Day four of ACBW had a tasting of River Horse beers, from Lambertville, NJ (right on the river between NJ and PA). My basic thought is that the River Horse beers fit right in the middle of the spectrum, and were the most consistent of all the breweries tasted so far.
Summer Blonde is a very light, crisp beer. A little bit of wheat, but not enough to start coming across as a wheat beer. With just a hint of citrus, this would make a great refreshing beer, without giving up on the taste.
Tripel Horse. A "Belgian Style" Ale that actually tastes Belgian in style (my apologies to Douglas Adams fans for the language). Light on the malt flavor, with a slight tanginess from the hops and a nice bit of effervescence, this is a beer to contemplate, providing huge body, 10% abv, and a load of subtle flavors and aromas. While it's crisp enough to work well with food, I see no reason to detract from the pure enjoyment of it.
Lastly, Hop Hazard Pale Ale. This is not an IPA, but rather a true-to-style Pale Ale, with a hop level high enough to provide a nice clean finish, but not enough to overwhelm the malty flavor. Very refreshing, this would be a great beer to choose to go with a plate of Buffalo wings or other pub grub. On its own, I think it would be a good almost-session beer, or a great palate refresher between bigger beers. While I find Cascade hops often tiresome (the result of living out west, where every beer was full of Cascade), here they are restrained enough and balanced out by other flavors to simply give a very nice clean finish. While I'm generally more of a stout/porter drinker, I can easily seeing this become one of my preferred beer for when I'm looking for something lighter.
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