Welcome back to FTW’s Beverage of the Week series. Here, we mostly chronicle and review beers, but happily expand that scope to any beverage that pairs well with sports. Yes, even cookie dough whiskey.
December is the perfect time for a spiced beer. Like most of Christmas-time’s indulgences, it’s rich, vaguely unhealthy and a little overwhelming. These beers aren’t anytime beers, even if they still hold up for a bottle or two come March. They’re best consumed slowly recovering from eating a dozen reindeer-shaped sugar cookies on a couch, testing the limits of how far your stomach can stretch.
My go-to in the category is Great Lakes’ Christmas Ale; a beer so good it effectively stopped me from looking for other examples. Milwaukee Brewing Company’s Plowed In winter ale hit the spot as well, but their beers have exited the circle of trust since their buyout. Either way, there’s an issue here. Costco doesn’t sell either of these in five-liter kegs.
Breckenridge, however, is a December staple between bulk underpants and rotisserie chickens across the concrete floors of America’s finest warehouse retailer. The Colorado-based brewer has several recognizable beers, but their Christmas Ale extends the biggest reach — it’s too seasonal to be a flagship ale, but it’s unmistakable on liquor and oversized shopping store aisles alike.
Is it worth dropping $15 to $20 on a little keg that holds roughly 15 beers? Let’s find out.
Oh, and let’s see is Shock Top’s Twisted Pretzel Ale is any good, too. Tis the season, after all.
It pours a dark caramel with a slow-forming head that rises up to about a quarter of an inch before slowly receding to a thin tan line. It’s all malt coming off the top of the pour with a little bit of allspice and maybe some nutmeg toward the end. That’s awesome for me; I love a malty beer. It’s not exactly what I’m used to from a Christmas Ale, but I’m not about to complain.
That malt remains the headliner, creating a dense but ultra smooth sip carried away by carbonation that isn’t quite crisp but very notable. It gives way to a little pale hoppiness. Nothing is bitter, but it is a bit bready.
The spices you’d expect aren’t there. That’s a bit of a bummer for a holiday ale, but it doesn’t stop the beer from succeeding. It drinks much lighter than its 7.1 percent alcohol by volume suggests. It’s still a heavier beer, owing to that density, but at no point does it feel like more of a chore than your average lager.
Without those spices, it’s very replayable. The roasted malt makes it better for colder months, but there isn’t anything especially festive. It’s just a well made beer that does a great job with the flavors I like most from my brews.
That said, a littttttle spice wouldn’t hurt fulfill the promise of the “Christmas” in big letters on the front of the bottle.
Speaking of malty things you’d find at Oktoberfest, here’s Shock Top’s newest seasonal. Pretzels and beer are a no brainer combination, and a wheat beer is an easy palette to drop some salty, doughy goodness into. Shock Top isn’t exactly a favorite of mine — I think the last time I had it was as a $2 beer in grad school — but I’ll admit you could do much, much worse at your local draft house.
It pours a color true to its inspiration, dark brown with a white ring of foam that lingers at the top. It smells — wow — salty. A bit like a pretzel but more like bar popcorn. If you closed your eyes and someone placed this in front of you, you’d think it was some moderately fresh kernels hastily scooped into a paper boat. I’ve never smelled a beer like this and, honestly, it’s kinda great.
The first sip is malt and salt and sweet and, hot damn I do not know why or how but it works. This is a weird beer that leaves behind a true pretzel aftertaste. It’s dry and, in the spirit of Cosmo Kramer, feels meant to leave you thirsty. But it’s bready and light at the same time, making it extremely drinkable for a darker ale.
It’s a nice effect to wash away the pale wheat that opens each sip. Instead of a lemon, you get a different kind of bar staple. It’s toasty and unique and, man, this was a weird swing that really worked out for Shock Top. Like the Breckenridge there isn’t much to set it off as a holiday seasonal, but it stands out nonetheless.
This a pass/fail mechanism where I compare whatever I’m drinking to my baseline cheap beer. That’s the standby from the land of sky-blue waters, Hamm’s. So the question to answer is: on a typical day, would I drink Breckenridge’s Christmas Ale or Shock Top’s Twisted Pretzel over a cold can of Hamm’s?
Yeah, I could mix these two into my routine without issue. Neither will supplant Great Lakes atop my Christmas beer wishlist, but that’s just because I do like those festive spices a few times per year. Both the Christmas Ale and Twisted Pretzel offer more replay value in warmer months. The latter in particular feels like a fun fall beer for here on out.
