Thursday, August 16, 2007

Clipper City's Heavy Seas "Hang Ten"


Another beer in the 'Heavy Seas' series from Clipper City in Syphilis City, Maryland, is Hang Ten. It's a Weizen Dopplebock and it means my friend the pirate is back. I'm not positive but I think a Weizen Dopplebock is a Double Bock brewed with a portion of wheat in lieu of being an all barley malt ale. This beer is paying tribute to the style made famous by Aventis of Germany.
Hang Ten has a sharply acidic yeast nose with hints of sour lemon. It's coloration is browish red and puts heads to bed with it's 10% a.b.v. One can't tell there is so much alcohol in this beer from taste alone. The body is fairly thin where it should be heartier, ala Loose Cannon. The flavor has a yeasty tang tempered by a hefty malt flavor with hints of fig. A good beer, it pays tribute to Aventis fairly well, but if you want the perfect representation of this style I would recommend Aventis.
Apparently Clipper City is trying to drive me crazy with it's Heavy Seas labels. They have a penchant for pairing good beers with ridiculous labels. The pirate in the Seinfeld shirt from 'Loose Cannon' is back. Once again: he is oblivious to the danger he is in, the bird refuses to fly and I'm left wishing something in the picture would just kill them both already. If the shark would just bite off the pirate's hand, maybe he would stop drawing these labels. Beers of this high caliber demand better labels. This is probably the same pirate who walked into a bar with a steering wheel on his crotch and when the bartender asked him how the steering wheel got there said, "I don't know but it's driving me nuts."

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