Review: Deschutes Brewery Zarabanda
What’s this? Acclaimed chef Jose Andres slumming it in the beer world? In Oregon?
Believe it or not, Andres and Deschutes have been collaborating for three years to come up with this: A spiced saison brewed with lemon verbena, pink peppercorns, sumac, and dried lime. Made with Vienna and Spelt malts (among others) along with Saaz hops, the beer is designed as a farmhouse-style brew. The name is inspired by the Spanish Saraband dance, which makes sense if you drink a sip or two.
Immediately exotic and funky, Zarabanda gets started with some mustiness that speaks more to earth and mushroom than to its intriguing aromatics. As the beer warms up a bit, it reveals some more of its fruity, herbal underpinnings. The pink peppercorn is a fun element, adding a gentle, smoky spice and some woodiness to the body. The citrus peel is the other noteworthy element here, adding not sweet lemon or lime notes but rather an additional herbal character that rolls around on the palate, seemingly for days.
Big, grassy, and loaded with oddball, avant-garde flavors — it’s exactly the kind of thing you’d expect Andres to be involved with.
6.7% abv.
B / $NA (22 oz. bottle) / deschutesbrewery.com
Deschutes Brewery Zarabanda
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