August Schell Noble Star Collection Orbital Drift

August Schell Noble Star Berlin Style Wheat Ale. New Ulm, MN. 3.9% ABV.

I can't tell you a single thing about this beer that sets it apart from anything else in the Noble Star Collction, I'm just going to open it up and find out, as per usual.

It's a hazy amber appearance, with a slim white head. Nothing wrong with that.

Aroma: full-on Belgian-style funk. Rich malts, twisted fruits, and unmistakable Belgian quality. It's what I like and I'm loving it.

In the mouth: Fruity. Sour. Funky. Love it. Sharp and tart at first, then comes the fruit, some peach and nectarine, constant tart. Rich and rewarding. All that stuff and more. Fruit and sour and funk and delicious. Refreshing. Tasty. Another hit in the Noble Star line.

Let's see what the website says:
BEER STYLE: Berliner Weisse
ALCOHOL BY VOLUME: 3.9%
CHARACTERISTICS: Orbital Drift is a unique brew with earthy aromatic notes and a deep amber hue.

Orbital Drift shakes up the long established tradition of brewing a Berliner Weisse, (“Berlin White”), beer to be light in color. By substituting the style’s characteristic pale barley and wheat malts with darker, more full-bodied and longer kilned malts, we created a unique brew that has a deep amber hue and earthy aromatic notes. Allowed to age for sixteen months in Cypress wood tanks, Orbital Drift has a complex character, deep acidity and dry malt spiciness.

August Schell Noble Star Collection Apricot Vista

August Schell Noble Star Collection Apricot  Vista, Berlin Style Wheat Ale aged on apricots. Bottled 1/16.

Clouded, full-on orange/apricot appearance, slim, soon-gone head.

Nose: Tart from the start, fresh and lively, funky, wild and weird.

In the mouth: more sour, more tart, more brash & bold. Each new sip brings on the tartness, the pucker, and plenty of fruit. Just damned deliciously sour. Vast complexity and richness. Good fruit/yeast character.

I call it good.

Editor's note: This one sold out quickly, and I wasn't at any store to pick one up during that brief window when it sat on store shelves. Until many months later when I found one in Wisconsin. Then, I go and take notes on it, and that's the best I can do? Well, no self-flagellation, I told the tale. It's sour and fruity and good. If you ever see it, grab it, it's good.

August Schell Noble Star Collection Apparent Horizon Rye Berlin Style Wheat Ale

August Schell Noble Star Collection Apparent Horizon Rye Berlin Style Wheat Ale. Bottled August 2015. Ale aged in wood. August Schell Brewing Co., New Ulm, MN.

Hazy, peach-y toned coloring, slimmish white head.

Aroma: fiercely funky, wild and weird. Tart, sour 'n' spicy wheat tones abound.

In the mouth: Sourness starts it off, then the smooth, wheat malt texture becomes apparent, and the rye adds some complexity to the proceedings. Citric flavors dominate. Refreshment incarnate. Tartness never quite fades, and the richness doesn't die off, either. So tasty. Another stellar entry in the Noble Star series.


Here's a brief, paraphrased synopsis of the description from the tag around the bottle:
Brewed as a full strength version of a Berliner Weisse (which are normally 4% ABV and below), with 30% of the malt bill coming from rye. After a mixed fermentation, including lactobacillus, then transferred to the cypress lagering tanks. Brettanomyces is added and it is aged for nine months. Unfiltered, bottle-conditioned.

I've been sitting on this bottle for several months, until I couldn't take any more. Coincidentally, I visited the brewery today and bought a Noble Star goblet. I detested drinking my other Noble Star bottles from improper glassware, and I wanted desperately to have something appropriate with the Schell's logo on it. Worth the $12, despite that I keep swearing off the constant growth of my beer glass collection.

August Schell Noble Star Series #6: Cypress Blanc

August Schell Brewing Company Noble Star Collection Cypress Blanc, Dry Hopped Berlin Style American Lager. 7.4% ABV.

Appearance: hazed, pale gold, slim head, soon gone.

Aroma: slightly sweet, slightly sour, pears, muscat grapes, green apples. Moderate carbonation, low hop bitterness, medium malt. Good balance of sour and sweet.

Taste: In the mouth, the sour comes through. With each and every sip, the tart keeps coming. Light-bodied, with a long, sour finish. Dry. Beautiful. Elegant. Sparkling. More apples, grapes, pear. Delicious.

Here's the quick scoop on it: Brettanyomyces yeast aged in their old cypress tanks, brewed "in the style" of the Berliner Weisse, but also an American lager. Dang if it doesn't come across as one. American lager, I mean. There's a whole lot going on with this one.

Here it is, word for word, from their website: BEER STYLE: Berliner Weisse
ALCOHOL BY VOLUME: 7.4%
CHARACTERISTICS: Through the long, slow, secondary fermentation process, the authentic Brettanomyces yeast in Cypress Blanc completely fermented the residual sugars remaining in the beer, transforming it into a very dry, tart and complex flavor profile wholly unique and dramatically different from any American lager previous aged in our cypress tanks.

It's every penny. I paid around $16, and it is remarkable.

August Schell Noble Star Series Dawn of the Aurora Starkbier Berliner Weiss

August Schell Brewing Company Dawn of Aurora, New Ulm, Minnesota. Noble Star Collection #5. Starkbier Berliner Style Wheat Ale. Bottled October 2014. Ale aged in wood.

There's a tag around the neck of this bottle, that I will help you read. I'll scan it and post it, or find a link or something, and then you'll know what's up with this starkbier. As for me, I'm just going to open it up and drink it, and give it the once-over that way. Let's do it!

Appearance: Beautiful golden color, cloudy, smallish head.

Aroma: sour'n'fruity. Peaches, apricots, apples. Bold fruitiness coming from either the yeast or the aging. Funky, sour twist persists. This is something else.

Taste: Wheaty texture and sour twang kick the palate first, with fruit washing in afterward. Fruity sweet followed by sour twist. Full-bodied, full-flavored, long, sour finish. Brisk, crisp, lip-smackingly delicious. Fruit notes don't quit, and the sour keeps a-comin'. Add to that that it's delicious.

August Schell Noble Star Series #4: Black Forest Cherry

Man, oh, man, am I ever behind. I just posted the 2014 Town Hall Festivus here in week three of 2015. And now that Noble Star #5 is out, I'm just getting around to #4. Notes away!


August Schell Noble Star Collection Black Forest Cherry Berlin Style Wheat Beer Aged On Cherries, August Schell Brewing, New Ulm, MN. Bottled July 2014.

Appearance: clear, cherry-red coloration, much carbonation, but no head, utter stillness.

Aroma: there's the funk, there's the wild, and there is the sour. Followed by a big, bad batch of cherry. Urging me to taste…

And so I do: Brisk and tart, a fierce flash of sour, washed up with cherries and wood. Terrifically refreshing and definitely downable. Dry, complex, and richly rewarding. Effervescent, sparkling, lively, arresting. It's practically delicious. Ah, I'm smacking my lips with every sip, and each drink I take, I'm digging this more and more.


Black Forest Cherry comes with a tag around the bottle. here's what it says: "Black Forest Cherry, the fourth handcrafted edition in the Noble Star Collection, is brewed from German heritage, American innovation, and 5,000 pounds of tart red cherries. An experimental version of a malty Berliner Weisse aged on cherries, this vibrant beer pays tribute to the timeless European custom of adding a little something sweet to the classic Weisse. Fermented a la cerise for more than a year in our distinguished 1936 Cypress Wood layering tank, Black Forest Cherry is dry, complex, and delightfully tart. Our noble Star beers are unfiltered, hand-filled and bottle-conditioned to allow the flavors to continue to develop and evolve in the bottle. Enjoy this unique interpretation of a cherry Berliner Weisse chilled, in a pokal glass."

You know…I don't know if I have a …yes, I do have a "pokal", but I went with a Schell's branded pint, instead. Would that have made a difference? Maybe, not sure…but I did enjoy the hell out it. And, once again, the Noble Star collection proves that Schell's is invested in innovation while hewing to their specific Germanic tradition, largely due to the efforts of Jace Marti,

I'm actually behind a bit, as #5 in the series has been released and is receiving raves. I hadn't gotten around to it yet (the price tag does spook me some), but I wanted to tackle it before I took down a bottle of Dawn of the Aurora. So, now I'm on the hunt for that one. Stay tuned!

August Schell Noble Star Collection No. 3: North Country Brunette

August Schell Noble Star Collection No. #3: North Country 
Brunette, Ale Aged in Wood. Berlin-style Marzen Wheat Ale. August Schell Brewing Company, New Ulm, MN. bottled March 14.

Hazy, copper-y coloring, slim white head, soon gone.



Aroma: tartness at the top, cherry-ish, wild and funky.

Taste: Crisp and tart right at the fore, snappy, alert and lively. refreshingly sour. Medium bodied. Clean, smooth, and fruity. Dries right out in the mouth, quits with efficiency. Fierce sour flavor blasts the palate with each new entry. Terrifically intense, complex and satisfying. Love it.

hey, what's it say on the little label around the neck? "The Noble Star Collection is an ongoing exploration into the many different variations of traditional Berliner Weisse beers by the August Schell Brewing Company. North Country Brunette is the third release in the Noble Star Collection and is our interpretation of a Berliner Marzen Weisse. This beer was brewed in the traditional manner, with the addition of wheat, Munich and Vienna malts to provide a rich malt backbone to the beer. It was fermented with an authentic mixed culture of yeast, lactobacillus and brettanomyces, and then aged for nearly a year in our original 1936 cypress wood layering tank. The result is a very tart, dry and complex beer that offers a taste of what a Marzen Weisse would have been like in the past. This beer is unfiltered, hand-filled and bottle-conditioned to allow the flavors to continue to develop and evolve in the bottle. Enjoy this unique interpretation of a Berliner Marzen Weisse chilled in a pokal glass."

Ooops, I used a shaker pint. Oh, well, life goes on.

August Schell Star of the North Berliner Weisse

Star of the North,  Berlin Style Wheat Beer, August Schell Brewing Company, part of the Noble Star Collection, August Schell Brewing Company, New Ulm, Minnesota.

Hazy pale yellow, almost "white", with a gargantuan head, leaving copious lacing.

Aroma: weird and funky sour. Lemon peel. Cat pee. Sauvignon blanc.
Interesting stuff, to say the least.

Taste: Bracingly sour, and refreshingly so, too. More citric zest not he palate, more wild, sour funkification. Intense sour that never quits. Good consumability, nonstop refreshment. And never once did I cry out for a sweetening syrup.

I'm liking this lots. Good choice on Schell's part to put it in a large bottle at a high price. Not everyone's going to want to down this by the 12-pack. Hardly anyone, actually. And also cheers to them for actually brewing such a thing.