Brewery: Peace Tree Brewing Company
Beer: Sidekick
Style: Kölsch
ABV: 5%
Character: brewed with pale malted barley, unfiltered, and with a top fermenting ale yeast at cooler temperatures of a lager
Ratings at time of Review: BA: 77 | RB: 49
Metal Connection: KICK AXE – Cause for Alarm

Rating: 4/5

When I was a member of the Big Hops team, one of the main things I loved so much was the friendships made with fellow Craft Beer drinkers of all kinds. One of these friendships is with Dan & Cyndi, an awesome couple who would frequent the first location I worked at. Every now and then they would visit family back in Iowa. On their last visit, they brought me back a few beers from one of their favorite breweries, Peace Tree Brewing Company. I am grateful for knowing such cool people. Cheers to them!

I really liked the can design. The can features a good color scheme of mostly gold and orange with a bright red Sidekick logo that features karate style fighting art within. Right away, the first thing that came to my mind was the old 70’s Hanna-Barbera cartoon, Honk Kong Phooey. Take a look here to see what I mean.

Using a recommended Stange style glass for this session, Sidekick Kölsch poured a hazy golden color, which was topped with a white frothy head that was about 1/4 of an inch thick. There was great head retention, as it left web-like lacing down the cylinder shaped glass.

The aroma was pretty on point with the style. Very welcoming aroma. The nose is a good mixture of pale grains, fresh loaf of white bread, sweet honey, crisp lemongrass, and mild citrus. There is a presence of a corn aroma thrown in the mix. The aroma was very crisp and refreshing.

Just as the nose, the taste was crisp, sweet, and refreshing. Rather an easy drinking beer, for sure. Right up front the taste of lemongrass hits the palate, followed closely by a body of sweet honey, malts and grains with a bit of a corn flavor. There was a nice touch of The aftertaste was very lager-ish, malty, taste of corn, sweet honey.

The body was light-to-medium in thickness. The mouthfeel was fizzy, crisp, and smooth on the finish. Average carbonation in this beer.

Overall, I will say I was pretty impressed with this beer. I am a huge fan of the Kölsch style, and this one being treated as a Lager really made for an exciting twist to the style. I wish this one was more easily available to me on a regular basis, as i would probably drink this one a lot. So, if you are ever up in the Iowa area, grab yourself a Sidekick, and enjoy the day!

Metal Connection: Here we have a band from Canada, originally formed in 1976. I went with this band as the Metal Connection cause of the name Kick Axe, obviously reminded me of fighting, and well, just being kick ass! As with the can art reminding me of an old cartoon, the album cover for their 1984 debut album, Vices is also very cartoon-ish. It heavily reminds me of something that would be featured in the movie Heavy Metal. Growing up in the 80’s, I was a huge cartoon fan of that era, and still find myself watching old episodes of certain bad ass cartoons. Kick Axe was a band that also contributed a couple of songs to the 1986 movie soundtrack to Transformers: The Movie, but under the band name, Spectre General for legal reasons. Kick back with your Sidekick and crank up the volume, and jam the fuck out to some kick ass music by Kick Axe. Here is the song “Cause for Alarm” from the album, Vices.