Beer Around Town

Alas, my trip is nearing an end, left on the agenda was a few days in Spain and a drive back to Lisbon to fly back to Beervana. From Gibraltar we headed north up the coast of the Mediterranean to the town of Estepona for a day on the beach. Note, my camera had to be kept in check on the Spanish beaches to keep this blog at an R rating, not sure the Spanish women would take to kindly to some gringo sitting on the beach with a camera.

A few new beers were found in Spain, none really worth writing much about, so here is a quick summary:

Mahou – Standard pale lager around 5%, clear golden with a quickly falling white head. Lower on the bitterness with less crispness leaving this as the unideal hot day beer. Served ice cold, fair enough on a 100+ degree day, this beer only got worse as the ice chill went away, now lacking it’s refreshing/cooling effect you are left with a glass of High Life.


Mahou Negra – Some sort of dark lager, not sure it deserves any real technical category, while I haven’t had Session Black yet I’m sure it will leave this beer in the dust. In fairness this beer wasn’t all that bad, soft roasty chocolate and caramel flavors to the malts, soft bitterness and a dry finish. Tasted under attenuated and had a bit of a mineral jaw clinch note to the finish. The Spanish and Portuguese seem to do better with their dark beers, you just don’t seem them as often.


Estrella Damm – One of the more popular beers in the area, another fizzy yellow pale later, this one holding a slight leg above Malhou due to the moderate increase in bitterness. I might have event detected a note of hops in this… is that possible? Fairly crisp and dry in the finish, although some grainy husky qualities to the malts up front. If Mahou was Steven Baldwin, Estrella might be Billy Baldwin.


The German Influence? I encountered a line of beers sold looking rather German and tasting rather Crap

Kensels Pilsner – Brewed in the Netherlands, this un-Pilsner was grainy and awful as ever. Not really any hops to be found, watery and bland, a pale lager in disguise. At under fifty cents a can  I didn’t hold out much hope, but thought I’d give it a shot, how international of me.


Meiburg – This one it turns out is actually brewed in Germany, but you wouldn’t know it by the taste. Another faux Pilsner, all malty up front with no hops to it. Please the heat is killing me, where are those damn lupulin bitterness shots when you need them!? Grainy like the previous beer, this ones malt profile slightly better, a bit more bready character to it.


Voll-Damm Doble Malta – A Spanish “Marzen” at 7.2%. Actually not all that bad, but my standards were pretty low at this point, being this beer deprived can lead to some wild claims. Lots of excess alcohol character to it, I bet over here that means you are getting your moneys worth. Bread and caramel up front, some bitterness in the finish but allowing the sweetness to carry into the finish. Finish had a bit of a metallic note and a lot of booziness, eh, drinkable.


Now, onto “craft beer”

We ended the day driving to Sevilla where we would stay until we headed back to Lisbon for our flight. Sevilla is a beautiful city, plenty of classic structures and charm remain in the heart, the modern city encircling from a distance. As  we toured the city I stumbled upon the first microbrewery of the vacation, Artesanos de la Cerveza La Fabrica.

La Fabrica was tucked into the corner of a mall, standing like nothing more then your average Macaroni Grill or Hometown Buffet, only tipped off by the crossed mash paddles on the sign above the door and the wine barrels sitting out front. Inside however contained one of the more unique drinking facilities I’ve encountered. Picture this… each table has it’s own 3 headed tap tour in the middle, accompanied with glass rinser, complete control for pouring your own libation. A screen on the wall monitors all of the tables consumption live, accurate to the centiliter, creating an atmosphere of competition amongst the tables. As we sipped and savored on beers and tapas we watched what looked like a bachelor party split between two tables proceed to put this system to the test, you could see the liters start racking up. I’m sure OLCC would have a field day with this system.

La Fabrica was about the size of the Green Dragon. A large bar stood front center, towering above were two copper kettles with a giant wood barrel between that seemed to house their cool/keg system for the bar draughts. They seemed to make only two beers (funny to have 3 taps per table with 2 beers), light and dark as they called them, but maybe they plan to expand their lineup in the future.

La Fabrica “light” tasted like an American wheat crossed with a pale. Poured hazy gold with a tall white head, already this stood out from the other beers I’ve been seeing on my trip. Smooth wheat flavor underneath but no German esters about it, then finish with a soft herbal hopping. Finished contained a bit of a soapy note, like cleaner a bit, while it didn’t overly ruin the beer it seemed to clash with the hops a bit. Overall sub par on the Beervana scale, might fit in at Tugboat or something, but as far as beer on this trip pretty A OK to me.


La Fabrica “dark” I’m still scratching my head about. Poured a darker rusty red with a tall beige head. Nose shows hints of fruity tartness and acidity, almost faint Flanders brown note to it. The nose showed more of this then the flavor, but it still had something odd going on in the background. I’m really doubting this was intentional, probably an infection that ended up working in their favor, but none the less proving some tartness that made this a decent thirst quencher. Notes of cherry and fruit cake from the malt. Now to be real about this, these descriptions are bold and the flavors much more subtle, again this beer wouldn’t hold it’s own in the Beervana scene, but this might have been the best beer of the trip, at least the most unique.

Finally it was time to leave, we headed back towards Lisbon to catch our plane. 3 countries, 2 continents, 1 territory behind us. Adeus, salam alikome, adios, and good bye.