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BOSTON BETTER BEER BUREAU: ALBATROSS + CITRA BRAU

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Welcome to the Boston Better Beer Bureau, our latest incarnation of the trusty suds reporting we’ve done at DigBoston ever since people referred to beer as suds. Really, we remember the days when we’d spend half our checks on fancy German bottles just so that we could review them, whereas these days breweries from all around New England kindly send us samplers and stay in touch. The BBBB is a new attempt to return that love, all while sharing more news about the innumerable microbreweries and pubs among us. SIGN UP FOR THE FREE BBBB NEWSLETTER HERE.

 

THIS WEEK: Two different types of perfect sipping beers

 

I can’t recall the origin of the quote I am about to butcher and rewrite for wokeness, nor can I find any trace of it on Google, but in any event here it goes, dated and untraceable as it may be: Whatever it is that physically attracts heterosexual men to women, Marilyn Monroe appears to possess more of it than any other woman on the planet.

 

Another version of this, I think, is the phrase coined by US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart in describing his personal barometer for hardcore porn during the 1964 case Jacobellis v. Ohio: “I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that.”

 

All of which is more or less my awfully longwinded way of saying that Albatross! by Medusa Brewing Company in Hudson, Mass, is extra special. I can’t exactly put my finger on it, other than to tell you it’s an ideally clean and sweet IPA, though there is some official info that helps. Specifically, one version that we found packs Galaxy and Motueka hops, as Medusa’s “rotating series of American-style IPAs is hopped exclusively with Southern Hemisphere varieties from Australia and New Zealand.” While another one incorporates Nelson Sauvin, Vic Secret, and Green Bullet hops, and is as delicious as its brother brew if not a smidgen more. It’s truly a race to the top.

 

In any case, those descriptions are mere words. Try this one for yourself; it’s perfect, with an Oh snap! in each taste. Whatever it is, I know good beer when I taste it, and this is that. Just be careful; despite the velvet nature of this beer, it’s a beast at 6.9% ABV.

 

The only other can that I have been Albatross-level excited about over the past month or so is the latest spring seasonal from Jack’s Abby in Framingham. Available only in New England, the ace brewers there are offering a Citra Brau that’s a “deep golden … color … Pilsner-style lager … bursting with aromatic American Hops.” “By using Citra Hops throughout the entire brewing process,” they pledge, “Citra Brau [gets] a tropical, fruity flavor, and juicy finish.”

 

They’re not kidding. Do me a favor. Do you a favor. Do us all a favor, and stick your nose right up to your can of Citra Brau after you crack it. Better yet, wait 20 or so seconds. It’s a metaphor made for your nostrils—you can tell there’s something sweet, even special tickling your senses, and unlike with the kinds of heavy in-your-grill IPAs that we tend to love in these pages, there’s nothing even close to bitter or offensive in this craft ringer from Jack’s Abby. The scent parallels the taste, which is all-around spectacular.

 

If you have an anti-craft dimwit in your life—say, your Trump-supporting uncle who busts endless balls at family functions as he cranks through Silver Bullets—then you’re probably familiar with the argument that certain people like cheap water piss beer because it goes down so easily. Unlike snobby selections, they say, their American lagers and light crap etcetera are just so incredibly sippable.

 

I’m sure they won’t listen to reason, but Citra Brau puts that kind of ridiculous reasoning in check. It’s light, exquisite, and sophisticated, and at 5.5% ABV you can even gulp along with your Budweiser buddies without getting stupidly plastered.

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- 8 hours ago