From the Beer Writer: There were only two beers to sample when I first visited Bolt Brewery’s La Mesa headquarters 13 months ago. They were nice, but not as nice as the owners. Authentic, all-smiles and extremely excited to open their doors and share beer with the public, they were easy to like. My positive assessment of them was further bolstered when co-founder Molly Rust shared her plans to make Bolt as much a vehicle for assisting charity efforts as achieving their entrepreneurial goals. Over the course of the company’s first year in business, Rust and company made good on that mission, holding fundraisers for myriad people and organizations in need. And they closed out 2015 by brewing Bolt Donator Doppelbock to help out the Beer to the Rescue campaign benefiting the Lupus Foundation of Southern California, going so far as to fold its debut into their one-year anniversary festivities. As kind as that was, this lager earned its Beer of the Week status based on lovely dark-bread flavors nuanced with slight caramel sweetness and a bit of black-pepper spice in the finish. Like any well-made doppelbock, the beer is nicely attenuated. Translation—not very sweet and deceivingly drinkable for a rather imperialized brew.
From the Brewer: “For Beer to the Rescue, we brewed an amazing German-style doppelbock dubbed ‘Donator,’ following the historic tradition of naming doppelbocks with monikers ending in ‘ator.’ Donator is on the dark side, has a big malty body and weighs in at 8.3% alcohol-by-volume and 25 international bittering units. This traditional doppelbock is stylistically uncommon, but has proven a crowd-pleaser. Inspired by Brandon Hernández, Bolt has attempted to make a beer reflecting his genuine kind-hearted nature with a gift for giving back. A portion of every pint of Donator sold over its lifespan will be donated to the Beer to the Rescue cause.”—Clint Stromberg, Brewmaster, Bolt Brewery