While watching Germany defeat Sweden in the World Cup with a last-minute goal, I cracked open my Father’s Day gift – Evil Twin Bushido. Bushido is an inventive Berliner Weisse style beer made with yuzu (Japanese citrus) and chili.
This unusual, tart ale begins with a juicy citrus taste and ends with a spicy chili flavor that gets a little hotter with every sip. It’s definitely not a drink to guzzle but rather one to savor. The name Bushido means the code of conduct for the samurai. This explains the logo on the can, Samurai Jack. My kids (and I) spent a lot of time watching Samurai Jack, so it’s pretty cool to get these cans for Father’s Day.
This beer is quite different from the Berliner Weisse Napoleon’s troops called ‘The Champagne of the North’ in 1809. Beer Judge Classification Program (BJCP) describes the style as a cloudy German white beer made with wheat and low alcohol content, somewhere between 2.8% and 3.8%. It is highly carbonated with very low hop and mild Brettanomyces character.
A traditional Berliner Weisse is served in a bowl-shaped glass often with a raspberry or woodruff syrup. So…what is woodruff? I recently discovered it is a ground cover that tastes of sweet hay and vanilla. My friend has some growing in his yard and gave me a plug to start in my shady yard, today. I don’t think I can wait years for my woodruff to get established enough to harvest and make my own syrup, so I’ll probably just buy some online.
Some Berliner Weisse beers to try are Berliner Kindl Weisse (from Berlin), Firestone Walker Bretta Rosé, Bruery Terreux Hottenroth, and Dogfish Head Festina Pêche. Also, here are 8 Berliner Weisse style beers suggested by Vinepair, including Bushido.
Back to Bushido. It is produced by Evil Twin Brewing, a gypsy brewery owned by the Dane, Jeppe Jarnit-Bjergsø. He is the identical twin brother of another gypsy brewer Mikkel Borg Bjergsø, the founder of Mikkeller Brewing. These two brothers have a rocky relationship and now rarely speak. I’m guessing that might explain the name Evil Twin.
Cheers!
Warren
Pretty cool Father’s Day gift!
🍻 Aku: Long ago in a distant land, I, Aku, the shape shifting master of darkness, unleashed an unspeakable evil. But a foolish samurai warrior wielding a magic sword stepped forth to oppose me. Before the final blow was struck, I tore open a portal in time, and flung him into the future where my evil is law. Now the fool seeks to return to the past and undo the future that is Aku.