Hitting Eastern Iowa shelves this week is a newcomer out of Kansas. Tallgrass Brewing’s (www.tallgrassbeer.com) entire lineup is now available in Eastern Iowa. Their whole lineup is canned and these are the beers they produce:
8 Bit Hop Rocketed Pale Ale: 5.2%
“Just like those classic video games we all grew up with, 8-Bit Pale Ale is spectacularly simple at first glance yet remarkably fun and complex when you get into it. Our Hop Rocket infuses the character of Austrailian grown Galaxy Hops into an American Pale Ale, giving a unique tropical, almost melon aroma in a classic American style.”
Velvet Rooster Belgian Tripple: 8.5%
“This beer is a Belgian Tripel that lives up to its name. Smooth and carefully crafted like a fine velvet painting, but with an 8.5% ABV this bird has some spurs! The beer pours a golden straw color with brilliant clarity. Topped with a lofty pure white head the beer has a wonderful floral nose, with subtle fruit notes.
The taste is clean and crisp, with subtle fruit notes and a touch of candy like sweetness. The beer has a Champagne-like effervescent that provides a crisp offset to its sweet finish. While a pint glass is always nice, Velvet Rooster would also be at home in a tulip glass or Champagne flute.”
Halcyon Unfiltered Wheat: 5.0%
“We originally brewed Halcyon as our first summer seasonal, but since all the Halcyon fans (a.k.a: kiteheads) asked so nicely, we now brew this magical brew year around. Besides, who doesn’t want a little taste of summer on a dark winter night?
We are proud of all our beers, but Halcyon is special. We are in “the wheat state” after all, so the pressure was on us to make a wheat beer, but we knew it had to be great. Halcyon Unfiltered Wheat is the result of that Midwestern angst, an all-American wheat with real Kansas-grown grain in the brew.
We start with raw Kansas white wheat in the mix to give it a nice edge, but what really makes it shine is the hops. We use “hop-bursting” late in the brewing process and this gives Halcyon its palate of tropical fruit flavors & aromas with a bright and refreshing taste like the best days of summer.
oh yea…Silver Medal in the wheat beer category at the US Beer Championships Woot! Woot!”
Oasis: 7.2%
“Oasis is a Double ESB/IPAish beer that came about from playing around with one of Jeff’s favorite homebrew recipes. Here at Tallgrass we love malt and we love hops, and this beer has both of them in record quantities; well, at least records for our baby brewery.
At a hefty 7.2% ABV and 93 IBU, Oasis is a big beer that has to be priced a bit higher than our regular line of beers. We think that once you taste the over-the-top hops and surprisingly sturdy malt backbone you will realize why it’s worth it.
Definitely not a fruit-extract seasonal shandy, this beer is meant to be enjoyed on the back porch, the front porch, or even on the stoop. What’s a stoop? Well, it’s a good place to drink beer, is what it is.”
Buffalo Sweat: 5.0%
“We love this beer here at the brewery, and think you will have one of those “I’ve never-tasted-a-beer-like-that” kind of moments when you try it!
What we really like about this beer is the smoothness that brewing with cream sugar brings to the palate. This smoothness balances out the copious quantities of roasted barley used in the brewing process to create a rich, complex, and delicious beer. If you have not been a stout drinker in the past, give this beer a try. It might just change your mind about how dark beers should taste. It tastes so rich, but is surprisingly easy to drink!
Can’t find the sweat? Don’t sweat it. Just ask for Buffalo Sweat at your local liquor store or your favorite tavern.”
Tallgrass IPA: 6.3%
“Our third beer, Tallgrass IPA, is an India Pale Ale that is rich, complex, and flavorful. We are proud to be the first brewery here in the Great Plains to have the first brewed, cans, and draft IPA out on the market!
Tallgrass IPA originally came to life as a creation during Jeff’s early homebrewing days (batch Numero Uno), and it was consumed in short order by his friends who came over to cook out and help with the next batch. After some modifications over the years (because nobody’s rookie homebrew batch tastes all that great, but your friends will tell you it does) the recipe was dialed in to become what is now Tallgrass IPA. We love this beer and think you will too!
What is with the name “India Pale Ale”? Well, India Pale Ales have a history that reaches way back to the days of the British Empire and the need for good and proper British beer for the soldiers in India. It just so happens that hops not only taste and smell great, they also have natural preservative properties that help keep beer fresher. Obviously, there was no way to keep beer cool on the long voyage around Cape Horn from England to India, so the intellectual forebearers of modern microbiology (genius brewers of course!) figured that if some hops were good for storage then heaps of hops would be great!
With this technique, these hero brewers and their hops kept the beer good and the soldiers of the empire inebriated, even in the furthest corners of the globe. Even more, the hoppiness of the IPA preserved not only the beer itself, but the great taste it created has preserved the style as one of the most popular beer styles in the world in the 21st century. If those brewers weren’t knighted by the empire back then, they should have been!”
Finding a terrific IPA under $10 is getting kind of hard these days. Two Hearted, Stone IPA, and Green Flash all come in around $10 or higher. However, Bear Republic’s Racer 5 is an affordable and fantastic tasting IPA. The only crappy part is, we have to go to Madison, WI to get it. Not available in Eastern Iowa yet, but hopefully it will be soon.
