Honeybeers

Oh, pooh!

So I thought I’d knock out a few more “summery” beers this time around. The weather’s been fantasticially terrible around here after the late April heatwave, so my desire to consume summer beers has accordingly been diminished. But no matter, I figure I’d plow forward with a couple of beers are purely middle of the road in my book. It just so happens that they both contain honey in them.

For once, I’m at a loss as to the history of honeyed beer. Since honey is full of sugar, you can absolutely ferment it into some kind of booze, and I’m sure ancient cultures did just that. But adding some to your brew? Well, you can add a lot of things to beer, for better or worse.

In my estimation, honey in beer is a push. The beer probably wasn’t stellar before the honey, so you’re doing no great disservice to the beer-drinking public by adding it.  On the other paw, you could quite easily overdo things and create a beery syrup. Byrup? Hey, I should try that!

Anyway, the first beer in question is actually a pretty decent honey beer, and that is J.W. Dundee’s Honey Brown Lager. This was one of the first beers I encountered outside of the macrobrews and the most common imports. Every once in a while, as nostalgia grips me, I’ll pick up a sixer of it and shed a silent tear for my lost youth. Or, just enjoy it on summer night.

As I said, summer beers need to be refreshing, and Honey Brown succeeds in this regard. Its honey flavor present at all times, but it’s not overpowering. You get timid taste of the caramel malts, without things being too watery, and the finish is clean and lightly hoppy. Nothing too bad–but nothing too good, either.

A final note on Honey Brown. To its detriment, the quality control at its brewery has improved over the years. By this I mean the following: when I first started drinking Honey Brown, we would get a six- or twelve-pack every once in a while that was substantially sweeter than normal. The extra dose of honey was actually a pleasant surprise, and it worked as an occasional occurance. Sadly, those days seem to be gone forever, but every time I get myself a Honey Brown, I can only hope…

But this article is entitled “Honeybeers,” so I need to review another. I’ll do a popular upscale macro: Honey Moon Summer Ale, from the makers of Blue Moon. This one not only has honey in it, but lemon as well!

And that’s why I don’t like it. Where the Honey Brown was refreshing, this is cloying. It’s too sweet, and the lemon is too strong. Its one saving grace is a wheaty crispness in the finish. Still, I can’t recommend it; a regular Blue Moon would probably better serve you.

Since I already did honey, next time, I’ll speak about the other flavor that seems replete in summer beers: lemon. Sometimes its works, sometimes it doesn’t. But that’s…another story.