Have you heard of Bananaweizen before?
It’s a hefeweizen beer mixed with a banana. Relatively common in bars in Germany.
This prompted me to search "banana beer", and apparently in some East-African countries there are beers where banana is the main ingredient in the actual mash.
My favorite beer - Live Oak Hefeweizen - has natural banana notes in it. It seems that’s common for Hefes, anyway.
I’d be curious as to how the bananaweizen tastes and whether it ruins the beer - like a Radler in Britain or Blue Moon which kinda tastes a bit artificial.
I posted in another comment about micheladas, but I think why I make a distinction about that not ruining the beer is due to the complexity of the flavor.
The yeasts used for hefe’s quite often produce banana ester. Many/most yeasts do at certain temperatures and it’s considered an ‘off’ flavour in most styles, but desired in some white beers.
Beer and banana mix pretty well surprisingly.
Radler (beer with some lemonade in it) is also pretty common in Germany, with a similar reputation to what you describe.
Bananaweizen blew my mind because it was the first time I learned banana juice existed. There are other wheat beer mixes, and there is the whole 'radler' thing too
It’s very popular in Texas. In the East (towards Houston) it’s called a Michelada. Towards the west, I’ve heard it called red beer.
It is delightful, and consists of about 50% beer and 50% secret mix (often Clamato, literally: clam and tomato mix). Or, tilt the proportions in either direction as you favor.
It might be delicious, but the concept of clam juice makes me want to barf.
Yep, it's not delicious.
That kind of thing is very common with many kinds of mixtures in Germany, especially apple juice unsurprisingly :) but really all kinds of things. I was shocked because in the UK it is very uncommon to see such a thing. I remember having something similar in Budapest too.
When you mix small amounts of alcohol in a high ball glass with other ingredients, it becomes even more healthier. You get the slight relaxation plus nutriants and taste.