Genesee Schwarzbier, 2019 return!

I don't know what I love more about this can illustration. Is it the closed eyes, signaling relaxed enjoyment? The full face beard and red flannel of the mountain man? The jaunty pipe -- a PIPE, on a beer label, oh my God! -- with the little design on the bowl?

No, it's gotta be the BIG GLASS OF BEER! The dude is loving that beer. Happy to be here, folks, having a big old schwarzbier.

And so am I, now, and I'm a happy fella. I've been waiting for months for the reappearance of Genesee's Schwarzbier. Yeah, really, a canned seasonal from a lumpy old regional brewery in upstate New York, and it is a happy day that it has returned. My wife brought some home from a visit to her mother outside of Rochester, and I can only hope that it trickles down to Pennsylvania soon.

Schwarzbier has always been a favorite of mine. Dark, flavorful, mild, and utterly drinkable in large quantities. I recall the first time I brought a case of Kostritzer's classic home. I opened one, and started making dinner...and 40 minutes later Cathy came through the door, and somehow 5 bottles were empty.

But it's fairly temperate, so it's all good. Take a big lager-brewed swallow: smooth, creamy mouthfeel, a roasty and chewy flavor, a just slightly tangy finish of black malt, and hurra! We're ready for another!

I'm taking a sixer along to dinner -- Figs, a BYO Mediterranean place in Philly -- and it's going to be welcome. I still recall being at a busy German-tapped bar one night, when a woman came up and asked for "your lightest beer." Give her a Kostritzer, I called, and they did. She looked at me as if to say, 'you're blind,' and I urged her to try it. It WAS the lightest beer they had: the black beer.

Thanks for the winter gift, Genesee!

Winter Rental: surprisingly welcoming

I got a sample from East Coast Beer Co. back in December, their Winter Rental schwarzbier. I was all "ho-hum, another New Jersey contract brewer," because these outfits haven't had a great track record. (Anyone remember Coffaro Beer? Diving Horse Lager?) It's brewed at Genesee, as you can tell by the "Rochester, NY" on the label, where they've done a great job on the Narragansett seasonals, but...to be honest, I wasn't in a rush to try it.


But then I needed to get some tasting notes together for a column I do in the local weekly paper (nice source of pocket money), so Tuesday afternoon I popped it. Okay, I'd made a mistake waiting this long! The beer smelled rich and malty from almost a foot away, but it was not thick and sweet on the tongue: smoothly refreshing (sounds like a 60s beer ad, I know, but it is), a little hop bite up front that swooshes into lightly chocolatey malt with a slight crunch of roast; saunters off into a clean finish.

I have to apologize to you: shouldn't have waited so long on this one. If you like schwarzbier, get out and give this one a shot. It's 5.6% ABV, and quite tasty.

HOWL!

Happily, I'm not talking about Ginsberg's HOWL*, but about Magic Hat's. Howl is their winter seasonal, a schwarzbier, and I'm liking it just fine. There's a good head on it -- tan and fluffy -- and a black body underneath that promises chocolatey goodness and delivers. There's roastiness, too; not stout-level, but enough to put a dark edge on the chocolate and crimp the finish. This is not as glass-smooth as Kostritzer, but its got pleasingly more guts: horses for courses.

I wish there were more schwarzbiers. You may remember how much I loved Moonlight's Death & Taxes (drinking it repeatedly when the west coast's bounty lay open and willing before me). This stuff's 4.6% and I could drink it all night. Get on the lager beam, my friends, enjoy your beer!


*Call me a philistine, but that poem's crap; I'd parody it for the review --
Beer! Beer! Nightmare of Beer! Beer the wineless! Mental Beer! Beer the heavy judger of men!
-- but who needs it?