Tales & Trails of a Traveling Wiseguy

I went shopping last weekend at the liquor store. Mostly I was buying wine; I had a coupon. And while I was there I picked up a six-pack of a beer I've been meaning to compare in my Beer Tasting 2022 project. (Yes, I'm very aware it's now 2024. I drink slowly, okay?)

The new challenger is Gordon Biersch Märzen. Gordon Biersch is a brewery that got started nearby, in San Jose. They did well enough with their brews that they gained regional distribution. Their original and classic beer is their Märzen, and old-fashioned Oktoberfest beer. Yes, Märzen is literally German for "March". And circa 100 years ago it's what Germans would drink during Oktoberfest. Which is actually in September.

The first beer I've paired it against is Abita Amber Lager.



Why put a old-style Oktoberfest Märzen against an amber lager? Well, they're kind of the same thing. And indeed, tasting them side by side proved that. From the pour they had nearly identical color. Abita, though, had an exaggerated head, even as I poured it carefully into the glass.

The similarity continued to the flavor. Overall these beers are very similar in flavor. Thus it's surprising that Gordon Biersch is so hands-down the winner. I drank them one after the other, then in reverse order, both with and without food (pizza!). No matter how I varied it, GB always came out ahead. Abita just tasted kind of sweet yet anonymous. GB was pleasantly sweet but had an enjoyable richness to its flavor. Every sip of GB told me, "Hey, I'm a beer! I taste like beer. I'm rich and a little sweet but not overpowering. Hey, what's that, pizza? Mmm-mm, I love pizza."

Hometown Gordon Biersch wins its first match with a walk-off. Of course, that's not particularly surprising because Abita Amber Lager is not a strong contender. It'll be interesting to see how GB measures up to Märzen-style Oktoberfests.

Continuing with our quasi-New Year resolution to explore more restaurants in the area we recently tried Teske's Germania. It's a German restaurant and pub in downtown San Jose. Like many "new" restaurants we're trying it's not really new; it's been there for at least umpteen years. It's only new to us.

I've been meaning to try Teske's for years. It's just never been that high on my priority list. What spurred me to try it finally— aside from that quasi-New Year resolution I mentioned— was a friend inviting us for dinner at Mezcal several weeks ago. When I mapped directions to Mezcal, Teske's appeared on the map a few blocks away. Both restaurants are in downtown San Jose.

From the outside you can barely tell what Teske's is. It's in a fairly anonymous low-rise building on a quiet-ish edge of the core downtown district. The only marker of what's inside is an old-style wooden sign hanging over the door. Once inside, though, it's a different matter. Right away you know you're someplace different. The doors open into a darkly paneled room, cramped in a cozy way, with an old-style bar near the door you have to sidle past to get to the host's stand to ask for a table.

While the bar just inside the door might be as far as some patrons venture, that's only a tiny fraction of the restaurant's space. There are two dining rooms with at least a couple dozen tables between them, and there's also a full menu of German entrees. I emphasize entrees as it's not just Germanic finger-food like sausage appetizers and pretzels but plenty of baked and sauteed dishes with beef, chicken, pork, and fish. Hawk ordered beef paprika goulash. I thought I might try the wienerschnitzel but then got interested in one of the chef's specials, sauteed beef in a white wine sauce. Friends of ours we met at the restaurant ordered a variety of other things including, yes, sausages and pretzels.

Then there's the beer. I did mention beer, right? 😅🍺😋 Teske's has a good selection of German beer, both on tap and in bottles, including some brands I don't think I've seen carried at Total Wine. I mention them as a point of comparison because they stock several dozen German beer brands. Another local restaurant that bills itself as a German biergarten only has half Teske's selection. Along with a sausage-and-pretzels-heavy menu. 🤣

On the whole, the food was good but not great. Did we enjoy it? Yes. Would we go back? No. Except for maybe a special occasion when we decide we really want German food and are willing to venture to downtown SJ for it. ...And even then, we'd likely check first for another German restaurant we haven't been to yet.

Most of my recent entries in my Beer Tasting 2022 project have featured dark lagers, aka bock beer. I've grown a bit tired of them. While I do want to explore bocks a bit further I also want to take a break. After trying a shit beer (and kind of liking it) with a light body I decided to try a light-bodied good beer. Almost on a whim I picked up a 4-pack of Erdinger Weißbier. What can I say, it was on sale at Costco. 😂

Weißbier is better known in the US as Weissbier, or wheat beer. It's fun that this beer comes in packaging with the German spelling on it. (In German the character ß is a sharp S sound, kind of an "sz" in English.) Using the letter ß makes it feel even more German than spelling things with umlauts.

Erdinger Weissbier pours out with a surprisingly foamy head. It's light and airy, so you kind of have to wait for it to settle down before you drink it. That's the one thing I didn't like about this beer.

Wheat beers in the US typically have fruity tastes. That comes from the type of yeast used; and American brewer accentuate the fruity and herbal characters. Often at brewpubs a wheat beer is served with a slice of fruit on top, like lemon or grapefruit, to doubly accentuate the fact that you're drinking a fruit-bomb of a beer.

Erdinger is refreshingly not like that. It has a simple, clean flavor. It's smooth and even from start to finish. It goes remarkably well as a solo beer— something to sip on a warm afternoon outdoors, without food to accompany it. But it also has just enough strength of character not to be overpowered by light and medium flavored foods.

This beer is a nice discovery for me. I really like a wheat beer that's not an overdone fruit bomb. I'm starting to really get why people love German beers, with their clean tastes from skillful combinations of basic ingredients.

So far I've been rationing this beer out, wanting to save a can or two (out of a 4-pack) to compare to other lighter German beers. But at the same time it's so good I want to drink it more often. Really I should just buy another package or two and keep them handy in the storeroom.

It's hard to believe it's Round 10 of my beer tasting 2022 project, but here we are. Round 10. For this round I decided to continue branching out a bit. After tasting lagers in rounds 8 and 9— Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy and ShaKa Brewing's Sunnyvale Pale Lager I decided it's worth going a bit deeper into the category.

I tend to prefer ales over lagers. The two categories are very broad, though, so there are ample variations to consider. As I was shopping online through my favorite liquor store I homed in on the bock sub-categoy of lagers. I remember enjoying bocks when I found them (rarely) in my early 20s so I figured I taste them again to see if I still like them. ...Especially now, when it's easy to find many different styles and brands of bock.

Bock is a style of lager created in Germany, like, 700 years ago. It tends to be dark and with a rich taste, though that's not totally a rule across the sub-varieties. For Round 10's tasting I grabbed two bocks that are in slightly different styles. So it's not exactly a head to head test, but it is... a bock to bock comparison. 😂🍺🍺



For this round I started with Hofbräu Dunkel (on the right), a classic dark lager. Hofbräu has been brewing beer in Bavaria, Germany for 400 years and is a well recognized brand there. I wanted to taste it against another German beer of the same style, but the two I'd put on my list were both sold out. Alas, while imported bocks are much easier to find in 2022 than 1992 they're still not that popular in the US. So I went to the next bock on my list, Estrella Galicia Reserva Especial 1906, from Galicia in the northwest of Spain. Estrella Reserva (above left) is a maibock, a paler variety of bock brewed with slightly more hops.

Going into this tasting round I expected I'd prefer Hofbräu Dunkel. It's dark, toasty, and very slightly sweet... not just in taste but also practically in its color. The taste is strong but balanced and doesn't linger. It's a great example of its variety. And yet....

When I tasted the Estrella Reserva, which I sorta poo-poohed while pouring it into the glass because of its lighter color, I was blown away. It is not a light beer. Not only is it high-ish alcohol content with 6.5% ABV but it's got a rich, toasty malt flavor. It's just not as strong with the dark flavors as Hofbräu Dunkel. It more than makes up for that, though, with just enough hops bitterness to really balance out the sweet, toasty flavors. The hops give it a nice, clean finish that makes it complement food really well.

After my first taste of these beers with food I came back around and tried them solo. Solo, they're a bit more neck-and-neck. As with other strongly flavored beers I've tried, you've got to be in the mood of "I really want a dark beer right now" to enjoy Hofbräu Dunkel. Estrella Reserve is more... beer flavored. The Hofbräu Dunkel does go surprisingly well with chocolate, though.

Language & History Lesson in a Beer Stein

By the way, bock is German for goat. "What's this beer got to do with goats?" you may wonder. Remember how I remarked above that bock has been around for 700 years? It was created in the city of Einbeck, in Germany's northwest. When Bavarians came they pronounced it Einbock with their accents. "A goat?" the northerner taunted them. "Goat," the Bavarians agreed, taking the taunt and making it a mark of pride. That's why bock beers often incorporate a goat into the label!