Baltika brings a basic European lager

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 03/03/2017 (3362 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

This year’s sixth annual Brandon Beer Tasting Festival is being put on by the Brandon Sunset Rotary Club and The Rotaract Club of Brandon. The event is taking place April 8 at the Victoria Inn Imperial Ballroom. You can purchase tickets at Brandon Liquor Marts or at BrandonBeerFest.com for $33 and I know I’m excited to try out some of Manitoba’s newest breweries and some great craft brews available in Manitoba while supporting Brandon’s Food For Thought.

This week I’m checking out Baltika 7 Export Lager by Baltika Breweries out of Russia. To be honest, this is the first time I’ve had a Russian lager in many, many years. In fact, I thought that this was a Ukrainian lager — it’s not. The beer comes in a nice 500 ml pint-size green embossed bottle, the bottle cap is actually a can-style pop top opener where you have a little ring that removes the bottle cap for you so there’s no need for a bottle opener or to scratch your fingers!

Baltika No. 7 was created as a tribute to the 1994 Goodwill Games that took place in St. Petersburg, Russia. The beer is brewed with purified drinking water, pale barley malt, malting barley, hop products and malt extract. The alcohol content is no less than 5.4 per cent ABV.

Baltika 7 pours a clean, crisp and light straw yellow. The beer gives off a moderate amount of micro-carbonation just like your typical Budweiser or Coors Light. The head starts off with a nice finger’s worth of white head on top only to diminish to a light amount of white foamy film skimming the very top of the glass in some places, especially near the side of the glass.

Baltika’s aroma is your classic European lager — it’s a very malt — and hop-forward beer, but seeing that it’s in your typical green bottle, it’s been light-struck so you get that typical skunky aroma that you know and love (or hate) in beers like Heineken, Stella Artois or Moosehead. The aroma is sweet, grainy, a hint of an aroma reminiscent to homemade chicken noodle soup, but also, for the most part, skunky with a wet, fresh-cut grass aroma near the end.

The flavour of the beer is surprisingly lighter than what the aroma put out. The flavour is a light, wet barley grain flavour, reminiscent to a typical grain storage bin, a hint of lemongrass, light amount of hop extract that gives off a lightly bitter and grassy hop presence and a good deal of wet straw. I’m surprised that this is my very first Russian beer and it tastes just like almost any European lager but without the full-on skunk for taste. If you like import lagers but only like the smell of skunk and not the taste, this might be for you. I honestly can’t see myself ever buying this beer again as there’s nothing in this beer that stands out for me other than the can-style, pop-off bottle cap. It’s reminiscent to Lvivske out of Ukraine and Zywiec out of Poland. You can buy Baltika 7 (5.4 per cent ABV) for an incredibly affordable $2.56 per 500 ml bottle at Liquor Marts in Brandon, Flin Flon, Killarney, Minnedosa, Roblin, Swan River and The Pas.

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• Beau’s Strong Patrick Irish Red — 6.7 per cent ABV — Strong Irish Red with a lightly hopped aroma and is the perfect organic beer for St Patrick’s Day! $7.40 per 600 ml bottle at Liquor Marts in Brandon, Dauphin, Flin Flon and The Pas. Don’t forget to try Beau’s 80 Shilling Mild Ale at the 10th and Victoria Liquor Mart and Keystone Motor Inn Growler Bars.

• Dead Frog Udder Domination — 7.9 per cent ABV — Imperial Milk Stout that combines flavours of dark chocolate, cappuccino and roasted nuts into a great stout. $7.35 per 650 ml bottle at Liquor Marts in Brandon and Flin Flon.

• Collective Arts IPA No. 1 — 7.1 per cent ABV — Yet another IPA out of Ontario’s arts-based brewery in Hamilton. IPA No. 1 features Nelson Sauvin, Simcoe and Citra Hops to give off a nice bitter and lightly citrused IPA. This will likely sell out before you know it because I’ve already purchased six cans and enjoyed them all! $3.65 per 473 ml can at Liquor Marts in Brandon and Flin Flon. If this beer is long gone when you get to one of the three Brandon Liquor Marts, check out Collective Arts’ Ransack the Hemisphere IPA.