12 Jul Gordon Street Tavern Hefeweizen by Tam

Gordon Street Tavern Hefeweizen

Gordon Street Tavern

Alvin, TX

Hefeweizen

ABV: 5.2%

IBUs: 0

Packaging: Draft

In a quiet hamlet of South Texas, lays a small tavern whose size cannot contain its titanic size dreams, aspirations, and ambitions in craft beer. Their goal is a simple but no easy task: To match its city brewing cousins and compete with them as well.

Many years ago, I was assigned for a short time to recruit future service members for our nations Army. At the time, Alvin was a quiet homestead that embraced its role as a neighbor in, what many refer to as, the “Greater Houston Area.” To me it was pass through town with not much to notice (or do), but with time it has changed those sleepy streets into a bustling center of growing commerce.

Gordon Street Tavern is Alvin’s first, and only, nano-brewery that caught the attention of our humble site; actually they contacted Tony D. Their invite was a simple “Come check us out and what we have to offer.” Of course, we could not turn down the offer to see the growth of what we believed to be a brewery dream taking flight.

Upon our arrival, we were presented with a warm welcome and a flight of craft beers. I immediately took to the Hefeweizen, being what I drank heavily during my years of European residence, and found it to be a near perfect likeness of what would be served inside the Oktoberfest Beer Halls.

Gordon Street Tavern Hefeweizen (woo, that’s a mouthful) is brewed with the usual combination of Wheat and Pils malts that goes into a classic Hefeweizen, but what surprised me is there use of Tetthanger Hops. Tetthanger Hops are classified as one of four classic noble German hop varieties that makes up roughly 5% of the German hop yield. Needless to say I was estatic about the painstaking authenticity they went in creating this beverage.

Gordon Street Tavern Hefeweizen pours a beautiful straw gold with absolutely no head nor lace to take up any room in your pint glass (or growler…go big or go home), which means more liquid gold for your enjoying pleasure. The aroma is a mix of banana fruit and earth tones, while its taste is calm and has a clean thirst quenching finish. This beverage falls perfectly along the category of craft brews that would pair well with our 12 months of summer and a session beverage as well. I give it a 2.5 rating because I believe, like the staff, that they can always do better. If their flight sampler is any indication of what is to come, then I am excited about the future.

Gordon Street Tavern humble beginnings can be traced back over 100 years as a stopping post for traders as well as travelers passing through to other parts of our great state in search of their fortunes in oil and trade. Today, it is still a center of gathering for all locals and nomads alike who wishes for a cold beverage and a warm meal.

Gordon Street Tavern Hefeweizen currently has no personal label, but that’s what I find to be the most stimulating detail of this beer. In the past, I’ve personally experienced attending a brewery that began as a warehouse and is now a popular tap room and I’m excited to see the possibility of that happening all over again. I’m even more enthused that we will be able to boast about how the Beer Chronicle team was able to get the scoop in the beginning.

So if you ever find yourself in Alvin, TX (Southeast of Houston off of Highway 6) stop in and try a flight, because I’m sure you’ll leave with a growler. “Beers to you, Houston!”