After work last night, Scott stopped by to pick up his Harley, and we had a beer. At first, I didn't think I had any to offer him, my fridge appeared completely empty of 22 oz. or 750 ml. bottles of stuff we haven't yet had*. But then I noticed one bomber on the side and that was Terrapin Side Project Volume 2, RoggenRauchBier.*I have lots of beer in the house that I haven't had yet, I just haven't chilled them yet.
So, we cracked open this one. I used my Cubs Old Style glasses because, well, I like the Cubs and I like Old Style, and these aren't massive pint glasses anyway.
This one looked like an amber (scott said rusty) beer with whitish foam. It looks almost like a pumpkin ale (it's a lager). After a while, it developed the spaghetti-o foam rings.
Scott said it smelled like gym socks; it seems smoke beers (and pepper beers) can have a tendency to smell kind of bad. I thought it smelled kind of spicy, but not smokey. I think I smelled the spice (like nutmeg maybe) because it really looked like a pumpkin ale.
It felt thin and fizzy, and had a salty bite to it. It tasted smokey and salty. there was a little bit of bitter, but I expected more from a rye (since rye's seem to hold their hops flavors longer than other malt styles). There may have also been some pepper spice in the flavor.
Overall it was a decent beer. It would go really good with hot wings. Sadly, I doubt I'll be able to find this again, due to it's once ever nature.
I picked this up at Bruisin Ales in Asheville. Yes, I paid $7.25 for the beer.
As I was drinking this, I thought about how smoke beers normally have the malt smoked, I was wondering if it would be possible to smoke the hops.
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