Rustic swill water opening and stale bread mouthfeel never gain authentic German weiss character. Honey tones are unnoticeable and wheat essence is completely lost in a congested mesh. Soft; watery; inconsequential. Serve with lemon.
All posts by John Fortunato
LEINENKUGEL’S BERRY WEISS
Inviting blackberry juicing overwhelms fizzy hop crispness, sorghum grained backdrop and supposed honey flavoring. Cloying sugary flow flagged for destroying substantive weiss essence and blocking out wheat wine insistence. Fair dessert fare to pour over vanilla ice cream with syrup.
LEIKEIM BAVARIAN WEISS
Light-bodied, flat-headed, maize-hued German wheat beer suffers from bland up-front indifference and limited floral perfuming. Covert clove sourness, mellow lemon succulence, clean water consistency, and polite buttery bottom too tame to add pizzazz to reticent banana trickle.
LEGEND TRIPEL ALE
Richmond brewer captures special Belgian style nearly as well as Ommegang with this admirable unfiltered ’04 ale. Though lighter than expected, effective butterscotch-fogged knockoff gains corky medicinal warmth for connective malt-candied bruised orange and floral tangents. Apricot, sugarplum, grapefruit, then allspice, clove, and rosebud, fight for attention beneath cereal grain sweetness, finishing with balmy citrus tranquility.
LEGEND PORTER
Dominant iced coffee frontage saturates cascading tan-headed mahogany-hued medium body. Chalky mocha, maple, tobacco, and chestnut illusions endow oncoming brown chocolate insistence as dark fruited finish gathers momentum.
LEGEND PILSNER
Fizzy-hopped butterscotch opening fades to cardboard as shaky pumpernickel-rye confluence, bleached orange-grapefruit bittering, and nebulous tangerine souring give in to unresolved phenol spicing.
LEGEND LAGER
Doughy lead-in gains sugary corn-malted cracked wheat sweetness, remaining mildly creamy to silken finish.
LEGEND KING JAMES ALE
Celebrating 400th anniversary of early American settlement, Jamestown, this maroon-bodied ruby-garnet-highlighted porter boasts strong coffee bean aroma and brown chocolate sweetness. Toffee, licorice, dried fruit, and earthen nut illusions trapped by astringently ashy peppered hop char. Tertiary black cherry, fruitcake, and peppermint hints scarcely register.
LEGEND HEFEWEIZEN
Ripe banana esters elevate yellow-fruited spicing to honeyed wheat spine. Polite lemon bittering complements herbal clove sweetness at midst. But washed-out sweet-sour banana finish peters out.
LEGEND GOLDEN I.P.A.
Weak clear-bodied amber deserves better hop resolve considering IPA category. Phenol astringency depletes grapefruit-peach slush and bittersweet malt finish subsides abruptly.
LEGEND BROWN ALE
LEGACY MIDNIGHT WIT
Garish straw-hazed pearly-headed Belgian-styled witbier ‘brewed with spices’ brackets gaudy citric spree with hard candy souring and refreshing coriander-abetted mint-eucalyptus reminder. Wafted lemon-banana esters ensconce serene wheat wafer wallow.