Bottle at Kaeru. Wheaty aroma, bit of sweetness. Taste is ok, light grassy hops, bit of grain, some sweetness. not so exiting.

Bottle sample at a tasting at troubles' place. Thanks Stas. Hazy yellow. Graininess, citrus, floral, sweetish, a bit of bread, bitterish finish.

Clear yellow with no real head. Aroma of wet maybe musty hops and dried leaves. Taste is quite sour with normal harsh hoppy bitterness. Not particularly smooth, but good to drink in quantities. Could be more refreshing though.

Part of the 1212 yen trail set for new customers direct from the brewery via their Rakuten page. I’m happy they switched labels the bottles look much better than the photo online. They need to update their webpage. After having their kolsch I was curious to try their lager side by side to compare. Colorwise they’re virtually identical with the pilsner being maybe a smidge darker but that could just be the lighting. The aroma is strange for a lager, a kind of fruity candy caramel-buttery? The taste is fruity at first then it mellows into more of a typical lager with light malts, and bitter grass in the dry finish. The kolsch is my favorite of the two, judging by that kind of indeterminate fruitiness I’m hard pressed believing it is a lager yeast as it should be for a pilsner. I can see what KyotoLefty meant about bananas... not at all to style.

Bottle from the brewery. Clear bight golden color with a medium head. Fragrant, buttery, yeasty aroma, quite sweet and a bit fruity. Bananas. Fruity, full round flavor, lots of yeast and butter. Rich malt. Relatively sweet, though hops are evident and become more so towards the finish. Slightly similar flavor profile to the Koelsch, though hoppier and a bit cleaner. Basically in the Bohemian style, I suppose. Full flavor, medium body, with just stronger than medium bitterness. Finish lightly bitter, fragrant, mellow. As with the koelsch, I’m not sure if this is really how the style should taste, but I like it quite a bit.