This past weekend the wife and I spent the weekend camping in southwestern Minnesota. I’ve got a bunch of stories to tell about the trip, but I’m going to start with one of my favorite topics… beer tourism. On the way out of town I looked up any breweries along the way, and discovered a new brewery in Jordan Minnesota. This is about 30 miles south of the metro area, and we managed to time our visit to be right around dinner on Friday night.

They had El Jefe Food Truck serving mexican food, so we were able to get some grub while I tried a couple of their beers. Unfortunately, they don’t do flights, but they do short pours. Since we still had a lot of driving to do, I just got a couple of shorts to sample and enjoy with my tacos. The first one I tried was their German black ale. I love black ales, and not enough places do them, or do them well. Too often, breweries decide that if they make a black ale it has to be a black IPA and they hop it up like crazy with Cascade hops.

I was pleased to see that Roets didn’t do this, and instead delivered a really solid, and drinkable, black ale, with European character to it. It had a good malt body, but it was smooth and quaffable. People always equate dark beers with heavy varieties like porters and stouts, but a good black ale can be very refreshing.

The second beer I tried was their apricot witbier. It was a bit cloudy (as it should be) and had a nice tangy quality to the yeast. The apricot was nice and sweet, without being cloying in any way. Overall, a great example of how to do a fruit beer well. Combining sweet fruit with the zesty quality of a wit helps balance the two characters really well, and this week really worked for me.

Alas, I didn’t have time (or fortitude) to attempt to try all their beers, but since they’re not too far out of town, it might show up on my itinerary again someday. If you’re in the neighborhood of Jordan (perhaps visiting the candy store), swing into Roets for some really solid craft beer.