Alexander Hita Yisra’elit
Brewed by Alexander Brewery
Style: Weissbier – Hefeweizen
Alexander, Israel
Alexander Beer is an Israeli craft brewery, founded in August, 2008 in Emek Hefer, near the Alexander River stream in Central Israel. They aim to brew the best Israeli craft beers, using only top European malt and hops (too hot to grow hops in Israel) and Israeli water from the famous Sea of Galilee.
After his discharge from Israel’s air force in 2007 following a 30-year career as a pilot, Ori Sagi 54, decided to become a brewmaster. Putting his hobbyist’s love for brewing and his business degree to use, he launched Alexander Beer with the support of investors. The name of the brewery of course is named after the Alexander River that runs close to the operation, while the logo of the turtles, well they are a plenty in that said river! Today, Alexander Beer produces about six different kinds of beer, bottles and kegs combined, as well as special edition beers a few times a year.
A while ago they made the papers for selling a limited edition ‘Gaza Border Beer’ where profits went to support Israeli farmers living in border communities, whose fields suffered from clashes with Palestinians. Some of the ingredients for the beer were made from wheat that survived torched fields targeted by incendiary devices (kites and balloons) launched from Gaza. So definitely not a hipsters beer of choice then. As for me, not a shit I give…….its beer and I drink. And plenty others are on the same page as the beers were an overwhelming success, selling out quick fast and, to date, over $60,000 from the beer sales has been contributed to the Gaza border farmers. Of course the positive PR with this act no doubt helped the company too…..
Review: 33cl bottle of Alexander Hita Yisra’elit: 5.0% vol.
Coming in an interesting bottle, with some Hebrew that looks unpronounceable to me, its not immediately clear what’s the name of this beer, but I picked it as I wanted to try a beer from Israel, a new nation on the list for me.
I do see the word Alexander, which I guessed at the time was the name of the brewery, and there is also the point that this is an “Israeli boutique brewery”, and that this beer is “a non conventional wheat beer”, which sounds dead exciting.
There is a nice logo of a flying turtle, which is a bit strange, but looks cool! And wheat fields with pretty flowers on show at the front, all very nice and colourful.
On pour got a very nice frothy white head, very good, and a yellowish golden colour. A decent appearance. Head maintained very well and stuck around, standing tall in this good looking brew. Looks the business. Some lacing present.
Yes got the usual Hefeweizen aroma, wheaty for sure, the cloves, the spices, the fruits, the malts, all present. Typical of the style but a very, very nice beer on the nose.
The taste is not bad, get a full mouthful of the wheat, Israeli wheat at that, very nice. Like a typical Hefeweizen, fruity and spicy, wheaty, coriander, cloves, all nicely balanced, nothing out of joint.
The wheaty taste dies down a bit the more you get into the beer, but its fine to drink. I think perhaps a regular Hefeweizen drinker might be a tad disappointed but for me its fine.
I would class it as safe, not daring, doesn’t want to disappoint. All the typical Hefeweizen tastes here but nothing strong enough to make an impression.
All in the front, hits you right from the start, and it isn’t bad, but overall its just too light, especially for the style. But for me it was overall ok, pleasant enough and I might try again.
The company make a large variety of different styles of non-alcoholic beer, including a sour, a regular lager, a golden ale and a milk stout, and sell far and wide, including to Hong Kong, Singapore, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Canada and Australia. They are savvy with their network distribution as they have many large supermarket chains selling their wares, from Tesco’s, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons (all in UK), and Albert Heijn in the Netherlands. And it isn’t only cans, they even are on draught as well in certain places in the UK. 
And seeing their pen pics on their site, they have that soy look down to a tee, go figure as this is non alcoholic after all……. They do have the whiff of the BrewDog about them, definitely tapping into that hipster market, with their snazzy can designs, crowdfunding platforms and appealing to the upper and middle class tippler. They are even into movement therapy and yoga, yes, fucking yoga of all things. Not football but yoga, lol. Look at the Covid year, to say a big thank you to the NHS staff, Big Drop visited various hospitals in and around London and gave the staff free pints of their piss to “enjoy”. “What, a 20 hour shift? No worries, have a pint of our non alcoholic pish” That’s tone deaf marketing, really scraping the barrel stuff. Look I know the market for non alcoholic beer is expanding rapidly at the moment, but still……ffs
From the pour we get a massive white head, pretty big, a lot of carbonation going on. The colour is golden amber. Not bad on the eye. 
Founded in 2007 by Joey Redner, Cigar City Brewing, is a craft brewery in Tampa, Florida, the Sunshine State. Joey had previous experience with Dunedin Brewery (Florida’s oldest microbrewery), and was also a well respected beer reviewer with the Tampa Bay Times, so it was no surprise when he decided to start up his own beer enterprise.
The name of the beer is a reference to the sport, Jai Alai, a game native to the Basque region of Spain, which is played on a court called a fronton. Jai Alai players attempt to catch a ball using a curved mitt, whilst the ball travels at speeds of up to 188 miles per hour! Tampa was once home to a busy Jai Alai fronton but sadly no more. At least Jai Alai India Pale Ale remains!
Smell is a typical IPA, hoppy piney notes and caramel sweetness, all nice on the nose. Get the tropical fruits, the grapes, the orange peel and the citrus and lemon, and an earthy feel to it. Good start. 
Coming in a brown bottle we get a cute drawing of a doggy. Plain and simple, I like it. Pretty much why I went for it in the off license! 
Onto the taste. Very sweet, those malts definitely coming to the fore. The hops are on the low level, not so bitter, manageable and calm enough to enjoy.