Bell's Oberon: 10 Beers of Summer

I've written about Oberon before, but it's worth touching on again. Bell's beers are not available in New Jersey -- a tragic thing, that -- so I've had to rely on the kindness of friends to enjoy their beery goodness. I don't think I've ever had a dud from them. This one, in fact, is low down the list of my favorites by Bell's, but it was my first Bell's, and it's still a good beer, AND it's a great summer, beer ...

So here we are.

I had my first Oberon about seven years ago when a friend from Michigan brought some to a BBQ I hosted. He said it was served in Michigan garnished with orange, so that's how I had it. I fell in love instantly. I ended up in Michigan not long thereafter, and since then a friend and coauthor has kept me supplied every summer.

Oberon is an unfiltered American wheat beer with a medium body, bubbly carbonation, and a zesty, slightly bready taste. It drinks easy and is very approachable, making it right for summer, but has just enough character to be right for lovers of better beer. Some might liken it to a cleaner, crisper Blue Moon (if you like Blue Moon, try these beers). I'd liken it to something that is good. Tastes nice on its own, and if you're inclined to blaspheme it with fruit -- I'm all about garnishing some beers -- it goes great with both an orange slice or a very thin slice of lemon.

If you're in New Jersey you're SOL, but elsewhere? Well, then you probably already know that Oberon is a summer tradition.

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Bell's Oarsman Ale: 10 Beers of Summer

When I first had Bell's Oarsman ale last May, I was not expecting heaps of flavor from a little 4% ABV session ale. Something nice, yes, something drinkable, sure, but not something packed with goodness.

Not only was I wrong, I also fell in love with the beer, so much so that I asked my friend and writing collaborator Jim McDevitt to bring me a case of it the next time he visited. (Bell's beer is sadly not available in my state.)

When it comes to summer beers, few are more perfect than this. Oarsman Ale is based on the Berliner Weisse style, a German classic few American brewers make. The style is typically very, very sour, so sour that in Germany it's served with a side glass of sweetened syrup intended to be poured into the beer. Bell's beer has prominent tartness -- if you don't like sour or tart candies and food you'll hate this -- but it's not nearly as sour as a traditional Berliner Weisse.

What it is, is refreshing as hell.

The aroma features a bit of fruitiness and a distinct tartness that is unmistakable. The taste follows suit. It's zippy, refreshing, fruity, tart, and utterly perfect for hot summer days. Frickin' delicious. Coming in at a dainty little 4% ABV, you don't expect much, but this is an outstanding session beer and is now among my favorites.

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Bell's Week: Special Double Cream Stout

Cream? What an understatement! This beer is creamy, creamy, creamy, with a silky soft mouthfeel that might as well be stout-flavored Cool Whip. Super creamy. Achingly creamy. Delightfully creamy. It's utterly delicious, akin to a sweet, dry Irish stout -- Guinness is the best known of this style -- but with the heavy-bodied awesomeness of a milk stout.

But I'm getting ahead of myself, launching into a review without an introduction.Bell's Special Double Cream Stout is a winter beer that ducks away from the bitter, roasted approach of many stouts and instead goes for smoooooth and creamy.

And that it is. It's fluffy and puffy like a dessert, silky like a milk sotut (but it's not a milk stout), and overall delicious. Jim,. my coauthor on A Year of Hitchcock, ranks this as one of his favorite beers. It's easy to see why. While I don't rate it quite as highly -- it's excellent, but not a life-changing brew -- this is truly a stellar beer. If I could get this all the time, it would be on my regular purchase list. I was initially going to finish Bell's week on a different beer, but decided to do it on a good note ... and this is a DAMN GOOD NOTE.

Bell's, you bastards, why don't you distribute in New Jersey!?

Bell's Week: Bell's Pale Ale

Thanks to the pioneering efforts of Sierra Nevada, who crafted the quintessential modern American beer with Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, every craft brewer needs a pale ale in their roster. Bell's Brewery is no exception.

Nothing wrong with that. Pale ales tend to be tasty but drinkable. And this one fits the bill.

The sharp bitterness here is more aggressive than most pale ales, a notch above the aforementioned American standard set by Sierra Nevada (which, to the rest of the world, borders on an IPA). Unlike that classic Sierra brew, however, the hops aren't full of pine forest. Here they're laden with citrus notes and a vague aroma of, errr, cat piss

Which sounds terrible, I know, but it's not meant to be negative! It's just that the smell is sharp, acidic, and faintly medicinal. It's actually not unusual to hear some hops described that way -- the popular Simcoe hops are often described that way, and people love Simcoe-hopped beers -- it's just, well, that's the first thing that springs to mind.

That doesn't make Bell's pale ale bad. I'd say it's quite good. It's a tasty brew. I'd also say, however, that it borders on ordinary. It's not a hoppy enough monster to be a good IPA (but it's close), and it's not lovely and drinkable enough to be a session pale ale (it's not even close). It's just ... a decent craft beer.

Again, nothing wrong with that. But also nothing to write home about.

Bell's Week: Hopslam

The beer geeks are going mad about this one, I'm sure.

Here's the thing about Bell's Hopslam. There is MADNESS surrounding its release each year. Madness! The beer is released once a year. Nothing special there, many craft beers are. Yet people buy it by the case -- bad idea, this is a beer best consumed within two months (8 weeks) of release -- drive miles out of their way to get it, and brag with abandon at having snagged some. The hype in beer enthusiast communities around this beer is INSANE.

The thing is, is this a good beer? Actually, hell YES it is. I've had it each of the last three years. With no Bell's available in New Jersey I've actually had to trade through the mail to get it. Glad I did. It's damn delicious. It really is.

But is it worth the insanity and hype that follows it? Is it one of the best beers in the world, as many would insist?

No. And let me explain, because it IS an excellent beer.

Hopslam is really really good. It's a double IPA released once each winter, usually around February. It's brewed with a load of honey, which gives it a wonderful sweetness, and it's also hopped to high hell. Tons of dry-hopping, I suspect, because while the beer has loads of hop character in the glass, it's got less bitterness than you'd expect in the taste. The aroma is wonderful. The taste is potent (backed by a huge 10% ABV) but very drinkable. The honey comes through nicely. It's super tasty, well-balanced, and overall awesome.

But dammit, this is NOT one of the world's top beers! Beer Advocate has it ranked in the Top 20, and Ratebeer has it at a more modest #26 overall. This IS a damn good beer, and if you can get it, get some. Drink it. Enjoy it. I have and I love it. But it's not so good that it warrants waiting on line (some people do), getting on waiting lists (ditto), or bragging as if you just snagged something super elusive like Westy 12 (considered by many the best beer in the world), because you didn't.

It's Hopslam. It's really good. But calm down, folks.

Bell's Week: Kalamazoo Stout

Kalamazoo. That's where Bell's got its start. It has a map and a bad website and a Wikipedia page and even a college.

But the most important thing of all is, it has a beer.

Hey, that's pretty awesome. Even Lakehurst doesn't have a beer, and that town has the damn HINDENBURG!

Kalamazoo Stout is (obviously) named after the town of Bell's birth. It's a stout brewed with brewer's licorice, which might sound weird but used to be common.

(Licorice isn't unheard of in brewing, and in fact used to be used fairly often in classic porters. Still is, at times. I used it in the colonial porter you can see in these pictures.)

With Kalamazoo Stout, the brewer's licorice is very up front, stepping on the typical roasted malt of a good stout and dominating it with licoricey (is that a word?) sweetness. It's tasty but just off-kilter enough so that I'm not sure you'd want to have more than one in a row. Definitely a nice twist on the style, I can't say I disliked this stout because I didn't, but Bell's makes better stouts. And so does everyone else.

Bell's Week: Two-Hearted Ale

Two-Hearted Ale is Bell's flagship beer, their American IPA made with Centennial hops. You ask a Bell's fan which beers they like and this one will invariably come up. (The fish on the label? The name? It's a reference to the Two-Hearted River in Michigan, a popular fishing spot made famous in a story by Hemingway.)

So goes without saying you've got to have one of these if you have some Bell's.

Once in the glass you'll get citrus on the nose, but it's laced with mild pine and a somewhat clinical herbal quality, as if it was a bag of illegal plants dunked in mango juice. As for taste, well, it tastes like it has been dunked in mango juice, and in the best way possible. Unlike most beers, this one is made with just a single hop; all the bitterness and hop flavor comes from that one hop instead of the usual blend of 2-4 in most beers. It's amazing the flavors this one hop can dish out. Very fruity. There is orange and mango and a touch of pine (but not much).

Two-Hearted Ale is bitter but not overly so, balanced so that it never veers into sweet but also doesn't merely blast the mouth with bitterness. You'll find few IPAs that manage to be both as hoppy yet as balanced as this. Bell's Two Hearted Ale is a highly regarded American IPA for a reason. It tastes damn good.

Bell's Week: Bell's Oarsman Ale

The first stop on our week-long journey through Bell's Brewery begins with Oarsman Ale, a new-to-me beer that surprised me with its deliciousness. Bell's touts this as their session beer, meaning it's a low-alcohol brew meant to quench your thirst. The kind of beer you can throw back all afternoon without ending up in the emergency room. Sounds fine to me, though it's not the sort of description that left me expecting big flavor.

How wrong I was.

First, a quick pour and a sniff. You don't expect much aroma from a session beer, but what a great smell from the glass! It's slightly tart with a bit of fruitiness. Very pleasant. The taste follows suit. This beer SCREAMS crisp spring days. There is a tart snap at the start and a hint of early summer fruit mixed nicely with the easy drinkability of a light ale. Frickin' delicious. Coming in at a dainty little 4% ABV, you don't expect much, but this is an outstanding session beer. I wish it was available in New Jersey. If it were, I'd drink it all summer. This beer is a winner that proves a beer doesn't have to be a monster to taste great. One of the best I've had from Bell's.

IT'S BELL'S WEEK!

Bell's Brewery is awesome. They make a ridiculous selection of beers which are almost always great. And by great, I mean freakin great.

Yet I can't get their beers. I write this blog out of New Jersey, which is unfortunate for a big reason: we don't get Bell's beer. New Jersey, believe it or not, gets distribution from more breweries than any other state in the nation. More than Oregon. More than California. More than New York. Yet we get no Bell's (not to mention no New Belgium, a craft brewery that gives Sam Adams and Yuengling a run for their money when it comes to size). Bell's just doesn't get here.

Bell's is out of Michigan, which, you'd never guess, is one of the best brewing states in America. I'm firmly on record as loving Founder's beers, also out of Michigan. Michigan also has Atwater, the much celebrated Jolly Pumpkin, the cool New Holland Brewing Co., Arcadia Ales, and dozens more. Bell's may be the biggest of all. They're pretty major when it comes to craft beer.

My first Bell's beer came courtesy of my friend Eric Ceresa. When he visited from Michigan in 2007 he brought local beer with him. That beer was Oberon, and as he explained, in Michigan you had Oberon with a slice orange. At the time, this idea was alien to me. Blue Moon had yet to explode and fruit in beer? No.

Well, yes. Because good is good. I had it that way, it was delicious, and I'm forever in his debt.
But I can't buy Bell's in New Jersey.

Thankfully, my buddy Jim, my coauthor on A Year of Hitchcock and co-host of the Year of Hitchcock Podcast, hooks me up when he visits. I've been able to have over a dozen Bell's beers, most more than once. On our most recent get together he brought me a fantastic assortment that included a six-pack of my already reviewed Bell's Oberon, among others.

So this week is dedicated to Bell's. Each day, I'm going to do a quick review of one of this brewery's awesome beers. Hope you enjoy ... especially if you can get their beer. Enjoy!

Quick Sips: Bell's Oberon Ale

Bell's Oberon Ale is something of a standard for beer lovers in the middle United States. In some ways, it's the flagship brew of this fantastic Michigan brewery.

Oberon is a wheat beer -- very traditional style during the summer -- with a clean taste and smooth-drinking character. It's often served with a slice of orange, and it's easy to see why. The citrus goes well with it. But even on its own (which is how I had it this most recent time) this is a crisp, refreshing summer beer that goes down easy but still offers good taste.

It's far from the best wheat out there, but it drinks so nice you'll want to go back for seconds (and thirds) on a hit summer day. Worth picking up if you see it.