back on track

Although Boira was tasty, my feathers are a little ruffled to have been given a non-alcoholic beer in a super special beer calendar. Maybe Day 2 will make it up to me.  It's Guineu again, this time working with Espiga, so another trustworthy team.  I do think I like what I see, too.  Not named, apparently, but an English Brown Ale, at 6%, a respectable number to even out yesterday. 

It gives a weird little eruption but doesn't overflow - I might be keeping the cans too cold.  There's plenty of bubble to the beer, giving a very fluffy head, although it does melt away shortly.  It's a nice dark brown color, not quite at the level of a good stout, but almost.  There's a stout-reminiscent smoke in the aroma, tinged with nuttiness, so I think we are looking at a good winter beer even if that isn't its official title.  The taste is subtle, giving just a hint of toast at first, and slowly melting into a light malt.  The beer feels heavier when it's holding back its flavor, interestingly enough, and when the sweetness and campfire roastiness comes through it seems much lighter.

almost time for cake

It seems we have lost another store, Cerevisia.  I had thought to pop in for the Saturday beer this morning, and it doesn't seem like that long ago that I last stopped by, but they are gone.  And I mean gone, all the social media and web presence has been wiped out.  Ah well, time marches on.  There are still a number of beer stores in this town, like La Mundial.  Being in the market, their space is on the small side, but they have quite a few quirky choices, both national and imported.  Among the familiar names on the stout shelf, I saw Espiga with celebratory looking pastry stout - 7.

Looking good pouring out, even with a real lack of head.  The aroma is heavy, cakey, syrupy.  With the number of malts that go into it (hint, it's in the name) that's not a surprise.  It's almost a birthday cake of a stout on the first sip, thick and rich, and a good quality chocolate cake, too.  Despite the pastry label, it's not terribly sweet, just a good amount of cacao.  There is a tendency to hang around after the swallow, which should be no surprise with the way it presents its substantial body.  I'm pleased to note no licorice in this stout, and oddly no coffee either.  The chocolate seems to increase in strength little by little, giving a bit of powder to the texture of the beer, but it doesn't fall apart into an extra-sticky mess.  A satisfying and hearty stout, just the kind of thing I'm looking for these days.

Supplier: La Mundial

Price: €7.20

self service

On the venerable street of Malasaña is a bar I have not yet visited.  As if that's special in a city this big.  Anyway, I had seen Los Grifos a couple of times as I hurried to some other place, and a little bit of checking told me they had taps that you can serve yourself with.  Wha?  How does that kind of thing work?  Seems dangerous!  It's something that brings you in to check out, in any case.  As I got there early, it wasn't hard to get a nice window seat.  I think it wouldn't be as nice in the evening, though, when the street is full of smoking drunks.

There are in fact taps to serve yourself with, as well as three at the bar, and a fridge full of bottles.  Being what I am, I started with a bottle because that's what the stout was.  Espiga's Blackcelona barrel aged stout is slightly odiferous on the pour with just a touch of that whiskey sweet.  It's an opaque dark brown, typical stout appearance.  The aroma is much fuller from the glass, slightly smokey but strongly alcoholic.  It's a little salty at first, then powerful liquor bitter, with a hint of licorice and subtle sweetness in the last few seconds.  There is a noticeable aftertaste, not unpleasant, although it alternates oddly between bitter and sweet.  The tastes are harder to separate towards the end.  It's not too sticky in spite of being barrel aged, but has definite weight.

As long as I'm here, I can have a draft beer too.  I remember La Virgen's Jamonera, but let's see if it lives up to my memories.  Cloudy amber color, light head, dusty honey scent - but disappointing taste.  The flavor is on the weak side, but a little bitter bubbles up at the end, not at all what the aroma would suggest.  A couple of sips bring out the honey, although just on the tip of the tongue, the rest gets a very mild bitter.  There's a kind of cheesy smell that starts to come off the beer as it warms up, which is odd, but doesn't get strong enough to really be distracting.  Like most of La Virgen's stuff these days, the beer seems thin and soulless, not the wild unpredictable thing it once was.  It has been tamed.

You need to get a card to work the taps, and the novelty is just irresistible.  There's a nice IPA from Península to end with, too.  A bit cloudy but good golden color, and that high citrus scent.  Nor surprise in the taste, a strong citrus bitter, very craft IPA, although none of the tropical nuances of American IPAs.  This is really more spicy.  A tad bit of cardamon or something similar.  Even pepperiness comes across in the flavor.  I am not quite sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if I've come across this beer at some beer fair in the past, since I'm finding that spiciness familiar.  It's not as light as some IPAs or pale ales, mildly sticky, but the spice makes it a refreshing and interesting beer.

time to bee happy

"There's a new bar in my neighborhood!" my friend said.  She had the business cards and everything.  I wasn't in a big hurry to go somewhere new, but it's always nice to have something different to explore.  I thought Bee Beer was just a gastro-bar, but when we went down there, it turned out to be one of those beer stores with taps.  Very small, very intimate.  They have more taps than most stores, hell more than a lot of bars, and for €8.50 you can get a flight of five beers.  I was disappointed that it didn't include number 7 actually, but you have to save something for another time, I guess.

1-5, right in a row

La Trappe was a very Belgian type beer despite being Dutch, typical scent, typical taste, a bit on the sweet side.  Oddly, I though there was a little bit of marshmallow in the flavor.  As expected from a Low Countries brew, something sour had to be in there somewhere, and it's in the aftertaste.  It's not a bad beer if you're a fan of the Belgian style, but I have different tastes, personally.

I had high hopes for the red ale, but it wasn't actually much better.  It was about the same scent, with a cloying sweetness, but the taste had a heavier sour fruitiness.  More in line with a lambic, although not quite so punchy.  It's sweet and sour, tangy, but a cleaner taste than La Trappe, going down with less aftertaste.  This is one time I prefer a lambic-like beer to...any other really.

The weiss bier is extremely pale and also nearly scentless.  Maybe there's a little grass in there.  It does have a nice wheaty taste, clean and sharp, not clingy, certainly refreshing for summer.  I was surprised to find something like lemonade lurking the background.  Makes it a contender for Spanish patronage.

Lefèbvre Barbãr pops up in bars here and there, but I haven't taken the opportunity to taste it.  Here it is without my even asking for it explicitly, so let's see what it's like...it's not bad at all, although not beery.  It's just sweet and smooth, without even a hint of bitterness.  It even smells like pure honey.  Not even a hint of bitterness.  Must be all that sugar that makes it so powerful.

Finally, an IPA to finish off.  It's another one of those collaborations, 7 breweries this time.  The smell is just what you'd expect from a craft IPA, citrusy and a little fruity.  It's a little astringent in flavor, not much fruit there, citrus or otherwise.  But it's a nice cleanser after the line of sweet beers in the flight.

There's nothing like finding a little corner of good beer, even though this city isn't lacking for it at the moment.  Hopefully, neighborhood interest will keep these experiments going.

color of a setting sun

Hey!  What's that there?  Why it's a coaster from a craft brewery!  It's still Beer Week, and since I have a commitment to go out anyway, I'll just kill two birds with one stone here.  At Toast Tavern, you can get eight different draft beers from rotating taps, and this week they have Espiga/Green Street Orange IPA.  It's uncomfortably warm already for me, so a nice IPA will really lift my spirits.  A stout could have done so too, but the stout on tap was a bourbon mix, and that's just too much for me tonight.

There's the Orange IPA, showing how accurate the name is.  It gives off some bitterness in the smell, but it's more of a prelude to the ale taste itself.  It's refreshing and invigorating, but balanced with a citrusy sweetness that flits lightly over the tongue.  I have to admit there's a little bit of stickiness too, and a bitter ale taste that hangs around after drinking.  It's not an aftertaste really, since it's the lingering of the same taste the beer itself has.  Still, I've had cleaner drinks in terms of leaving the mouth with the swallow.  This by no means is to say that Orange is a bad beer!  It was quite tasty and pleasing, but I do try to be complete in my descriptions.

Toast Tavern gives some more interesting tapas than a lot of bars, although you're likely to get a bowl of chips at some point.  I got nachos today.  They were delicious, but the cheese solidified so fast we had to dig our hands in and break them apart.  Fortunately, nobody is germ-phobic at the table.

Tune in tomorrow!  Beer Week rolls on!

Supplier: Toast Tavern
Price: €5.50/pint