a quick night's beer tasting- Ishikawa and Weihenstephan festbier

Oh! The beers kicking in - I just got to a loud point in the music and I banged my head and my headphones fell off.
The alcohol is kicking in, rather.
The beer is simply wonderfull.
Find the right beer and only a kiss from the woman you love or a child's smile or some beautiful piece of natural beauty (a butterfly gliding past/bamboo flowing in the breeze/beautiful sunset/glimpse of a deer in the forest/chance encounter of a squirrel, playing with his nuts) can hope to compare. Mide you, I say the right beer.
The right beer, I say. This will entail not only the right beer but the right set of circumstances and events (taste, feeling, surroundings, atmosphere, phase of the moon, number of the special bonus ball in tonight's lottery, etc.) shall be conducive to the ellusive 'perfect pint'.
Rumours abound that such a pint exists.
But little evidence remains from anyone who has experienced such a phenomenomenomenomenon.
It can perhaps be comparable to the experience experienced by a very experienced astronaut, returning from space. He immediately becomes depressed and suicidal.
"Once you've been into space and seen the whole freaking planet from the outside, what can possibly compare? Why carry on living? Everything else is a dissapointment, by comparison."
Bit drastic?
Obviously, you've never had the perfect pint.

I must admit, I've come close, a few times.
One time was in a bar called Nürnberger Bratwurstglöckl, in Munich.
It's located near the Frauenkirche. Amazing place. Wow.
My favourite bar in Munich (and THAT'S saying something!). The beer in question was Augustiner Helles, served from an oak barrel by a very nice over 60 year old 'wench' (and I mean that in the nicest possible sense of the word), whose son had the same birthday as me. Gorgeous beer and amazing setting.
That was one of my closest to achieving a true 'when Harry met Sally' moment (you've seen that scene, right?)

aNYWAY, BACK TO THE ENTRY...

DANM, GOT THE CAPS LOCK STUCK.FIXED? N OPE!OK?
dAMN. oH! THERE IT WAS! Ok now?
YESSS!! I mean 'yes!!!'.
I typed in upper caps for emphasis. Bit stupid, on hindsight.
But then, in hindsight, my parents would have used protection...or just played the normal version of twister, instead of the 3 dimensional interactive version (and so, using shcb a Chewbacca defense, everything I do, I blame them - teehee!).

Tonight's tasting set includes:

• Ishikawa Brewery's Pale Ale
• Ishikawa Breery's Munich Dark Ale
• Weihenstephaner's Festbier

First up, the Pale ale:

Lovely.

If you like malty, thick, easy drinking beer, then you'll lurrrrv this beer.
Isikawa uses the same water, presumably taken from the Tamagawa river and treated (presumed to be prepresumed), but tasting the same in all their beers.
The results of such similar distinct tasting water is that certain styles are not suited to this specific water type (specifically the Belgian wit beer and the pilsner). However, their pale ale and their bottle conditioned pale ale seem to benefit from the water's taste.
Nice, smooth, evenly carbonated beer. Malty taste and a slight yeasty palate (but then I like to pour all the beer into the glass and not leave the sediment behind).

Very nice.

My only preference to this in the Ishikawa selection is the bottle conditioned pale ale. Similar but slightly superior in smoothy maltiness, if such a term exists - well, if it didn't, it does now.

Verdict: 6.5/10
(great session beer)

Ishikawa Munich Dark lager (based on a Munich dunkel{?}).

Thid baby also seemed to benefit from the water's special taste.
malty, smooth and yet slightly sickly and toffee like.
I would put this as almost a Czech dark ale, but milder.
It has the faint sicklyness of caramel and roasted sugar but also some smoothnes that I would associate with a good dunkelweiss (although it doesn't contain wheat). Lakcs the slight bite of a dunkel or the heaviness (again slight, but there, just the same in a real dunkel). Lack of body dissapoints. Bit too sweet for me.
It seems like this one was adjusted, to suit the typical consumer (being Japanese and having little idea of a Munich dark beer taste - have I mentioned that Disneyland and Universal Studios are ultra popular over here? - The power of suggestion).
Not the ebst beer but not terrible, either.
I drank two of these,a t the Ishikawa brewery.
Still, my favourite has to be the bottle conditioned ple ale or a nicely poured (I mean head wise AND temperature wise - why do Japanese insist on all beers being chilled to freezing point?) pale ale.

Verdict:5.5/10

Next up was a Weihenstephaner festbeer.

I won this baby in the Meguro Taver Brown beer festival.
This ws the firs ttime I had a Weihenstephaner Fest bier.
I've had Spaaten, Paulaner, Hacker Pschorr and many others, but not this one.
It's quie nice!
A malty, dry lager. Hoppy and malty and a good dry taste. Perhaps a cross between a Munich helles and a Czech pilsner? A slightly strong aftertaste.

Verdict: 6.5/10

Ye gods! I must be drunk! Just went to the toilet and instead of flushing, I turned on the light switch.

I think I ned something healthy, top balance this beer out in my system.

I know!


Murphy's Irish Stout!!!!


Aah... just what I needed...


G'night.