Beer Camp Across America: Alt Route
Sierra Nevada Brewing Company in Chico, California, United States 🇺🇸
Collab with: Victory Brewing CompanyAltbier Series Out of Production
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Score
6.82
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Brewers are notorious for refusing to take the easy path. Instead, we lead with our hearts and pursue our passions no matter how difficult the road ahead. Alt Route is a tribute to this stubborn spirit that drove us to dodge the status quo and found breweries. Together we chased the siren song of beer with this revamped take on an antique beer style.
Like us, Victory is one of the few brewers with an allegiance to whole-cone hops. They do extensive work with hop flavor, especially focusing on clever and delicious single-hop beers highlighting the same hop grown in different regions. They too share our roots in home brewing and never lost their passion for working with new beers and styles solely for the joy of making something new.
Alt Route is our take on the old school German Altbier style featuring an ale-lager hybrid yeast, which is top fermenting and fruity like an ale, but matured at cool temperatures for a clean, lager-like flavor. This deep amber beer has a slight emphasis on the richly layered, slightly sweet malt body with enough citrusy hop flavor and aroma to produce a balanced, dry finish.
Like us, Victory is one of the few brewers with an allegiance to whole-cone hops. They do extensive work with hop flavor, especially focusing on clever and delicious single-hop beers highlighting the same hop grown in different regions. They too share our roots in home brewing and never lost their passion for working with new beers and styles solely for the joy of making something new.
Alt Route is our take on the old school German Altbier style featuring an ale-lager hybrid yeast, which is top fermenting and fruity like an ale, but matured at cool temperatures for a clean, lager-like flavor. This deep amber beer has a slight emphasis on the richly layered, slightly sweet malt body with enough citrusy hop flavor and aroma to produce a balanced, dry finish.
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7.1/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 7
Flavor 8
Texture 6
Overall 7.5
12oz bottle from Bevmo
Pours clear dark amber/brown with a small beige head, some lacing. Mild aroma of toasted malts, toffee and bready. Taste is toasted malts, fruity, bready, yeast and spicy hops
Decent
Pours clear dark amber/brown with a small beige head, some lacing. Mild aroma of toasted malts, toffee and bready. Taste is toasted malts, fruity, bready, yeast and spicy hops
Decent
Tried
from Bottle
on 31 Aug 2014
at 15:27
6.8/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 6
Flavor 7
Texture 6
Overall 7
Tap at MacGregors. Reddish amber with lace. Nose of light caramel, grass, earth. Somewhat faint. Metallic, earthy flavor, big bitterness. Very soft caramel malts. Crisp and bitter. Needs more malt, and it has a weird matallic character. Otherwise a rather Uerige-like intensely bitter alt. Interesting for sure.
Tried
from Draft
on 30 Aug 2014
at 07:31
7.1/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 7
Flavor 7
Texture 8
Overall 7.5
12 ounce bottle from the Beer Camp Across America pack, opened 7/26/14. Pours a clear copper color with a thin creamy tan head. Good head retention. Aroma of toffee, caramel, nuts, raisin and a bit of an earthy note. The taste is caramel, toffee, raisin, nuts, treacle, spicy hops. Medium bodied, slight lingering bitterness.
Tried
from Bottle
on 29 Aug 2014
at 20:06
7/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 8
Flavor 7
Texture 6
Overall 7
Rich deep amber coloured body with hints of cola and light brown - very nice, all with a good two centimetre tall tan head. Aroma of crisp toasted malt, oatmeal, raisins, figs, yeast and a hint of molasses - very nice and crisp. Medium-bodied; Strong assertive toasted maltiness with a bitter and slightly offensive metallic and nutty flavour that shows strongly. Aftertaste has hints of metal, malt, alcohol, nuts, earth, grain, hops and even a twist of licorice - strong and pungent. Overall, a nice beer for the style with slightly more pungent flavours than usual, but in a good way. Deep and strong and if you like alts with more flavour than typical watered down versions, this will be perfect - great flavours throughout with a distinct complexity. I sampled this twelve ounce bottle purchased from Harris Teeter here in Arlington (Pentagon Row), Virginia on 30-July-2014 for US$22,00/12 pack sampled at home a few blocks away in Washington on 28-August-2014.
Tried
from Bottle
on 28 Aug 2014
at 22:39
7.5/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 7
Flavor 8
Texture 8
Overall 8
12oz bottle. I consider 6.6% for an Alt to be pretty strong, but it works well here. One of the better examples of a Stateside Alt. Smooth, rich brown malt, touch of amber maybe. Nice bitterness upfront, which fades into a luscious sweet malt finish. Pretty excellent stuff, I’d love to see Sierra do an Alt for a seasonal.
Tried
from Bottle
on 28 Aug 2014
at 21:16
7.4/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 8
Flavor 8
Texture 6
Overall 7.5
Bottle: Poured a clear deep brown color alt with a nice light brown foamy head with good retention and some lacing. Aroma consists of caramel malt with some earthy and citrus hoppy notes also noticeable. Taste is also dominated by loads of caramel malt with some earthy and citrus notes with medium residual sugars notes. Body is about average for style with good carbonation. Nice take on the style with great drinkability.
Tried
from Bottle
on 28 Aug 2014
at 12:13
6.4/10
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Appearance 6
Aroma 6
Flavor 7
Texture 6
Overall 6.5
4oz pour at Churchkey DC pours a clear amber with some soapy, lacing white head. Nose is crackery, some fall fruit, some mild citrus, hints of herbs. Flavor is malty, lightly bitter, some black tea, mild yeast. Clean finish. Solid for the style.
Tried
on 24 Aug 2014
at 15:56
7.6/10
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Appearance 8
Aroma 7
Flavor 8
Texture 8
Overall 7.5
Pours dark mahogany into a shaker. Off-white head with excellent retention recedes to coat surface. Dark caramel and pit fruit aromas. Sweet dark caramel and dry bitter earth front to back. Lasting dark resin finish.
Tried
on 22 Aug 2014
at 15:52