Short’s Smoked Apple Ale

Short’s Brewery, Bellaire, Michigan

Smoked Apple Ale

Rauchbier / Fruit Beer

6.25% ABV

12 oz. bottle into Mason jar

Another smoke beer!

I opened this beer with great optimism. I really want to love Short’s crazy concoctions. This time, I did.

The beer smells like woodfire smokiness, not liquid smoke from a bottle. The apple complements the smokiness with a refreshing sourness. I’m not sure I would have picked it out as apple, had it not been labeled as such on the bottle. Given that I knew, I registered apple juice flavors pronounced more in taste than aroma. Yet the apple doesn’t make the beer sweet– it is a golden ale with a sour center cloaked in smoke.

This a good multi-season beer. I enjoyed it in the (cold) springtime evening, but could drink it with equal pleasure in the winter or summer, and especially the fall.

I nibbled on grated Romano cheese while I drank this beer. The light sourness really cuts through the cheese and makes a happy match. The smoke may not complement all cheeses (stay away from fresh mozzarella, blue cheeses, and fresh chevres) but I think that many– Gouda, Cheddar, Ementaller, Gruyere– would go perfectly.

It’s not as though the apple/cheese combination is anything new. Some people even put cheese on their apple pie.

~ by nininja on May 18, 2010.