The main reason I picked up this beer in the first place was fact that it was a Black Lager (I mean, how frequently do you get the opportunity to drink a black lager?). After reviewing doing a through review, the fact that it was a black lager turned out to be the least interesting thing about the beer! More interesting to me was the acronym GYO which paraded prominently around the circumference of the label. GYO stands for Grow Your Own and proudly proclaims that this beer in it's entirety is a product of the Rogue Brewing Company...
Now, I could write 10 posts on why the concept of an 'estate grown' beer is so cool but the fact of the matter is that very few of my readers are as geeky about this stuff as I am so I'll limit myself to a humble paragraph.
The craft beer industry is founded on choosing QUALITY over QUANTITY. It's about home-grown goodness... Hand-picked ingredients selected not because they have the highest yield or the best price but because they are of the finest quality and will produce the best tasting beer! The craft beer industry is about consuming local beers, made from sustainably-produced, NATURAL-ingredients... Ingredients that are combined with love to create beer that's not only unique within the global beer-market, but unique to the very sun and soil of the place where it was created! The French call this characteristic terroir but apparently Rogue prefers the earthier term, Dirtoir!
Knowing as I do that Rogue is committed to producing quality beers I shouldn't be shocked by this beer, but I still can't help but be surprised to see it readily available on Arizonian shelves and at a competitive price.
So how does it taste? All this talk about what a special process the production is doesn't mean much if the end result is a mediocre beer right? Well, fortunately for me, this beer is far from mediocre!
It pours a rich dense jet-black color with a nice tan head. The flavor is much more robust than I had expected from a lager. There are aromas of dark-roasted, whole-bean coffee, bitter-sweet chocolate, and rich malted hops. There's also a smokey aroma that comes through on the nose and again on the palate. The mouth-feel is clean and round, and the flavor profile is dense with malt and coffee.
The only thing that would have made drinking this beer more enjoyable would have been consuming it at the brewery, enjoying a plate of farm-to-the-table plate cuisine with old friends and a perhaps few new ones. So do yourself a favor, go down to your local farmers market, pick up some in-produce, call up some friends, and pick up a bottle or two of this beer from your local craft beer vendor. Cook, open, and enjoy.
-Prost!
D.Lux
P.S. Take a look at the label.. they give the latitude and longitude of the hop and barley farms-how cool is that!?! For more info about this gem check out the official Rogue Website.
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