Vacation Beer Review Part 1 - California

Your West Coast correspondent has just returned from a two weeks of well deserved vacation. The first ten days or so were spent driving down the California coast, and the remainder was spent in the socialist paradise of Toronto, Ontario. Having now made the drive down the Coastal Highway I cannot recommend it highly enough. It’s definitely worth doing before shuffling off this mortal coil.

Although the focus of the California trip was on hiking and wine-tasting I did somehow manage to consume some California beer along the way. First up, the Acme Pale Ale:



I had the Pale Ale while waiting for my dinner reservation at the Big Sur Bakery. Incidentally, the food there was so delicious that the boyfriend and I headed back to the restaurant for breakfast.

The Acme Pale Ale checks in at 5% ABV and is produced by the North Coast Brewing Company. Although I didn’t realize it at the time, I’d already had another one of North Coast’s beers before, the Scrimshaw, which I would recommend highly to pilsner fans. I'll definitely be checking out their other offerings soon.

As you can see from the picture, the Acme Pale Ale has a beautiful almost pumpkin or roast squash color and light foam. The nose is very mild and the beer has a great crisp taste. The Acme has a mild citrus and hop flavor to it, and it is an extremely refreshing beer after a long day of hiking (and undoubtedly extremely refreshing without the hiking as well). Highly recommended.

Our second beer is the Firestone Walker Double-Barrel Ale (DBA), 5% ABV. The DBA is produced by Firestone Walker, which is located in Pasa Robles, CA. Apparently they are the winners of Champion Brewery/Brewmaster award from the Brewers Association World Beer Cup (an event that it sounds like I simply must track down tickets to) in the mid-sized category for the past three years. The beer is an English Style Bitter/Amber Ale, and ours was poured from a bottle.



As you can see from the photo, there was virtually no head from the pour. I almost wonder whether the bottle had been mishandled in shipping or by the restaurant. The DBA had a maple color and had a strong sweet and hoppy taste which ended with a finish a wet stone. Honestly it was not my favorite beverage of the whole trip. I found the sweetness unpleasant and didn’t like the finish or the lack of carbonation. However, given Firestone’s long list of accolades I’ll probably be trying their Pale Ale soon.