I found the first bottle of porter so tasty, I figured I would try the other three types of Texas Big Beer Brewery beers that were available. Yes, even the scotch ale! A link to all their beers is here.
I’ll start with the Working Stiff Ale.
Excellent appearance, it was tannish with some orange tint, a smidge hazy, had plenty of rising bubbles, and had a great sturdy off white head that left a great cap and plenty of sticky lacing.
Aroma is somewhat malty with a good bit of bitterness, not a ton of overly distinct particular hops aromas, but still a notable degree of hops aroma. The flavor follows right along, being fairly malt forward, but with a crisp and pronounced bitterness. I like it, I don’t really want tons of mango, pine, citrus etc when I drink an ESB, I just want a good solid bitterness and a solid malt body. This beer delivers.
The drinkability is pretty high, medium body with a crisp but bitter finish, and a little lingering dry maltiness.
I like it. Tasty and delicious, interesting and different. This is my second of four from this brewery, and so far I’m very happy to have another good brewery that’s pretty local. Definitely try it.
Seriously, the working stiff is some damn fine beer. I wrote part of this post shortly after I wrote the first one, as I wanted to try some more of their beers as soon as I could. The working stiff was my second of Texas Big Beer’s brews, and as I finish this blog off, I’m having yet another working stiff ale! A very fine beer indeed, especially considering how few ESBs are out there in the US.
The Big Texas Blonde Ale was another really interesting beer. It really does retain quite a bit of the characteristics of a blonde ale, despite the high ABV. It’s listed as a Belgian strong pale ale on beer advocate, but it doesn’t really have the same characteristics of those beers, it’s more, well, “blonde,” with less of the pronounced yeasty and spicy flavors of Belgians, and more of the refreshing and light flavors of a blonde ale. Hard to think of something 10.5% as light or refreshing, but that’s part of the charm of this beer, the fact that it’s somewhat of a paradox in a bottle. I will certainly be drinking this one again too!
And finally, the Scotch ale, Renaissance Cowboy. I am not a big fan of this style in general, Scotch ales just don’t do it for me. However, on the recommendation of several people, I went ahead and tried it. Excellent! Probably the best example of this style that I’ve ever had. There’s enough of a solid, even pronounced bitterness to balance out the sweetness and brown sugary flavors (usually Scotch ales aren’t balanced enough in this respect for my taste). And it’s not carbonated to such a low degree that it’s nearly-flat, a flaw (IMO) that many Scotch ales have. This one has enough carbonation to keep me interested. I found it somewhat barleywine-like (a style I generally much prefer over Scotch ales). So even with a style that I’m not especially fond of, Texas Big Beer kept me interested. That’s pretty cool.
Cheers!
Beer and Stuff 