Lightly sweet, lightly smoky. Definitely less smoke than other rauchbiers I’ve recently had.
Elysian Pumpkin Old Fashioned (unknown release)
Don’t know if this was mislabeled but it felt way less than the listed 12.3%. There was, however, a bit of whisky on the nose. Fruity, mildly sweet ale.
Extremely creamy pour. Lightly sweet, caramel cream ale with just a hint of cold fizz at the end. Perfect for what I wanted.
Pine-lemon IPA with a cloudy flavor and mellow finish. Bought it because of the name; worked better than the Redhook IMO.
Peach, lemon, very mellow, surprisingly unbitter. Kind of found myself actually wanting this to be more of a hop bomb.
Pineapple-forward, juicy, slightly tangy going to a high herbal bitterness. Clean finish.
Started off great, a little murky, dark citrus, smooth finish. By the end though I felt like I was sucking on grapefruit rind.
Not that different from the Fresh Bois, a little more lemon, more bitter, uric tackiness. Pretty good but love the can.
Matchless Fresh Bois (2024)
Fragrant of melon, lightly sweet. Other than that, a bit like a malt soda, I could hardly detect alcohol.
Orange-forward and very not-bitter. Slightly drying finish with not much cereal at all.
Definitely a beer in the lemon-pine strata-sphere. But very good example of that. If I have any complaints it's that it's overwhelmingly in the juicy-fruity arena with not much counterbalance
It's deifnitely spice-heavy, so if that's not what you like about pumpkin beers you might want to avoid. But it does seem balanced by the overall strength of this beer for me. This might appeal more if you're in the mood for a spiced liquor rather than a beer though.
A much better experience than the Evasion. Bright, only a hint of orange, lots of banana, finishes spicy. Kind of wish there was a stronger orange quality but at least this tastes like a beer.
Only learned after the fact that this is a gluten-free brewery. Maybe that's why it's missing any trace at all of cereal? Starts with a perfumey orange-flavor, a little candy-like, and then proceeds straight into bitter oils. Did not like.
A nice, earthy coffee flavor up-front followed by caramel. I don't really like how this finishes though, very tacky and a bit metallic-tart.
Starts with Apple-hop dryness, finishes with pithy bitterness. I liked this, but a little less than the Lumberbeard.
Early pith bitterness, with a lemon-pine flavor that carries straight on through. Finished clean. Brian thinks the opposite though.
Fremont Melange Barrel Aged Cuvee (unknown release)
Light, chocolate, caramel. Really excellent. Enough barrel to show itself but not in your face.
Light and fragrant. There's the typical rice sweetness, but also a little more of a bitter edge than I was expecting for the style.
Lumberbeard Disco Weapon (2024)
Bright up front, citron, pine, without that sweet lemon cleaner sheen. Finishes closer to the Kolsch than I was expecting: cereal, yeast. Very clean though.
Zoiglhaus Fresh Hop Kölsch (2024)
Yeasty, lightly estery Kolsch, finishes with cereal funk. Just one step removed from an American hefe. There's not a traditional fresh hop sheen on this, but it does seem to give a clean, bright crest to the flavor wave.
Lager with a drying, apple/cereal opening. Very light, clean and tasty, but the opening salvo of flavor is welcome. It does get increasingly tacky in the finish as it goes on.
Unlike last time I very clearly tasted the taro in this, which was super interesting. That said, there was also a very strong, musty smell about it which wasn't at all carried through to the flavor but was somewhat off-putting.
It has nice, Thai character, star anise, clove, coriander? But I've been making a lot of homemade phở lately, and I can't help but think of phở broth when I drink this, which isn't a great association. There's also a quality of Orange Crush too.
Bitter pine and hints of lemon. This is oilier than the beer from earlier.
It's fragrant all right. High-alpha, juicy citrus oil and a uric finish. Just a hint of acridity.
Zoiglhaus Oktoberfresh (2024)
My palate may be muted today, but this seems exceedingly pleasant. Grassy, cereal, bit of toast on the backend. Finishes dry and clean. Not sure I’m getting fresh hop, but it is tasty.
A little bit more sour than expected. Goes well with mussels done every way. Will have to try with Snackachangi Chips next.
Really nice. Lightly tart, clean (if a bit candy-like) strawberry flavor. Just a touch of funk on the finish tempers the drinkability a bit, but if you're in a fruity mood this is a good one.
A robust pilsner, but also the kind that if you don't log it for eight hours you won't remember anything specific about it.
There is so much going on here. It's like a racecar in my mouth. Not everything in a racecar tastes good. The cherry cough syrup is out of control. Man. The non barrel aged is so much more on point.
But at least it's not used coffee grounds in bad beer.
Complex. lots of corny corniness and cornish cornundrums cornucopiating
Stolen from Jet. It's like someone took burnt motel coffee, watered it down, and added it to a mediocre Marzen.
Smells like you took some used coffee grounds and put them in a lot of water.
Ummmm it’s like used grounds of a burnt coffee were poured into my lager.
I started to like this but as the lemon hits there is this kinda unpleasant waft of almost medicinal scent that disagrees with me. that and the mango was undetectable which is unforgivable in a product with the word mango in the name haha
I cannot believe i’m saying this but this might actually be too stouty too bourbony too barrelly
Wonderful sweet cherry dark chocolate smell. Syrupy stouty chocolate cherry taste. My only hesitation is that I suspect this will give me a headache if I drank too much. (Otherwise I'd rank it higher. )
Really complex and well balanced. nutty but also sweet. toast. a little char even forest floor. it expanded my perception of what a dark lager is.
really balanced light lager. good flavor, a little herbal. goes down easy