Bud, this is a cross between a Oktoberfest-style Festbier and a Vienna-style Marzen. It’s OK, though I’ve only tried it once. I was actually in Bamberg, Germany drinking beer when this was brewed. Lisa has done a couple of collaborations with MT. This was more up our alley, and the Hazy IPA, Path of Perspective, was more up theirs. Because this was brewed at Modern Times, we didn’t have as much control as we would like. I thought that is missed the mark ever so slightly on the malt bill (there’s a slight malt bitterness that doesn’t fit). We’re pouring this in our Tap Room this weekend as well, along with our Baltic Porter, Sandy Paws (with Scott Tallman’s dog on the label).
Todd, we brew traditional and not-so-traditional German style beers. We just sent down a pallet of Pils and a mixed pallet of kegs, with another pallet of bottles (Baltic Porter and Dunkel) and kegs going down next week. We’re trying to increase the amount of beer we send to CA - probably twice as much this year as last, and probably that much more again next year. That said, it’s still a drop in the bucket.
I’m looking forward to this Rick, would love to see any kind of HA beers in our neck of the woods, man cannot live on IPA alone and believe it or not I love well made Pils and drink them often, actually Henry@ Monkish brews some amazing Pils and they last a lot longer than the IPAs so I can usually grab some.
I talked to Lisa about this beer, and MT pretty much followed our practices. Step mash, first wort hopping, long fermentation at low temps, and top quality malt (Weyermann). They used less Munich Malt than I would have and more Caramel Malt (for color). We’ve become more interested in longer boils on our direct-fire system to get color from caramelization. We just brewed a Helles using only Pilsner Malt but a long boil to get a deeper color. Hopefully that will make it down your way (along with Pils, of course).
It’s a little bit of a pain to get Rick’s beers in the LA area but I’ve seen it at K&L and a few other stores in the area. Not sure why you’re having so much trouble, Bud.