21st Amendment Hell or High Watermelon Wheat

Brewed by 21st Amendment Brewery
Style: Fruit Beer
San Francisco, California USA

Sampled at SpringSlicker’s fishfry. Hazy yellow pour with floating watermelon seeds. Sweet fake bready watermelon aroma. More like carbonated watermelon juice than beer. But the can and name is pretty sweet.

Sample at the KLCC microbrew festival. Pours out a sick yellow color with a thin and quickly dissipating white head. Hefty wheat aroma with a dash of watermelon. Flavor is more heavily watermelon with wheat mixed in. Initial sip was nasty but after chugging the rest of it...still gross, but kind of tasted like a watermelon jolly rancher. Not something I ever need to drink again.

Hazy light yellow with a fleeting white head. Sour lemon Aroma. The flavor is basically watermelon flavor without the sweetness. Thin, light body.

Can at the ’09 Fish Fry. Pours gold with small white head. The aroma is quite awful: buttermilk, stanky yogurt, hay, cardboard, and a hint of artificial watermelon candy. The flavor is rotting wheat (like wheat that’s been left in the field too long), cardboard, some random unpleasantness, and artificial watermelon. This is no good.

This poured a golden color with a white head. The aroma is buttered popcorn and some rotten watermelon. The flavor is a little better than the aroma with more butter, watermelons, and a hint of lemons. Very unusual beer and not that great.

Tap at the brewpub: Cloudy golden with a dense white film of head. Wheaty aroma with a soft watermelon essence and some dry phenolics. Nice creamy feel. The watermelon presence in the flavor is subtle and natural. The body is wheaty and crisp. Balanced and surprisingly decent. Based on the past ratings I’d say this stuff is better on tap than it is in the can (this fresh tap example at the brewpub was creamy and solid).

Can at the brewery, 29th March 09. Bright yellow with a small white head. Very clean & crisp aroma and a distinctive watermelon flavour. Palate is like a soft drink almost and the aftertaste is not too good, but I can see this being great at the right time (a hot summer’s day).

Cloudy, slightly pinkish yellow, no head. Aroma is more wheaty than watermelon. Flavor is a little more watermelon forward, with a familiar wheat flavor backing it up. Ever so slightly bitter finish. Thanks to robertjm for this one!