Rauch Beer
Sierra Nevada Brewing Company in Chico, California, United States 🇺🇸
Smoked / Rauchbier Regular|
Score
6.73
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Bytemesis (16229) reviewed Rauch Beer from Sierra Nevada Brewing Company 11 years ago
Appearance - 10 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 5 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 5.5
Tap. Pours clear light amber, medium off white head, good lacing. Aroma is heavy smoke, woody, campfire. Flavor is very smokey as well, a bit of sweetness and acid ity. A bit meaty, unfortunately. Light body, high carbonation.
Clarkvv (16523) reviewed Rauch Beer from Sierra Nevada Brewing Company 19 years ago
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7
Draught pint at Sunset Grill on 2/10/07
Ruddy auburn with beige-tan hues and a medium-beige head that is small but well-retained, providing minor lacing. Well-conditioned and showing a high clarity with moderate carbonation.
Dry woodsmoke in the nose only incorporates a bit of salty/meatiness. Unfortunately, crystal malt hardness is very apparent lending that "iced tea and hard candy" sort of note that always seems too dry when used to the point where you can smell it. This keeps it quite dry and actually distracts from the smokiness through the middle. Light breadiness and a some sweet pale maltiness lends a light vanilla cream note that almost succeeds in warding off the crystal maltiness. Smoke returns, lightly, on the finish, with light phenols of clove, black pepper and some light band-aids. Medium to medium-high strength of aroma that definitely improves vastly with warming. The sweeter malts emerge and fend off the hard crystal malts, while the smokiness seems to grow stronger as well. No alcohol noted.
Wet/slippery texture with a prominent hardness thanks to the crystal malts, that slowly eases up and allows light pale malt sweetness in to the picture. Smokiness arrives quietly and with an almost scratchy, wooden dryness. Strong breadiness fights with the sweetness and a moderate amount of acidity begins to build. The smoke isn’t overdone (can you really overdo smokiness? haha), that’s for sure and definitely is of the more dry, less full variety. Low to moderately-low carbonation somewhat helps to concentrate the sweetness and offset some of the oily/wetness. Hickory-like woodsmoke, with lots of fruitiness, lingers on quite nicely. No alcohol noted. Hops are earthy and lightly grassy at times, leading to some pleasant, additional complexity. Tastefully done, as always, from SN, but I wish they’d cut out the crystal malt.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7
Draught at Blind Tiger, NY - lighter in flavor than some other rauchs I’ve had, but that made for a much more subtle smoke flavor, which is good for me (a lot of rauchs taste a bit baconesque to me) - not overhopped as I expected from this brewery - quite malty (caramel malt mostly) - actually much better than I was expecting.