New Belgium 1554 Black Lager

The first thing I noticed when I pulled this bottle out of the fridge was that 1554 Black Lager used to be called 1554 Black Ale. What the hell? So I did a little research, which took all of about 2 minutes on the interwebs. It turns out that the beer has not changed, it has always been a lager brewed with ale yeast (kind of like an Altbier) that they wanted to call a lager. However, in Texas, a ridiculous law (I know, imagine that, a stupid law in Texas) decreed that any beer with an ABV of 5% or higher had to be called an ale. I noticed this on a Sam Adams variety pack a few years ago, and now I know the answer! I am attaching a link to the New Belgium explanation as well as to my previous review.

http://www.newbelgium.com/community/Blog/new-belgium-brewing/2014/02/10/Did-you-notice-the-change-to-1554

http://ill-gottenbooty.blogspot.com/2013/04/new-belgium-1554-enlightened-black-ale.html