New Brew News – August 21, 2017

Our Thoughts: While Schlafly might be the oldest craft brewery in St. Louis, they are definitely not set in their ways. They continue to brew new styles and get creative with classics.  This new Paloma gose sees them melding the classic German gose beer style with the flavors of a Paloma, a popular Mexican cocktail. Spanish for dove, the Paloma traditionally consists of tequila, lime juice and grapefruit flavored soda. By using a gose as the base beer, they've essentially created a low ABV, tangy, fruit and refreshing cocktail in a bottle. This promises to be perfect to give the summer a proper send off. This will be packaged in 750 ml bottles.

Our Thoughts: Earlier this year in April, Schlafly brought the fire and unleashed The Variant upon us. This imperial stout that spent time in port barrels and had cocoa nibs added proved that Schlafly still has a few tricks up their sleeve. Now, they're stepping their game up another notch with The Variant II. For this iteration, they've taken an imperial stout and laid it down to age in brandy barrels and have also added cherries. Sounds face meltingly delicious to us. We were honored to be able to review the first  version of The Variant and to say that we're excited about this release would be an understatement. Watch Schlafly's social media feeds for release details.

Our Thoughts: While adjunct laden, high gravity imperial stouts, imperial IPA's crammed full of exotic hop varieties and any and all barleywines hold a very special place in our hearts, sometimes the best beer is the simple crisp, refreshing lager. Piney River have already mastered the big beers with Raise a Ruckus and Mule Team, their imperial stout and IPA, and now are bringing us Cerveza Rio, a Mexican-style lager. Perfect for these waning days of summer, this style of lager offers a balanced, palate-pleasing drink experience that reminds you that simple can be fun too.