To Øl: Ölrepubliken: Total Hubris (Denmark: Premium Lager: 4.5%)
Visual: Hazy apricot to grain. Large mounded yellowed bubbles for a head and moderate carbonation to the body.
Nose: Fresh grapefruit. Pineapple. Custard. Crisp hops. Floral notes. Oat flakes. Apricot.
Body: Good bitterness and crisp. Lemon fresh. Pineapple. Light peppered crackers. Kumquat. Cloves.
Finish: Kumquat Crisp and dry. Moderate bitterness. Lime. Pepper. Popcorn hope feel. Dried fruit.
Conclusion: Over the years I have gained a hard earned respect for the various lager styles. One that had to wrest away youthful ale dedication and the memories off cheap piss water lagers to be achieved.
This is definitely helping the lager’s case with a massive citrus aroma and crisp hops over a dry and crisp refreshing character. Lots of flavor and a dry peppery element that lingers out into the finish.
It is a full boded yet refreshing lager, and unlike the usual expectation of short finish for lager styles this thing’s final notes hold on for an age.
Now it’s not up with the all time greats that originally rocked my preconceptions of what a lager could do. For closest comparison, a similar quality and high citrus hops style is Mikkeller’s American Dream, a very tasty beer but not one that well emphasises the strengths of what a lager does better than an ale. In this case it results in the dry vegetable flavours becoming a bit too strong twixt sip and finish, a bit cloying at time that hurts the lager freshness.
Still, it may not be perfect but there is a ton of hop flavours in there which makes up for a lot. Now, unfortunately I can’t see a good session of these, as despite the lager crispness the cloying elements would become too heavy, but despite that the level of flavor and ease of drinking means that I can’t be too hard on it. A highly proficient beer with a few flaws that keep it from breaking my expectations.
Background: A collaboration between the Denmark brew team of To Øl and the Swedish Ölrepubliken resulting in me needing to spend a lot of time looking for the extra characters available to me for this write up. Two breweries I have not tried before and in the hard to do well lager stakes. Seemed like a good challenge to see if they were up to their reputation.
