Review of Left Hand Brewing Stranger Pale Ale
Posted By Ken Monday, 14 March 2011 21:55
Well, this past Saturday was a wacky night, to the say the least. Started out at a church for an art show that wasn't really an art show, per se, and ended up at a great little place on the southside of town called Shallo's (see review in the "Bars" section - hint, hint). Anyway, I was hoping for milk stout when I asked what Left Hand products they had that night. The first one mentioned was Stranger Pale Ale. Seeing as how the server deemed this a new beer, or at least a new one to that establishment, I decided to give it a whirl. Read on to see if in the church-art-Shallo's-fest of the night this beer provided more interesting things to remember.
Ken's Review
Taste: B- Ok, so this is a pale ale. I know I shouldn't be limiting the range that much, but in all reality, Stranger didn't give me really anything to build on in this arena. The taste was rather mild, and tried to finish off with a bit of a bite, but just fell short of getting there. It wasn't as bad as some pale ales I've had (I won't name names), but it left a lot to be desired in the taste category, unfortunately. Needless to say, I didn't go for another one after this.
Packaging: A- Looking at the bottle at face value, you may be wondering why I rated packaging so high. Well, I didn't really notice as I was sitting at the bar table looking over the label, with the side images of a crowd and some shadow looking figure in the middle what I was missing on this label. It wasn't until someone at the bar pointed it out by first asking me, "You know what a 'Stranger' is, right?". I said if it was what I was thinking of, then yes. But how does it relate to the beer? I wondered. Then he pointed out to me that the shadowy figure on the bottle's left hand appears to be in the vicinity of his crotch. Then it all made sense to me. Kudos to Left Hand for that idea. Subtle and fun, much like "The Contest" episode of Seinfeld in a lot of ways.
(If you don't know what a "Stranger" is, look it up. This isn't a sex ed site. Moving on...)
Value: B- Not sure what this would cost in the stores, but a bottle of this at Shallo's ran me somewhere in the vicinity of $4.50. Bah! Not worth it at all at that price, but then again Shallo's is a little bit pricey on some of the beers they sell. Unless this is $8 or less in a sixer, probably not worth it.
Drunkeness: B+ Stranger comes in at an even 5.00% alcohol content. Not too heavy, but not pussing out either. Maybe a little more in the content department would have helped boost the taste ratings, hard to say. But it's good enough for a very mild buzz, if that's all you really want.
Overall: B I'm going to let this one roll overall with this grade. It could have been better, but could have been worse. It was cool to try it, and in hindsight I wish I had made another choice, but if I had done that you wouldn't be getting another review from me, now would ya?