds the distinction of being one of the first craft beers I ever had, so Troegs holds a special place in my heart.  Cultivator is part of their Hop Cycle Seasonal series and celebrates the start of hop-growing season in early spring.

I was initially worried when I poured my can of Cultivator into my glass because of its pale, golden color and effervescence.  While I know better than to judge a beer by its color, I still prepared for something more lager than bock.  That first whiff of toasty malts and mild grassiness made me quickly change my tune.  And that first sip was something of a revelation.  Biscuits, slight sweetness, earthy and floral with a touch of bitterness that stays on the palate.  How can such deep flavor be in a beer that looks downright ordinary?

How Spring Is It? 9/10

Cultivator nails the essence of spring.  It looks like one thing, but what you have is something completely different.  The bright color contrasts so well with the unexpected earthy flavors.  And while the floral hops are noticeable, they don’t overpower the beer.  Cultivator reminds you that the winter days of drinking roasty and sweet beers are slowly fading into the days where brighter and lighter fare are the norm.

Harpoon Brewing: Long Thaw

Boston, MA

Style: White (Belgian) IPA

ABV: 6.2%

Price: $2.39

Because this is a judgement-free zone, I’m going to make a little confession: I used to really like pumpkin beers.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that per se, but I’ve certainly moved on to greener pastures.  Harpoon’s Pumpkin UFO was one of my favorite pumpkin beers during that time.  The mix between wheat and pumpkin made it a flavorful and super easy to drink beer.  Besides the Pumpkin UFO and their IPA, however, I’m not sure I’ve had any of their other beers before.  It’s kind of surprising because they’ve been around for such a long time (since 1986) and I feel like I see their stuff all over the place.  That’s the funny thing about craft beer though, sometimes you pass over beers simply because you see them all the time.

Light golden and filtered, Long Thaw offers a nice nose of citrus, wheat and some spices.  Besides some bitterness in the finish, however, there wasn’t a lot of distinct hoppiness to counterbalance the “white” aspect of the beer.  Instead of complementing each other, the tastes muddled together which left me wondering what exactly I was drinking.  I can imagine it can be tricky to create a hybrid beer like this and in this case, Long Thaw just fell flat for me.

How Spring Is It? 5/10

Because my spring scale isn’t necessarily an indication of how much I enjoyed the beer, I do have to give Long Thaw some credit.  The “is it an IPA or is it a wheat beer” conundrum I faced, is incredibly similar to the “is it winter or is it summer” you may experience every spring morning.  In the long run however, there simply wasn’t enough to distinguish it as a seasonal beer.  Unlike the other beers on this list I likely won’t be picking it up again.

So there you have it.  The standout of 1st Annual Splendid Spring Seasonal Beer Reviews is Troegs Cultivator followed closely by Rogue’s Dead Guy.  Classic maibocks reign supreme.  That combination of bright hops and earthy malts perfectly match the conflicting natures of spring.  While new styles and hybrids keep the creativity and variety of the craft beer industry going, sometimes you just have to give a nod to the classics.

If you have some suggestions for other spring styles or specific beers, leave a message in the comments below!