Great Lakes Dortmunder Gold

Brewed by Great Lakes Brewing Company
Style: Dortmunder/Helles
Cleveland, Ohio USA

Light amber gold, creamy dense white head. Some pilsner malt on the nose, shortbread and sawdust. Fantastic. This beer is great all around and all together as well. Slightly bready, moderate body, refreshing, snappy hop clean finish. This beer rekindles my optimism in Helles. What a great beer. More intense than other beers I’ve had in the style but I claim that they are missing the mark that this beer has created.

Appearance: Pours an amberish yellow gold with almost no head to be found. Aroma: Bready grainy notes and a touch of sweetness. Taste: A nice mixture of dry malts, slightly sweet malts and some bitter Euro hops. Mouthfeel: Full bodied. Overall: A balanced well crafted lager. Not super exciting, but flawless.

Tastes good but gives me a massive headache. Darn. The taste is pretty good, the aroma is pretty bad. I can drink one of these and be quite content with that. I could also be content with zero.

Like the medal which adorns her label, she pours liquid gold into my awaiting lager glass which practically glows from her golden straw brilliance. Make no doubt of it though, there is nothing unnatural or unearthly about this glow unlike some corn-crazy lagers I have come across over the years. A soft cloud of white settles lazily atop fields of golden hay which softly sway in the breeze, carrying a gentle and sweet aroma of ripe grains and Mother Nature. I haven’t stood in a field of harvesting grains in quite a few years, but I am sure this was what it smelled like in my younger years. Just down the street is a local bakers shop cooking warm fresh loaves of bread from those very same fields of grain while sweet rolls with a warm honey glaze sit already on the shelves for my senses to peruse. Is that lemon tree blossoms I smell in the background? If all my mornings smelled like this getting up would surely not be the chore that it is now. Wasting no time, I dive deep into her golden depths where I am embraced in mouth-coating soft sweet breads dipped in honey fresh from the beekeepers out back. Sweet rolls, butter rolls, white bread, fluffy and still slightly warm from the oven as lemon cream sneaks in for a peppy finish. Her mouthfeel is soft and lightly effervescent, practically floating across my tastebuds just as her cloud of white clings stubbornly to her surface. Only near the last quaff does a more forward bitterness make her presence known, offering a final flourish of perfection.

I now know why the Dortmunder Gold from Great Lakes has won multiple awards over the years with more to come, I am sure. Who needs lagers and pilsners when there is some Dortmunder Gold to be taken home, cradled, loved, and supped. Until Great Lakes makes it to Florida, I shall hopefully continue to savor her multitude of lip-smacking options with continual thanks to my friendly beer-gifters.

Bottle. Pours with an immediate aroma of fresh cow poop. Odd. as it breathes a slightly better smell arises, mostly of grass and hops.Taste is surprisingly good considering my initial thoughts. Some malt, some grain, and pretty good bitter hop note towards the end. The sweetness is just about right. however the warmer this gets, the less impressed I am and it begins to have a Budweiser blah to it. So, based on the initial beer being cold, it aint bad.

Good-sized head with a little lacing. Full brown-gold body. Aroma is of understated hops, which leads to a surprisingly bitter hoppy kick in the taste. Very clean, very hoppy brew. A little weaker on the finish than I’d like.

Bottle. Pours a clear red hued amber with a medium large white head. Grainy, light lemon and hops. Thin, very light and clean, with a touch of sweetness. Finishes with a light touch of grain and a light bitterness. Pretty well balanced.

Bottle. Pours dark gold color with a medium off-white head. Aroma is malty, mostly cereal. Flavor is subtly sweet cereal malt. Great beer for the style.