Flavor Scale: 19
Henry Weinhard's; now THIS is a root beer meant to be poured down the tilted side of an ice cold mug! Even when expertly poured, at the very end, it froths up with a very foamy, creamy and somewhat thick root beer head. Nothing makes a beer or root beer nut happier than to feel the soft embrace of foam on one's lip. We wear it with pride to announce our satisfaction to the world and that this--THIS is what it means to slap life's trouble in its brutish snout, laugh heartily (maniacally at times), tip the mug to our lips and enjoy the day, right in its confounded face! Okay, perhaps that is a bit of a dramatization but the satisfaction and enjoyment of a good frothy root beer and/or beer do certainly brighten the day.
Here's a small and fairly boring anecdote about my first experience with Henry Weinhardt's. It does have a precautionary lesson behind it though:
The first time I had it, we were at the Campe Verde cafe/gift shop near Bandera, TX, which is right out in the middle of nowhere Hill Country. It was right in the beginning of my quest to drink every root beer I could possibly find. Saw it in the shop; ordered it; opened it and took the first surprisingly enjoyable gulp; set it down; turned to talk to my brother and/or cousin, and about five seconds later, the next thing I know, foam is erupting from my bottle like a slow magma making a nice mess for myself. I hadn't been violent with it at all, and it had the whole neck and them some to sneak up out of it. I took note for the next times to remember the volatility. Though I've still had times where all I did was open it and a few seconds later it still managed to slowly creep out the top.
Henry Weinhard's Root Beer, founded in Portland Oregon, was first brewed during the peaceful and practically tension free prohibition era. A lot of beer brewers were known to switch root beer brewing at the time, because what else were they going to do? All they had to do was change the recipe and add another word to the name. Henry Weinhard's is exactly that though. It feels like a root beer brewed by a beer brewmeister, which worked out fabulously in my opinion.
The texture is very smooth and the carbonation is very subtle but nicely noticeable at the very end. Imagine a good amber lager but make the beer slightly more viscous; that's a good way to describe the texture and carbonation--if you're familiar with beers at least. The taste is almost closer to cream soda. Pretty sweet and most definitely creamy, but it still has that, for lack of better adjective, darker kind of feeling to it, just like you'd have with a darker beer. One downside to it being a very good example of a draft style ale, the carbonation goes away fairly quickly. It seems very much meant to be poured in a mug, hopefully on tap, and enjoyed thoroughly yet very much within the near future.
I'd have to say the vanilla flavoring is just enough as it is coupled with honey, neither being overbearing. A lot of root beer's I've known that use honey either use it as the main flavor and overpower the root or the only reason I knew it was in there is because it was in the ingredients. However, I really like how well it fits in with the sassafras hear.
Burp Factor: despite smaller bubbles, it comes out deep, yet not boisterous, and possibly foamy. But a pleasant aftertaste.
All in all, an excellent gourmet root beer whose critique likely suffered, optimistically, only trace amounts of bias. This marks one of my favorites so if you think your tastes are similar to mine this is exactly what I'd suggest to you. Also possibly enjoyable for darker beer drinkers who also partake in life's sweeter accomplishments. Thank you for reading and, as always, may your mugs stay frosty, frothy, and frequently filled!
P.S. (Pre-Script) I'm posting this before I put up the pictures as I currently indubitably lost my camera somewhere in the house. There will be photos very soon though I promise!
