Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7
Bottle from Total Wine Uptown. Murky copper pour with a one finger fluffy head. Malty aroma, caramel, brown bread. More malts in the taste, sweet, light barrel accents.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7
Taster at the brewery - cola-colored brew - richly smoky aroma - somewhat thin-bodied for the abv (and to hold the smoke) - flavor is less smoky than the nose, but settles on a moderate chocolate sweetness and woodiness - the best beer I tried here.
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 5
Taster at the brewery - hazy orange - flat, overly sweet, bubblegum-y rendition of the style, with slightly harsh finishing phenolics - needs major cleaning up.
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7
Taster at the brewery - a valiant effort at the style - it's clean, lightly floral, with a moderate malt richness - overall, though, the flavors together are generally indistinct; your palate has to work at it, so it doesn't pop or have the bright vibrancy of the better examples of the style.
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 6
Taster at the brewery - hazy gold - fairly light, with pleasantly crisp maltiness and a moderate hop bite - however, the middle brings moderate acetaldyhide in the form of a green apple flavor, which I found too off-putting to make the beer fully enjoyable.