Russian River Rejection and Damnation

Hard to believe it's been almost year since we last visited Sonoma County and the bounties of wine and beer that can be enjoyed there. Last week I decided we needed to get away for a few days, so we booked a room in Sebastopol and left the house by 10 so we could get to the Russian River Brewing Company before it got too crowded. We got there around 11:50am and still had to wait about 15 minutes for a table, but all things considered, I'm guessing that's about as chill as the place ever gets. There were many more people waiting on the front patio by the time we left.

As always, they had about 16 beers on tap, divided between California-style and Belgian-style (very loose categories). My favorite beer here is Row 2 Hill 56, a single-hop Simcoe pale ale, and I think the sours are amazing as well, but I wanted to try something different. First up was Rejection, a Belgian-style black ale (almost all of the Belgian-style beers end in "tion"). It's very dark with nice lacing on the glass. The nose is yeasty and fruity and very mild, but the taste, to my surprise, was much more roasty and even a little bitter. If the nose reminded me of Belgian beers, the taste mostly reminded me of a stout. It had a pleasant, creamy mouth feel. Definitely a sipping beer.

Next up was Damnation, a strong golden ale. It's a dark straw color, with again the yeasty and fruity nose typical of Belgian-style beers, but with a mildly fruity taste as well. This beer goes down really easy, especially with the pizza and beer bites we ordered. Scarily easy, in fact, at 7% ABV. If you find yourself unable to make a decision about what to order here, well, if you like IPAs, you should order Pliny the Elder. But otherwise Damnation is a fine beer to start with.

Russian River is such an iconic brewery, and while some of the beers show up on tap elsewhere in the Bay Area, it requires good timing. I highly recommend stopping by if you're in Santa Rosa, at lunch on a weekday if you can since I think evenings and weekends are always crazy. If you don't care about getting a table (and you should, the pizza is delicious), you can always grab a beer at the bar.

Unibroue Ephemere

Unibroue is a brewery in Chambly, Quebec, that produces some great Belgian-style beers. In fact, these were some of the first beers I really learned to appreciate. I'm looking forward to July when we'll be in the neighborhood and hopefully have a chance to pay a visit to the source. They're not particularly hard to find. Many grocery stores carry their flagship tripel-style, La Fin du Monde, and lately we've seen 750 ml and variety packs at Costco for a good price, but I almost always see them at better liquor stores.

Ephemere is a fruit beer made with apples, but unlike most fruit beers, it's not sweet or more like apple juice than beer. It pours a very pale color without much of a head. It has that fruity and yeasty aroma typical of Belgian brews. It's a very nice taste, mostly of a pale ale, but with a refreshing apple note.

According to Unibroue's website there are other fruit varieties of Ephemere, but I've never seen them. Maybe they're easier to find in other parts of the country or in Canada. It also lists Noire de Chambly, which is a dark ale, on their classics list, but I haven't been able to find it in many years. Of all their beers which I can get hold of, I think La Fin du Monde and Maudite are my favorites, but you can't really go wrong with any of them. They're a little pricier than many American craft beers, but cheaper than most of the ones from Belgium.