March 4th, 2010 by Nate

Ahh my first post for March. I’ve been very busy working through a new collection of biers that I’ve acquired from various locations. I’ve previously mentioned my upcoming reviews of biers from Nürnberg and the Franconian region of Germany. But that’s not quite done yet, so here I present the Andechs Spezial Hell.

I was gifted a case of these beauties during the holiday season and so I’ve had ample time to review them. Rather than just post an overview after one bier I decided to hold out and share some more details after drinking, well, a few more than one

The Andechs Monastery Brewery has been doing their thing and turning out the good stuff since 1455 (yet another ancient middle age brewhaus). As you can probably see from their website these guys do have a wide selection of beir types, but I’m here to give you a review of their Special Lager (Spezial Hell).

Drinking these in large quantities did help me to get a good overall idea of the bier. I will be honest, I expected more from a brewery with such heritage. Thats not to say the bier was bad, it just seemed to fizzle out (literally) just when it seemed it was going to become good.

As you can see from the picture, the colour of the bier is strong gold, but maybe too clear. The foam lasted for a very short period and the flavour lacked the punch that a good 5.8% lager should have and was almost tart when you thought it should hit you with a bitter flavour.

All this being said, I still drank every bottle and enjoyed doing so. As I said, the bier wasn’t bad. It just didn’t meet my expectations. It’s quite pleasing to have friends, family and colleagues that know to buy you bier as presents. So where does that leave the review? Well I can’t get this adventure past 3 steins. But lesson learned. I’ll see if I can get my hands on some other Andechs brews.

Andechs Spezial Hell, Bavarian, Bayern, German Bier, Lager, Pils