Neuzeller Closter Zell (Golden Abbot)

Brewed by Klosterbrauerei Neuzelle
Style: Premium Lager
Neuzelle, Brandenburg, Germany

Nice pour on this beer. Aroma is present, not over powering. Malty carmel taste is a bit out of balance with the lack of hop bitterness.

I don’t have much smell, but this smells nice. Orange-yellow consistent appearance. Malts are evidents, but flavored well. It has the certain bland characteristics of many lagers, but certainly isn’t bad at all (either that, or maybe here in Vegas, where we keep setting records for high temps, it was just too darn hot when I ranked this and I needed a beer). In fact, that probably is the case.

(Bottle 50 cl) Dark golden, almost amber, clear beer with a creamy head. Very strong and sweet beer which feels somewhat alcoholic and not that refined. The style is like a pale bock, same style as Carlsberg’s Elefant-beer but more full and sweet. 291103

Dark golden orange colored body with very active carbonation swirling around. A large and foamy white head. The aroma is sweat socks, dirt and ammonia. There is a subtle hint of caramel behind the other garbage. The taste is rotting, dirty oranges with some nasty chewed bubblegum in the aftertaste. A slightly sweet note just makes this beer more confusing. I know that this bottle was not more than a couple days old at my local store, so I hope storage was not an issue. I had a couple others form Neuzeller at about the same time and they seemed alright. This is just a mess of a beer.

16.9 oz bottle. Decent head atop a semi-clear orange brew. That’s about as many "good" things as I can say. I didn’t like this beer. It’s rich, but I simply didn’t care for the sweet caramel and grape flavor. Yeah, there’s some hop bitterness, but I didn’t want to hang around long enough to experience it.

Bottle: Orangey colour, firm off-white head; bready nose (cookies) with some traces of citrus and well hidden hops; initial malty sweetness with some traces of honey; sweetish flavour; short bitter-sweet aftertaste

(bottle) Orange amber colour with a small white diminishing head. Malty and slight sweet aroma. Also malty taste with a soft initial sweetness that turns into a quite fruity and a soft hopbitter finish. A remarkable and somewhat “heretic” brew for Germany, that tastes not of the well-known Reinheitsgebot. As it is not a buttered taste (diacetyl), I assume it could be some ascorbic acid.

Now, this is how a pale lager should be! Having a slender white head capping a deep golden body, this has a rich, caramel malt aroma - sweet, but not cloying. This is very lush and creamy in the mouth. It’s got a very full, sweet malt flavor and coats the mouth thickly. The hops come through in the finish, mild herbal bitterness to balance the drink out. It’s no wonder the monks of Neuzelle used this brew for their celebrations.