High Five

Our new flagship light lager, A Beer With No Name, released back in May and made a big splash in our lineup.  In fact, the entire 5 bbl test batch was drank before the next 10 bbl batch was even ready.  With how well it sold, we immediately knew this needed to be a full-time tap.  It also needed a name!  So, on June 30th when the next batch was ready, we released High Five Light Lager, and since then it has continued to be our best-selling beer.

For such a simple beer, the process of designing this recipe was anything but simple.  Straddling the line between not enough, and too much flavor was a balancing act that actually took a failed attempt to get right.  On one of the saddest days of my life, I watched as the entire first batch of A Beer With No Name went down the drain.  The malt character just sadly was not present enough, and it was therefore watery and a tad hoppy, along with being too light in color.  For the second batch, more Pilsner malt was added along with a touch more Aromatic Malt, and the hop load was reduced slightly.  The result was the batch of A Beer With No Name that you all finished off in less than 30 days back in May.

The newest batch of our light lager has a couple slight changes that we feel makes it even better.  One of the Tettnang additions was moved earlier into the boil, which will result in a less hoppy, and therefore more malty finish.  An extra pound of Aromatic Malt also boosts the malt character of this beer.  Finally, we switched to a different strain of lager yeast, S-23 German Lager.  This yeast provides some subtle ester character that really rounds out the palate. 

We wanted to create an approachable and drinkable light lager for everyone. Having a light lager also allowed us to make changes to Uncle Johnny's that we have been very pleased with.  Overall, this addition to our tap lineup has been very successful and we're excited to have High Five Light Lager on tap full-time. 

Cheers!

Thomas Derstein

Head Brewer

Dodge City Brewing