Beer #3 brought up some pretty vivid memories from my past. If you were of legal drinking age (or a dubious youth) in the 80’s or early 90’s and lived in Alberta, Electric Avenue was like Mecca for people wanting to party. I spent many a night out on Electric Ave – I don’t remember most of them but with 20 plus bars in the span of four city blocks can you blame me? One of my most favourite nights on Electric Ave was with my cousin who at the time was going through a cowboy phase…10 gallon hat, snap button shirt, skin tight Wranglers, and Roper boots. We make Cousin Cowboy take us to the Republik, an alternative grunge bar where he sticks out like a gigantic denim clad hayseed amongst a sea of flannel. We get Cousin Cowboy out dancing after some drinks and he proceeds to break out in a James Brown-esque dance session ending in the most awesome splits I have ever witnessed. How his Wranglers did not blow off his body is still beyond me. Anyway, one of my favourite memories of Electric Ave…where was I going with this…right…beer review. Allow me to introduce you to Wild Rose Electric Avenue lager.
Wild Rose Brewery has been brewing single batch, craft beer in Alberta since 1996. They have a great taproom here in Calgary at the Currie Barracks and if you are in town I highly recommend you check it out. So what is the beer like? Let’s get to it…
As always, to keep things consistent I stuck to my “4 Rules of Beer Review”…
1 – Make sure glassware is clean. I drank my Electric Avenue from the very nicely adorned bottle. I was really diggin’ on the look of the label.
2 – Cleanse the palate. Roger that…my palate was in dire need of cleansing. At least that was what the wife told me after I kissed her coming in the door.
3 – Don’t review while intoxicated. I had just come home from work and it was a Monday…even I have limits.
4 – Look for appearance, smell, taste, mouthfeel (could they make that sound any more disgusting), and overall.
Appearance – a nice golden color.
Smell – Struggling with articulating how the beer smelled I polled the wife and kids…the kids essentially echoed what my wife said which in an odd way made sense…
ME – I need you to tell me what you smell here?
HER – Can I have one, this smells good!
ME – what does “Good” smell like?
HER – It smells like how a beer should smell when you are drinking a real cold beer on a patio in summer…now go get me one.
One of these days I will have a smell “ah ha!” moment, until then, you will be subjected to my family ramblings.
Taste – it had a nice, crisp flavour. A little hit of malt, a dry finish with no bitter aftertaste .
Mouthfeel – I found this beer to be a little frizzy, but in a good, light sort of way.
Overall – Final verdict on Wild Rose Electric Avenue Lager – I give it an “I-Wish-Coconut-Joes-Had-This-Back-In-The-Day” out of 10. For those of you not in the know, this would be equivalent to a “We’re-Gonna-Rock-Down-To-Electric-Avenue..” out of 10.
Categories: Beer
The Accidental Cyclist 
I vaguely remember those splits. Among other things….
The last 3 beers sound fairly tasty, which fails to appeal to my sadistic brotherly nature. Perhaps in the future I will bring over a beer or two for you to sample???
For free beer, my door is always open!