Boulevard Tasting Room ESB & Ginger-Lemon Radler

From Boulevard:

As we approach Spring, it’s time to refresh our Sample Twelve pack. Mid-Coast IPA andWestside Rye were both very well received and found their fans, but it’s in our nature to experiment and play. This is, after all, the intention behind the sampler pack. Brewmaster Steven Pauwels encourages our brewers to brew whatever they’d like and then the best beers are given the opportunity to leave the brewery to be shared with a wider drinking audience. The two Year-Round beers featured in our upcoming package will be Unfiltered Wheat Beer and Single-Wide IPA. Rotating in from the Tasting Room series will be an ESB (Extra Special Bitter) and Ginger-Lemon Radler. Both new beers will also be available to sample in our Tasting Room at the brewery.

Tasting Room ESB is 4.9% ABV and 36 IBUs.

Our ESB will fall along the more traditional lines of the style with a nice balance of English malt character with spicy/earthy English hops. Although referred to as “a bitter,” ESBs aren’t necessarily that bitter. You can think of them as a quaffable English pale ale. I talked with brewer Matt Hecke about the team’s intentions behind the ESB and here’s what he had to say: “As of late a lot of our newly released beers have been more hop forward or extreme in their own ways. We wanted to show that a traditional style ale can hang with the best of our beers. We specifically chose to make an ESB because it isn’t very common, but still traditional in nature. It’s a good opportunity to showcase our knowledge of brewing past and present.”

Ginger-Lemon Radler is 4.1% ABV and 13 IBUs.

Radlers, which are usually a mixture of beer and a citrus flavored soda, have really blown up over the past year as drinkers seek out more flavorful beers that still pack a ton of flavor. We’re using Unfiltered Wheat Beer as the base for our Radler and blending in lemon and ginger juice following fermentation. The slightly tart, spicy character of the beer brings plenty to the palate, but Ginger-Lemon Radler is crisp and super drinkable. This beer has been crafted to be a refreshing beer worthy of session drinking.

You can look for these to start hitting shelves in towards the beginning of May.

As in the past, head to Boulevard.com/TRBeers to let us know your thoughts on our Tasting Room beers.

– Jeremy Danner, Ambassador Brewer