Ochakovo Zhigulevskoe

Aroma: 4 | Appearance: 4 | Mouthfeel: 4 | Flavor: 5 | Overall: 5

Clear pale yellow with small white foam head. Aroma and taste are of mass produced pilsener. Not outstanding and yet another pale ale. Cheap though. (Moscow 201401)

Aroma: 4 | Appearance: 5 | Mouthfeel: 4 | Flavor: 4 | Overall: 3

Not sure why I’m going thru this Russian phase of beers. Maybe subliminally I’m trying to get rid of them all? This beer pours out a piss-yellow body with a foamy off-white 1" head. Aroma was quite grainy with a strong lemony/grassy note. Flavor was equally citrusy, and notes of breakfast cereal. Easy to drink with a consistency very close to mineral water.

Aroma: 5 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 6 | Flavor: 6 | Overall: 6

Pale yellow color, quite a lot of foam, but it dissapears quite fast. Aroma is nicely hoppy and malty, as it should be. Taste has some iron and cucumber in it. Aftertaste is a little bit too watery.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 5 | Mouthfeel: 6 | Flavor: 5 | Overall: 5

Pours with an almost brilliantly clear, yellow-gold color. It is topped by a frothy, initially one-finger thick, almost pure white colored head. Aromas of sweet malt, a touch of candied corn (from some subtle underlying diacetyl), grassy hops, perhaps a touch of hone, soda crackers and crisp grain are all noticeable to varying degrees. The sweet grain aromatics and the grassy / herbal hop aromas are the most noticeable part of the aroma. As the beer warms a bit it starts to pick up hints of nail polish, though this is still fairly soft.

This tastes lightly sweet up front & even through to the finish, but somehow this still manages to be dry over all. A lightly biting bitterness touches the tongue up front; it lingers through to the near finish but then is held back by sweet grain notes and an herbal (almost menthol like) character in the finish. This beer is fairly light feeling, it has some heft to it though, at least enough to keep from being watery feeling. Perhaps a hint of DMS adds some very subtle cooked corn notes and there is a hint of diacetyl that shows up as a slight butterscotch type thing. These last two are so subtle that I would not even characterize them as flaws, if anything they give this beer a bit more character.

In the end this is not a bad beer, it is certainly simplistic, but has no real off flavors (at least none that are strong enough to not be considered part of the background make up of the beer). Though I should warn that you should drink this one on the cold side as I have a feeling you don't want it to warm up to much.

Purchased: Bevmo, Palmdale CA

Aroma: 5 | Appearance: 5 | Mouthfeel: 6 | Flavor: 7 | Overall: 6

"Ochakovo Zhiguliovskoye" Try saying that three times fast! :) I think if were in Russia trying to order this, I'd just point at the yellow&blue .5L bottle, and say "Pivo, Spaseba!"

But that begs the question, would I actually want to drink this, in Russia, or anywhere else, for that matter? East question, but not easily answered.

In short, this doesn't suck. Not nearly as sythentic and artificial tasting as most cheap East European beers that have crossed my path. Nothing special, not at all..., but does go down simply enough. No mid-beer headaches, or weird dryness in the backend mouthfeel. Just like this beer's label, this is quite plain-jane, but not particularly offensive.

Not something I would buy again, but one that I don't regret for having crossed my path. {Shrug} you can much worse than this...

Music: Witchfynde's "Stagefright"
//TB