Old fashioned dark lager parades dark-roast chocolate malts across black rye breading, mossy peat dewiness and dried fig swig, recalling English-styled ESB with its underlying earthen brown tea bittering. Tertiary toffee, pecan and burnt toast reminders waver.
Decisive medium-bodied dark lager brings sweet tobacco-roasted carafa malting to smoky Blackstrap molasses bittering, dry hop-charred singe and cocoa-dried coffee slumber. Cola, hazelnut and walnut illusions swim alongside rice-browned mocha-like splendor in the midst.
‘Luscious’ chocolate-roasted märzen lager aged over ‘gobs of cocoa nibs and vanilla beans’ imparts milk chocolate sweetness above Octoberfest-related dark roasted barley malting and leafy Noble hop astringency. Splendid dried cocoa finish may benefit from richer vanilla influence.
Unspecific German-styled dunkel lager allows phenol hop astringency to drag down chocolate-caramel malting and brown-sugared winter spicing. Toasted nuttiness adds some depth as wavered red and orange fruiting dissipates.
Sweet Czech dark lager brings caramel-burnt toffee, brown chocolate, molasses cake and creme brulee niceties to the front above light hop toasting. Honeyed pumpernickel breading and tobacco-leafed crisping sit way below mocha attributes.
Before America’s microbrew revolution swept the nation, this original Czech-based Budweiser product would rate higher. But competition’s thru the roof so its mild dark-roasted mocha malting and pleasant toasted hop bittering seem complacent by today’s standards. Dusty cocoa-powdered dark chocolate chalking, distant brown-sugared molasses sapping and slight chestnut-praline conflux pick up minor charcoal acridity for musty Old World moderation.
Somewhat dull dark lager at least betters most nebulously drab schwarzbiers. Dark chocolate, toffee and cocoa tones get coarsened a tad by astringent light-roasted hop murk. Pecan, marzipan and burgundy illusions tease the soft mocha surface. FYI: go to elpedalero.com for coolest collection of Latin American beer labels.
Overreaching Estonian dark lager suffers from murky earthen hop coarsening working against pleasant, if musty, chocolate-spiced burnt caramel malting and ancillary fig-cherry conflux. At its center, molasses-sugared medium body recalls peanut-buttered Mary Jane candy bar, hard toffee and marzipan. But nasty astringency cuts like a knife.
Indistinct cola-browned dark lager never fully integrates. Murky oatmeal-sugared chocolate malting and dewy molasses sapping undone by dirty watered swill. Black licorice snip and wispy nuttiness lost at the dire mocha finish.
Indifferent dark lager brings phenol schwarzbier mustiness and reedy porter acridity to muted stout-like mocha chalking. Baker’s chocolate, dried cocoa and coffee-stained walnut receive musky peat-smoked grain roast, thwarting molasses-sapped gingerbread spicing. An uninterestingly lower-rung hybridized style.
On tap, delectable Bavarian lager (a specialty beer made exclusively for Barcade’s three locations) brings beguiling chocolate, cocoa and toffee flavors to caramel-toasted Munich malting. Soft-hopped earthen peat dewiness and recessive dried-fruited sherry-port conflux affect amiable mocha finish.
