BONE HAUS BREWING ENGLEMANN’S ELIXIR PRICKLY PEAR PALE ALE – A review.

 

By Daver

Alright, let’s get local again. Bone Haus Brewing, over in Fountain Hills, has the kind of décor a little nerd goblin like myself truly appreciates. The whole brewery is done up like a haunted mine, with coffins and skeletons and bone piles all over. Not just for Halloween, it’s year round! The beer list is worth sampling, the last time I was there. Now due to the emergency brakes getting thrown on the world for a whole year, the beer list has no doubt changed. I recalled there was a prickly pear sour some time ago, rich and tangy sweet and reddish if my memory serves. Unfortunately, I have no photos, nothing written, and a failed Google search, so maybe I imagined it. Nevertheless, I felt like a prickly pear ale was in order. I went to the nearest Total Wine and picked up this brew, Englemann’s Elixer Prickly Pear Pale Ale. Sounds like fairly easy drinking for a hot summer day, doesn’t it?

The can label has its own narrative for the origin of this brew: “Dusty has a talent for discovering opportunity wherever it may lie. When he learned of the powerful properties of the prickly pear fruit from the botantist (that’s their typo, not mine) Dr. Englemann, by sheer happenstance, he concocted a plan to fund our continuing search for my lost uncle. He learned how to turn this widespread fruit into an elixir, one he could sel to townsfolk for their clear benefit. The good doctor advised against it, but Dusty is… persuasive.” What did Dusty do? What happened next will surprise you!

And the surprise is, this is not like any pale ale that I’ve drank before. This tastes more like a lager, something mild and easy to drink. At first it feels like you’re drinking a domestic beer, light flavor, wheat-y, crisp in the beginning. What I don’t taste is hops. That's a relief, many pale ales I've found can be overly generous with the quantity of hop in their brewing. Then, you get the essence of prickly pear, only not to obnoxious extremes. Here's the thing about most prickly pear products you may encounter from Arizona tourist spots: they're heavily sweetened. But this ale is hardly sweet at all, not till it reaches the back of your tongue as you swallow. Same goes for the bouquet, you can detect prickly pear but it’s not overwhelming. It’s perfume-y, but not cloying.

It’s not a bad summertime beer. But there’s not much else I can say about it. The body’s a cloudy yellow, foamy at first pour, 5% ABV. It’s alright, Bone Haus produced another quality brew, no question. It’s also boring. It’s a safe, inoffensive beer. I don’t regret picking this up, but it doesn’t stand out.