206: Flanders Red

I’m going to miss Roots, but I won’t do a eulogy here. If you haven’t yet heard, Oregon’s first organic brewery is closed indefinitely. They’re an old favorite of mine, and seemingly a lot of people, having brought great beer to inner Southeast Portland. Sure, there was a Lucky Lab on Hawthorne, but the dark years for the Lab marked the brightest years of Craig Nicholls’ place. I have a bottle of their legendary Epic Ale in the basement that I’ll use to mark this pub’s passing; this particular bottle of Roots 2009 Flanders Red doesn’t do the place, or its brewers, justice. I tried it on tap and from the bottle on its release a year or more ago, and while the Band-Aid flavor has subsided, it’s still got an odd, slightly off-putting funk to it, and the acid is nowhere near where I think it should be. Not a pour-out by any means, though. It’s definite 3-star beer that, given another try at the recipe, could have been a 4- or even 5-star beer. Cheers to you, Roots.

Paired with a garden-fresh salad of spinach and lettuce topped with pine nuts, feta, sundried tomatoes and grilled chicken marinated in Upright’s Turkey on Rye.

Beer Name: Flanders Red
Brewer: Roots Brewing (Portland, Oregon)
Price: N/A
Sampled: July 25, 2010
Rating: 3/5
Notes: Bit of a dusty, musty basement smell and flavor. Not as sour or acidic as I would have guessed, and fairly bitter, too. Very clean aftertaste. Cloudy red. Some roasty malt?
ABV: 9.2% abv
IBU: N/A
OG N/A
TG N/A
Serving Type: Bottle.