New Glarus

A brewery that I fell in love with this summer is New Glarus Brewing Company from New Glarus, Wisconsin. I have been unable to find New Glarus in any of the liquor stores in the twin cities, but whenever I go to Wisconsin, I make a point to pick some up.

New Glarus is a husband and wife duo who makes some ambitious and award winning beers in Southeastern Wisconsin. They brew a wide variety of beers, including a lot of interesting Belgian style beers. I've tried a handful of their beers, but check out their website for a bigger list:
http://www.newglarusbrewing.com/


I've tried their Yokel, a straight unfiltered lager. Its good, but I'm not a huge lager fan. The three beers of theirs that I love are the Fat Squirrel Brown Ale, the Stone Soup Abbey Ale and the Dancing Man Wheat.

Stone Soup: This beer is a great summer beer. This is a light abbey ale that is slightly fruity, but just delicious. It's a light golden color and is crisp and sweet. As their website puts it: "Both elegant and drinkable this ale is cleanly aromatic with spicy notes of clove and ginger." I can drink a lot of these beers, and at 5.3% abv, that's not a good thing. As my friend Josh says about a good Belgian, it's like candy. This is a summer seasonal.

Fat Squirrel: This is a brown ale that has a lot toasty flavors to it. Its got some chocolate and hazelnut tones to it. It comes in at 5.8% abv and bears a strong resemblance to Fat Tire. I was very excited about the arrival of Fat Tire to the Twin Cities this summer and love New Belgium's beers. But I have to admit that while I love Fat Tire, I think Fat Squirrel is almost better. Its a close call, but either way, Fat Squirrel is really good.

Dancing Man Wheat: My parents recently went on tour of the New Glarus Brewery and came back raving about this beer. My dad is also a homebrewer and brews the best hefeweizen I've ever had. Well, this beer is a close second. He couldn't stop talking about the cloviness of this hefe. It's a classic bavarian wheat beer, that weighs in at a whopping 7.2% abv, and is smooth and crisp. It pours a hazy, light gold color and has a strong clove and cinnamon presence. Its a shame this beer is only a seasonal, and again, not available in the cities. For all my friends who don't like hefeweizens, this would change their minds.

Wisconsin Belgian Red: I bought a bottle of this beer this summer because I needed to try it. This beer is an award winning beer that is very unique. I read about it in a book by the "father of homebrewing" Charlie Papiazan. I was really intrigued to try this beer since it is unique and well known. It's brewed with 1lb of Door County cherries and it definitely doesn't skimp on the cherry flavor. It's highly carbonated and pours almost like a champagne. I wasn't crazy about it at first but it grew on me. I liked it and would consider drinking it on occasion, but its so heavily cherry flavored and sweet that it almost tastes like a cherry soda.

There are a number of different styles they brew. Based on the few I've tried, I'm guessing their others are good. Hopefully they will expand their distribution to include the Twin Cities.

Next blog is going to be about my Bearded Fury Pale Ale and my adventure brewing the Burning Beard Belgian Ale...
Cheers!
The Bearded Brewer