72. Two Brothers Cane & Ebel

Our second beer from Two Brothers Brewing Company, and this one actually has a write up on the brewery website! We had this on tap at the Trolley Stop—the open mike this evening was really rather annoying. Hello, you two chord clowns, it’s called variety—look into it. If I wanted bad acoustic covers, I’d go hang out in the college bars. As for the beer, we’ve had several different versions of Cane & Ebel. While I know that a craft brewery is not supposed to have “versions,” some of the kegs of this that have run through the area have been distinctively different—we’ve seen at least three different versions pass through our neck of the woods. The first one we dubbed “lake water”—it was brown, murky, and, while slightly spicy, was also somewhat non-descript. Since we’d already had it in the bottle, we knew this wasn’t what it was “technically” supposed to be, but, well, we kinda liked the lake water/dirty dish water version for what it offered. And that was before the most recent couple of versions—we still do, however, affectionately refer to Cane & Ebel as “Lake Water.”

This version of Cane & Ebel had a dry malt & hoppy nose with a dark ochre color and a creamy rich head that was full and thick. The soft creamy malt start built into a hoppy and spicy subtle middle with some crisp sharpness that also combined with some burnt yummy maltiness before closing with more bitterness and some slight chocolate notes across the palate. With a medium body, Cane & Ebel had a bitterness that lingered as the beer warmed, although it was a bit more brown-ale-like and less spicier than it was last time. This one tastes more like a hoppy, well-balanced brown ale and less spicier than it was last time (the version between “Lake Water” and this one)—it is not as clean or complex in body and has less of the spicier and nuanced pepper notes of the most recent version. And it is most certainly not the Lake Water of yesteryear. But across the board, Cane & Abel has been drinkable, interesting, and certainly worth the price of admission.

worst photo of the year...

From the Two Brothers website: “This unique red rye beer is full of hop flavor and aroma. We add 70 pounds of Thai palm sugar to each batch. The sugar does not add much sweetness to the beer, but rather a fruity and vanilla-like flavor. A new hop variety call Summit is really showcased here. This 18% alpha hop is also very aromatic which gives a pungent citrus aroma. Then we heavily dryhopped the beer with Simcoe. Original, yes and that is no sin.”

(9/10/2009)