LAUGHING BUDDHA GETS ITS ASIAN ON

Count me as being fully in favor of the trend to throw brewing curveballs at the beer dork public, with strange combinations of ingredients making their way into the hops & grains & malts of 22-oz bombers nationwide. Take the “Asian beer” trend right now. We told you about UNCOMMON BREWERS a few weeks ago, and even thought that one was something of a “miss” (at least I thought so), you can’t fault these fellas for trying to shake things up in this uber-fragmented market of one-upmanship. In that review we hinted about LAUGHING BUDDHA BREWING in Seattle, and expressed a desire to sample their wares. Now we have, and we are the better for it. HBJ received two bottles in the mail from The Beer Retard, and the first one down the hatch was their MANGO WEIZEN. This certainly is a stunning example of east meeting west, with the Indian “mango lassi” (you know, that ultra-sweet yogurt drink found in Indian restaurants?) meeting the hundreds-of-years-strong German hefeweizen.

The mango flavor is just as you’d like it – not too intense, but with a nice tang and medium body, with sediment left behind just to show you how unfiltered and pure the thing is. Unlike the SIAMESE TWIN ALE from UNCOMMON BREWERS, this Asian-inspired beer eases one into the hybrid of flavors, and is a great Indian summer beer while the clouds are at bay & your cookout weekends dwindle. I guess in Seattle that time is long gone, but when word gets out how good this one is I reckon they’ll be drinking it in Santa cups on Christmas morning with the eggnog. Good on ya, Laughing Buddha! 8/10.