Brewed By: Sierra Nevada Brewing Company in Chico, California
Purchased: Single 12oz bottle from the 2014 Beer Camp bought at Jewel-Osco in Chicago, IL; 2014 (PKG 05/22/14)
Style/ABV: English-Style Bitter, 5.6%
Reported IBUs: 40Purchased: Single 12oz bottle from the 2014 Beer Camp bought at Jewel-Osco in Chicago, IL; 2014 (PKG 05/22/14)
Style/ABV: English-Style Bitter, 5.6%
What is Beer Camp? It is Sierra Nevada's celebration of craft beer and the numerous breweries across America that make that craft beer. For 2014, Sierra Nevada collaborated with 12 different breweries to make 12 different beers. They also have a Beer Camp Across America Beer Festival, which will stop at seven different cities and feature many different breweries and beers.
About Sierra Nevada:
Sierra Nevada are one of the big players in craft brewing, and one of the first craft breweries to arrive on the craft beer scene. If you check out their history page, you will see that founder Ken Grossman began his quest to build a brewery in 1976. In 1980, Ken Grossman and co-founder Paul Camusi brewed their first batch of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. According to Wikipedia, Sierra Nevada's Pale Ale is the second best selling craft beer behind Boston Lager. Sierra Nevada is the sixth largest brewing company in the United States as well, cranking out over 750,000 barrels in 2010. For more info, check out their website.
The There and Back English-Style Bitter is a collaboration with everyone's favorite cow-sodomizers, New Glarus. My bottle reads: "For beer folks, Chico, CA, and New Glarus, WI, are bucket-list pins on the U.S. brewing map, but it's no simple feat seeing both. There and Back is named for the planes, trains, and zeal that connect them. This classic English-style Bitter is a complex mix of toasty malt and fruity, herbal hops."
This one pours out a hazy orange color with a finger of orange/caramel-tinted head. There is nice lacing, moderate streams of mid sized carb, and bells and whistles that might impress the UK but good lord show me some implants in bikinis thank you 'Merica.
New Glarus knows a thing or two about German-style Lagers, so it doesn't shock me that they also know a thing or two about English beer. This aroma is really nice, with deep toast and toasty notes, Lager-like cleanness, and fruit notes. This smells very much like one of New Glarus' German-Style or English-Style Ales/Lagers. If you've had any of New Glarus' beers that aren't Spotted Cow or the fruit beers, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. There are some fruity notes here: berries, apples, pears, sweet grain. The nose is ultimately on the mild, sweet, and toasty side.
At cooler temps this is quite toasty with pear/apple/berry fruitiness and raw grains. As the beer warms up, floral English-Style hops emerge with great floral notes and fruitiness. There's lots of toast and caramel notes here, balanced and cleaned up nicely by grassy hops and clean yeast.
This is clean, Lager-like, light-bodied, and quaffable. You don't get any booze here, and my only regret is that this isn't in a 16oz can. Palate depth is top notch, and complexity is also very good for the style. This definitely reminds me of early Autumn and English pubs. You could drink this at a fish fry or with fish and chips. Up front: toasty notes, caramel, berry fruit notes; apple, pear, and bitter floral hops in the mids; the back end cleans up with grain, lingering fruity notes, and mild bitterness. The finish is toasty and round.
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| There and Back English-Style Bitter |
This one pours out a hazy orange color with a finger of orange/caramel-tinted head. There is nice lacing, moderate streams of mid sized carb, and bells and whistles that might impress the UK but good lord show me some implants in bikinis thank you 'Merica.
New Glarus knows a thing or two about German-style Lagers, so it doesn't shock me that they also know a thing or two about English beer. This aroma is really nice, with deep toast and toasty notes, Lager-like cleanness, and fruit notes. This smells very much like one of New Glarus' German-Style or English-Style Ales/Lagers. If you've had any of New Glarus' beers that aren't Spotted Cow or the fruit beers, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. There are some fruity notes here: berries, apples, pears, sweet grain. The nose is ultimately on the mild, sweet, and toasty side.
At cooler temps this is quite toasty with pear/apple/berry fruitiness and raw grains. As the beer warms up, floral English-Style hops emerge with great floral notes and fruitiness. There's lots of toast and caramel notes here, balanced and cleaned up nicely by grassy hops and clean yeast.
This is clean, Lager-like, light-bodied, and quaffable. You don't get any booze here, and my only regret is that this isn't in a 16oz can. Palate depth is top notch, and complexity is also very good for the style. This definitely reminds me of early Autumn and English pubs. You could drink this at a fish fry or with fish and chips. Up front: toasty notes, caramel, berry fruit notes; apple, pear, and bitter floral hops in the mids; the back end cleans up with grain, lingering fruity notes, and mild bitterness. The finish is toasty and round.
Rating: Above-Average (3.5/5.0 Untappd)
I'm feeling a Light Above-Average on this beer. This definitely skirts by being just average...it's memorable and really well-made. Kind of like everything that New Glarus puts out. I know I'm holding them to an impossibly high standard, but they generally nail all the beers they make (and there's a lot of them). Still....this is like a busty English BBW. Refined, but the teeth are still janky.
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