Flat Earth’s Organic?!
Last week, I jumped a technological hurdle on got “What Ale’s Thee” onto my iPod. This allowed me to use my commute to think about beer. In the latest edition, Phil and Alvey talk with the owners of Flat Earth Brewing. So, by the time I got to work, I was all excited to go get some Flat Earth beer. The next night, I found myself at the Happy Gnome and in a position to order their Angry Earth Pale Ale.
I’d had the Belgian Pale in the past and found it to be a perfectly passable beer, not totally unlike a beer I brew myself. I’d heard, however, that organic brewing ingredients weren’t quite up to the quality of conventional ingredients (running contrary to my food preference and evidence). I wondered what this would mean for Angry Earth?
I found it meant good things…and bad. The aroma was certainly suprising. I expected more hop aroma. What I found was something slightly off-putting. To me, it was kind of a pumpkin-guts vegetal thing. Tentatively, I sipped… There was a lovely bright, freshness to the hop flavor. I loved this, but I had a hard time getting past the funk.
When I passed it around to other homebrewers, they agreed it was a little weird, chalked it up to organic ingredients and moved on to other beers.
Myself, I’ll go back to the Belgian Pale and I’m still anxious to try the Element 115 Cali Common, but I guess I won’t run out for organic beers or ingredients any time soon.
