Ok, you say, you try to keep up on some of all these seemingly endless types of beer that adorn your local store shelf. And, you add, it’s become a rather tough job. And say, isn’t that the 200th IPA I’ve seen in the last year? And……what’s this? A weissbier? Victory Sunrise Weissbier, to be precise? Just what the heck is that supposed to be?

Ah, friends, fear not, because if you’ve tasted the wondrous glory of a hefeweizen, then you know what a weissbier is: the same thing. Weissbier is wheat beer, and hefeweizen is wheat beer, and as they used to say in algebra class (and likely still do), if a=b and b=c, then a=c. And you thought beer made you less intelligent.

Why name a beer sunrise, you ask? After all, I can remember plenty of occasions after a long night of imbibing that I wasn’t too happy about seeing the sun rise. Do I need a beer to remind me of that? We’d have to ask Bill Covaleski, brewmaster over at Victory, why the beer was named as it is. But I can tell you that Bavarians sometimes indulge in a breakfast of weissbier und weisswurst (white beer and white sausage), and my money is on that inspiration. Indeed, I have fond recollections of a tall cool glass of Tabernash Weiss with breakfast at Oldenberg's Beer Camp a decade ago.

Here are the specs from the Victory website:

Malts: 2 row German barley and wheat malt
Hops: German and Czech whole flowers
Yeast: imported, of German origin
Alcohol by volume: 5.7%

Victory Sunrise Weissbier pours to a cloudy, murky whitish yellowy color with a thick, towering rocky head formation and an invitingly spicy clove nose. Close your eyes when you take a sip and you can almost imagine yourself back in Bavaria, sipping from a tall curvy glass in a festive biergarten. Victory’s version of a classic hefeweizen is very authentic, with a crisp refreshing palate of tart crackery wheat, spicy notes of vanilla, banana, and clove, some lemony citrus, and a very quenching tart finish.

I’ve always though wheat beers to be some of the most very drinkable beers, and perhaps some of the best suited for warm weather. Today, it reached about 76 here in Atlanta, and after my daily walk I was craving a very good beer as my reward. Victory did not let me down with Sunrise Weiss, and I suspect it won’t let you down either.

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