Archive for July, 2011
Ninkasi Brewing Co. Maiden The Shade
Ahhh summer. It’s arrived in Portland, at last. Being a recent transplant to Portland, I have to admit that I struggled a bit in June. Seeing as how I was used to June being summer that is, and here in Portland June is a continuation of spring, which itself (this year anyhow) was ostensibly a continuation of winter – i.e. cool (50-60) temps and cloudy skies pretty much every day.
But once it’s arrived, summer here is pretty swell. And it really arrived all of a sudden. One day (June 30th) was gray and cool, and the next, July 1st (no kidding, it actually was July 1st) dawned with nary a cloud in the sky and temps in the low 60s. By the end of the day, they’d risen to the high 70s, and we still had no clouds in the sky. The weather then remained just like that for the next week or so. I think we saw more sun in that brief period of time than we had for the previous several months. Pretty amazing!
But this post isn’t about summer in Portland, so much as it’s about summer beer in Portland. Because when summer arrives, the whole city changes. All of a sudden every patch of lawn and park is covered with people soaking up sun, and practically every restaurant, bar, and brewpub opens up their patios. And brewers follow suit, with most breweries in Oregon releasing one or more of their summer beers.
What’s best about this raft of summer beers is how they’re all pretty different from one another. There are lighter, more refreshing styles (Cascade’s Portland Pale, Spring Pale, and Summer Gose come to mind), bigger, bolder, hoppier ones (HUB’s Galactic Imperial Red and Evelyn Sunshine Imperial IPA), and those that hover somewhere between the two (such as Lompoc’s Pilzipa). Ninkasi’s recently released Maiden The Shade falls within this overall spectrum, being both pleasantly hoppy and very refreshing.
Ninkasi is based in Eugene, Oregon, and has been brewing since 2006. They’ve grown to become one of the bigger breweries in Oregon, and are one of the few to bottle their beers in both 22oz and 12oz bottles. They have a lineup of year-round beers that are all good-to-very good, with the Total Domination IPA being a typical go-to IPA around here, and the Tricerahops Double IPA a scarily drinkable imperial IPA. Alongside this, each year they release a number of seasonals. Maiden The Shade is their summer seasonal IPA.
In my estimation, Maiden The Shade is a great beer on two counts. 1) It’s a really good beer. Super drinkable and very flavorful, with lots of hop aroma and flavor without much hop bitterness. 2) The name of the beer and the typographics on the label (see above) are a play on Iron Maiden:
Admittedly, I’ve never been a big Iron Maiden fan (honest!), but I love the approach. And I especially loved it when they released this past winter’s Sleigh’r, whose label again used both a play on words and on the typographics of a well-known heavy metal band. This time it was Slayer, and seeing as how I’ve always appreciated the occasional Slayer song*, this one really struck me as pretty awesome.
Of course, however much I may like their tongue-in-cheek naming and typographics, the most important point is that the beer itself is typically very good. I’m a big fan of flavorful-but-not-super-bitter IPAs, and Maiden The Shade fits the bill to a T. It’s not a small beer, brewed to an ABV of 6.8%, but it’s 72 IBUs are spread out nicely towards the aroma and flavor end of the spectrum. Best of all, look at this lineup of 7 different hops that they use in this beer: Summit, Centennial, Simcoe, Columbus, Crystal, Palisade, Amarillo.
All in all, I’d recommend giving this one a try. Especially good if you pair it with something on the lighter, quaffable side, like a Fort George 1811 Lager or even a Trumer Pils.
Tasting Notes
As I said above, this one is brewed to 6.8% and 72 IBUs. They use the 7 different hop varieties named above, along with 3 different malts: 2-row pale, vienna, and flaked barley.
The nose opens up with lots of orange and citrus notes, and as the beer warms a note of coppery malt enters into the mix. The palate has lots of citrus and evergreen hop flavor balanced by sweet malty notes and a very mild bitterness, almost all of which picks up at the back-end of the palate. The flavors here are well-balanced, with the malt base layer really highlighting the hop flavors. More hop bitterness comes into the picture on the finish, with pine and resin notes dominant. The finish is pretty lengthy, with those hop flavors really sticking around and making their presence known.
Like I said, go try it. It’s a summer seasonal, but just came out recently. And since summer only just started, it should be around for a couple of months or so anyhow.
*In the interest of full disclosure, I’m actually a huge Slayer fan. My interest is bookended by Hell Awaits and Decade of Aggression, which admittedly is limiting the scope of their oeuvre. But let’s face it, Reign In Blood, South Of Heaven, and Seasons In The Abyss are incredible albums and form a trilogy of true metal greatness! Yeah!!
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