Pale Ale – American – The Tap Takeover

Beer Review: Maine Beer Company’s a tiny beautiful something

Name: a tiny beautiful something
Brewing Company: Maine Beer Company
Location: Freeport, Maine
Style: Pale Ale – American
ABV: 5.5%

Subtle flavors make for a delicious clean, American Pale Ale.

From Main Beer Company’s page for the beer:

Our single hop pale ale brewed to highlight the flavors and aromas of El Dorado hops.

FLAVOR PROFILE: ORANGE MARMALADE AND APRICOT WITH FLORAL PERFUME NOTES, SPICY AND EARTHY

Maine Beer Company is one of the more respected New England breweries despite having a relatively small portfolio of about only 20 beers (as listed on untappd). The majority of what they brew are pale ales and IPAs, the styles they make are close to perfect interpretations of the styles, from the few I’ve had and from the reputation they’ve gained since they opened in 2009. All of their beer comes in 500ml bottles, which is convenient and something that sets them apart from a branding perspective. a tiny beautiful something is one of their Pale Ales, maybe the style that comprises the majority of their portfolio.

The bottle opens and pouring the beer into the glass produces a bright orange-yellow beer with a nice fluffy head. The hop aroma wafting into my nose is quite pleasant and combined with the look, makes for a very welcoming beer.

First sip is extremely refreshing and is gives off the “will always hit the spot” kind of beer. After a few more sips of the beer the hop presence emerges. a tiny beautiful something is exclusively hopped with El Dorado hops. I don’t know that I’ve explored the El Dorado hop as much as some other hops, it is more often than not one of the hops in a hop blend rather than the “feature” hop of the beers I’ve had and enjoyed. It is a fairly new hop, having been released in 2010, but because of the hops’ tropical elements, El Dorado has gained a great deal of popularity with the emergence and growing popularity of Hazy/Juice IPAs and Pale Ales. Based on El Dorado being the only hop in this beer, I’m a fan.

The descriptor above from the brewery is spot on. I found the beer to have a subtle, yet pleasant and noticeable citrus/orange presence, which isn’t uncommon for most hops. There’s also a hint of spice on the finish and some other fruity elements. I don’t know that I can pinpoint it as apricot like the brewery describes, but the flavor is very tasty. The evocation of the fruit elements persists in a very positive way, it made me want to keep drinking to get more of that flavor.

Of the 125+ different Pale Ales I’ve had, a tiny beautiful something might have the cleanest finish of any of those Pale Ales. What I mean by that is there’s no real negative after taste, the beer ends on a very pleasant note.

a tiny beautiful something is s superb Pale Ale. I’ve had three other beers from Maine Beer Company and they’ve all been excellent. This all just makes me want to explore more of their beer.

Recommended, link to 4.25-bottle-cap Untappd check in.

Beer Review: Lone Pine Brewing’s Portland Pale Ale

Beer Review

Name: Portland Pale Ale
Brewing Company: Lone Pine Brewing Company
Location: Portland, Maine
Style: Pale Ale – American
ABV: 5.2%

A clean, crisp, and flavorful American Pale Ale that should please almost all beer drinkers.

From Lone Pine Brewery’s beer page:

Our flagship pale ale carries a bright, clean body, with stone fruit and ripe citrus flavors from heavy late addition hopping.

When a new, out-of-state brewery begins distributing to your state, you want to give them a try. I’d been seeing beers from Lone Pine Brewing pop up on my untappd feed from in state friends, particularly Lone Pine’s double IPA Oh-J. However, I wanted something a little lighter and not quite as hop-aggressive. Of the Lone Pine beers available, Portland Pale Ale seemed to fit that bill.

The Pale Ale…not quite as popular as the IPA, but a defining style of American Craft Beer nonetheless. Noticeable hop presence, some malt body, maybe some sweetness from those two elements. What does Portland Pale Ale offer the beer drinker relative to those elements? Let’s take a look…or a drink.

The pop of the can hints at a nicely carbonatied beer, which turns out to be true when I poured the beer into the glass: a pale yellow, not quite clear, beer fills my glass. Topped with a thick white head, Portland Pale Ale is an eye-pleasing beer. A very nice and welcoming citrusy, hoppy aroma wafts from the can and glass.

A beer can look great, but does that positivity flow through to the taste? First sip brings a smile to my face. There’s a crispness to the beer I don’t typically associate with Pale Ales, more so with Pilsners. It isn’t unwelcome, or out of line with full profile of the beer, but a pleasant surprise.

After that first sip, a very nice hop flavor follows, accompanied by a balanced sweetness and a decent amount of body given the relatively low ABV. Lone Pine doesn’t list the hops in the beer, but I suspect there’s a blend of maybe Citra, Nugget, and Azacca? Or at least one of those? The hops give off a fruitiness that I can’t quite pinpoint to one specific fruit, maybe some citrus, or maybe some peach/apricot? That’s part of the fun of this beer is that the profile from the hops ring off some familiar notes, but maybe in a different key than I’ve had before or often.

Portland Pale Ale is quite simply a solid Pale Ale. You get hops, but they don’t bludgeon you. There’s enough sweetness to balance the inherit bitterness from hops, but it isn’t a cloying sweetness. The beer is very clean and balanced. In other words, a very well-made beer. This beer falls into the category of “pleasing to the more discerning/experienced beer, but not too aggressive for the macro-beer drinkers.”

Recommended, link to 4-bottle-cap Untappd check in.

Beer Review: Tonewood Brewing’s Freshies

Beer Review

Name: Freshies
Brewing Company: Tonewood Brewing
Location: Oaklyn, NJ
Style: Pale Ale – American
ABV: 5%

“The growing NJ brewery’s flavorful, hoppy take on the classic American Pale Ale is well-worth a spot in your cooler/refrigerator..”

From the Untapped page for Freshies:

Freshies – 5.0% ABV – American Pale Ale – A soft and crushable Pale Ale brewed with Wheat and hopped with Simcoe, Amarillo, and Cascade hops.

Tonewood Brewing opened up in 2015 and has been brewing well-received beer since then. Located in Oaklyn, NJ, they aren’t exactly close to me, so I was very pleased to see a few of their beers at one of the three liquor stores at a major intersection on my commute home. Keeping to my recent trend of mostly lower ABV beers towards which I’ve been gravitating, I grabbed a six pack of Freshies with its relatively low 5% ABV.

Cracking open the can and pouring the beer into the glass, a pleasant hop aroma wafts to my nose. The beer is golden yellow and with the hints of citrus in the air, Freshies is very inviting to the senses. It is almost cloudy/hazey along the lines of the Northeast/New England style of Pale Ales, but not quite. The nose doesn’t lie with this beer, big hop presence, almost as much as an IPA. More of a pleasantly aggressive hop presence than some of the IPAs I’ve had, in fact. Lots of hops on the first taste and all the way through.

The hops used in this beer – Simcoe, Amarillo, and Cascade – are some of the most popular hops used in Pale Ales and IPAs. For example, Cascade is used in arguably the most important American Pale Ale – Sierra Nevada’s Pale Ale. Tonewood’s take on the style is less malty than Sierra’s flagship ale, but that’s not a knock on the quality at all. The blend of hops gives the beer its own identity. That blend, coupled with the ample wheat used in the beer, gives the beer a softer feel and with the relatively low ABV of 5%, makes for a flavorful beer that falls into the currently overused term of “crusher” category. In other words, great flavor along with a not-bludgeoning-you ABV.

Freshies is a delicious beer that is a fine addition to the style of American Pale Ale. Perhaps the best way I can describe this beer is as follows: between the color, level of haze, and hop profile, Freshies perfectly straddles the line between a “traditional” American Pale Ale and the juicy Northeast/New England Pale Ale. It compares pretty favorably to some of the other pale ales I’ve enjoyed recently and mentioned here on the Tap Takeover including Kane’s Sneak Box and Industrial Arts’s Tools of the Trade. While it may not be as widely known as those two breweries and beers, Tonewood’s Freshies, for my drinking dollars, is no less a beer.

Recommended, link to Untappd 4-bottle cap rating.

Untapped badges earned with this beer:

Pale as the Moon (Level 21)