Kalnapilis Brewery - Expat in Kaliningrad, Russia

Bull-headed whilst drinking Taurus

11 March 2023 ~ Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)

Article 24: Taurus

Oh, come on! Even those of you who are far too rational to have any truck with mystic nonsense know that Taurus is an astrological sign and, for what it’s worth, the second astrological sign in the modern zodiac. No, not the Ford Zodiac. Who remembers those long bench seats and that tricky column gear stick?!

The zodiac sign for Taurus is the bull. Zodiac people are said to be hard-headed, down-to-earth, tenacious, reliable, loyal, and sensual. I wonder if the latter quality is why so many wear the cuckold’s horns?

Reviewing Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

So, this beer that I am reviewing today, this pilsner, is named after the second sign of the zodiac. It has a bull’s head on the label, so it must be so, but we won’t know if the label stands for zodiac sign or something else until we attempt to drink it. Well, they ~ the brewers and distributors ~ are hardly likely to adorn the bottle with a hefty pile of bull droppings, are they?

Now, I’m not a pilsner man … blah … blah … blah …. Yes, you’ve heard it all before, but that does not mean that I am not afraid to try it. I once tried a liberal girlfriend. At least, I think she was a girl? Maybe, she was a feminist.

There are some out there who say yes, but … and they don’t get any further because they are drinking a good strong ale, but others say a pilsner is a pilsner is a pilsner, and most of them are me. But what the tongue doesn’t taste the tum can’t grieve about, so whilst you can’t teach your grandmother to suck eggs (why would she want to?), you can occasionally, on a hot afternoon, get a real-ale drinker to forget his religion and sip an ice-cold lager.

And if that lager is pilsner, make sure that it is ice cold, or it could taste like the bull I am hoping this pilsner will not be.

Mick Hart reviews Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

So, off we go with the top and up to the nostrils: ‘Dull, sour smell’ ~ make a note of that.

I pour it into the glass, and it looks light. I am relieved about that; don’t want to be asking, what did you do with the water that you washed the bull’s hind quarters with?

I sip it; I taste it; I swig it: Dull metallic taste. “Just as I thought, Watson!”

“Well, you silly bugger Holmes, why on earth did you buy it?”

“Why, because I have this ‘Year of the Bull’ tea towel, which I knew would make for a very interesting photograph even if the bull’s head attachment makes it a very inconvenient tea towel.”

“What a load of bullocks!” In the farmer’s field opposite. {Watson is looking out of the window into the farmer’s field opposite.}

The strength of the beer is not OTT. It weighs in at a very respectable 4.6%, which in the hereabouts, Kaliningrad, would be seen as lightweight but in the UK regarded as A-OK. For example, a matador could drink it and still not be incapable of waving his little red handkerchief.

As with many lagers, iced over from the fridge as if imported from a Siberian winter, pilsner is nothing to do with taste but all to do with coldness and getting it down your throat, hence the expression ‘Lager Louts’. Obviously, no regard for taste and quality equals no regard for decorum.

Drinking Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

Some pilsner lagers evade the spell checker and by the time you have finished drinking them, let alone writing about them, they have turned into something else. I am relieved to say, however, that Taurus does qualify as a pilsner, not a pisner. It has all the ~ we won’t say qualities, but we will allow ourselves to use the word usefulness ~ of an alcoholic drink that comes in handy on a hot sweaty day.

And that was the penultimate sentence, which leaves you wondering how exactly, given the Taurus-bull connection, I resisted including a word like bullshit.

😀TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: Taurus
Brewer: Kalnapilis Brewery
Where it is brewed: Panevėžys, Lithuania
Bottle capacity: 1 litre
Strength: 4.6%
Price: It cost me about 127 roubles (£1.38) [at time of writing!]
Appearance: Light
Aroma: Dull, sour
Taste: Typical pilsner
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: A load of bull
Would you buy it again? Hmm, debateable …
Marks out of 10: 4.5

*Note that the beers that feature in this review series only include bottled beer types that are routinely sold through supermarket outlets and in no way reflect the variety of beer and/or quality available in Kaliningrad from speciality outlets and/or through bars and restaurants.