Spring just started, but summer beers are everywhere
A Miracle March never delivered the deluges of rain that drought-weary Californians hoped for, and since an Awesome April and a Monster May are even less unlikely events, it’s reasonable to consider the winter over, and with temperatures in the 70s, it appears the summer season is almost upon us.
And just in time, as summer beers are now hitting taps and shelves. Up at Anderson Valley Brewing Co. in Boonville, the Summer Solstice Ale is already out, and a line of fruit-flavored, gose-style beers are on shelves, including one made with raspberries and rose hips, another with cherries, and another with melon and a touch of salt. Each of these tart beers, soured with the help of Lactobacillus bacteria, runs 4.2% alcohol by volume.
At Adobe Creek in Novato, you’ll find similar signs of summer with the brewery’s kettle-soured tropical-themed ale, made with guava, passionfruit, mango and pineapple, and dinging the scales at a relatively meek 4.8% ABV. Slightly burlier are Adobe Creek’s sour IPAs — part of its Into Fruition series. One that’s now on tap is brewed with blackberries and currants; another is made with a variety of stone fruits. Each is a touch more than 7% ABV.
Firestone Walker is promoting its 805 Cerveza lager, a 4.5% ABV craft take on the Mexican lagers best represented by Corona and Tecate. It’s brewed with lime — a touch inspired by the Baja tradition of stuffing a sour citrus wedge into the bottle. All of which gets me thinking: It’s funny, isn’t it, that these beers are so culturally associated with warm beaches and subtropical fruits. They are, at their roots, central European products, especially of German and Austrian origins. When German immigrants began mak
ing their favorite pilsners in Mexico, the style underwent an identity shift. Adobe Creek acknowledges this history with its Tiburones Mex-Vienna Lager. So, drink your favorite craft lagers with tacos or sausage and kraut.
At Pond Farm in San Rafael, the scent of summer is strong in the kettle-soured beers. (Kettle-soured beers are made sour almost overnight with the addition of bacteria, or even a dollop of yogurt, added prior to fermentation; the other type of sour beer is the barrel-soured style, which is soured in wooden casks after fermentation and may take months or even years to reach maturity.) Look for Sour Adversity, a 4.2% mango-guava ale, and the Blackberry Pi, which takes the cake in the contest of lowest-possible alcohol levels. It registers 3.14% by volume. (Get it? It took me a few seconds.)
And if year-round beers can be considered summer beers, look to Headlands Brewing for its Point Bonita Pilsner and its Hawk Hill Hefeweizen.
Minding the vague difference between tropical fruits and summer fruits, and between boozy-flavored sugar water and beer, let’s talk about some new hard seltzers on the market.
Kona Brewing is rolling out a lineup of Spiked Island hard seltzers. Flavors include tropical punch, starfruit lime, passionfruit orange guava and strawberry guava.
21st Amendment Brewery in San Francisco has launched a line of hard seltzers flavored with such items as watermelon, black cherry, guava, passionfruit and mango.
The beers — I mean, seltzers — are fermented with grain-based sugars and Champagne yeast, which helps to keep the beverages in the beer category, in my opinion. (Many seltzers are made with cane sugar.)
Even wineries are now elbowing into the seltzer fray. Decoy Premium Seltzers is featuring a lineup made with additions of wine and fruit.
Look for the Chardonnay with Lemon and Ginger, Sauvignon Blanc with Vibrant Lime, Chardonnay with Clementine Orange and Rosé with Black Cherry. I was kindly sent some samples and they’re quite good. The drinks come in dainty 8-ounce cans, and if you split one with a partner, you’ll barely know you had a drink.
The beers — I mean, seltzers — are fermented with grain-based sugars and Champagne yeast, which helps to keep the beverages in the beer category, in my opinion. (Many seltzers are made with cane sugar.)