Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7.5
2022 Island of Misfit Beer pack of 16 oz. cans. Dark brown pour, looks like it could be a Dubbel-style. Fizzy foam that goes away very quickly. Mostly some Belgian specialty malt in the nose. I guess caramel and raisins mostly went in for fermentation. Although I can let this breathe for a few minutes and start to pick up what smells more like Belgian candi sugar, And now what I can only call raisin juice starts to seep on to my palate. And there is yet a bit of yeasty bite from a Belgian dubbel, completing the circle.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7.5
16 oz. can from the 2022 Island of Misfit Beers 4-pack. Pours a porter-ish brown, with a big, foamy tan head. Smell has a nice toasty stout malt to it. I pick maybe just a hint of sweet cherry. The taste is a little light on sweetness, but the roast of a regular stout is pretty evident. The holiday cheer seems to be a light assortment of spices that aren't out of place in a roasty beer: maybe cardamon or allspice, with a note of perhaps some stone fruit juice. We end up with a nice beer for dessert or enjoying by the space heater.
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7
2022 Island of Misfit Beers 4-pack. Trying to suss out just what the “Holiday Cheer” is. It looks pretty normal in the glass: amber color, almost reddish, with some American pale ale haze. A note of hop citrus; then when I move the glass around, I actually catch a whiff of Tootsie Roll. Taste? Once I think of Tootsie Roll, I try to see if there’s a fudge-like note. Probably, or else I can’t get the thought out of my head. I’m also picking up the idea of wassail spices, and maybe some lemon peel. This is all done very nicely, though, without going overboard on hops or on holiday spices or adjuncts, which I can appreciate.
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 4 | Overall - 7
Sampled from the tap at GMTW 2022. Pours a near clear light yellow with a white head that dissipates to the edges. Aroma has a combination of citrus and mango with a sweet grain backing. Flavor has sweet grain and citrus with a bit of mango and tropical fruits coming through.
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 5 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 5.5
Sampled from the tap at the brewery. Pours a clear straw yellow gold with a white head that dissipates to the edges. Aroma has lots of straw and a biscuit with a bit of grain and bread backing. Flavor has lots of straw and grains with a bit of biscuit underlying.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 6.5 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7.5
16 oz. can from mixed 4 pack at Jewel stores across Chicago. Does it bounce? Not trying that idea. This coffee stout, the label notes, uses coffee from Soul Loco Artisan Roasters in Maple Park, IL. It pours another frothy head with some Guinness-like cascading down the side, just like the Spotted Elephant. Smell has plenty of coffee to it, of course. Slight malt sweetness, but not as roasty as the Spotted Elephant, either. Just some nice sweet coffee. It’s a fine stout beer taste. Coffee runs around the side of the palate, with coffee roast malts up front. No spices, no fruit. Just a sturdy stout with a little cola sweetness, and more coffee as I drink it further down.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8
16 oz. can, part of a mixed 4-pack at Jewel. Nice mellow stout nose. Mainly a light coffee malt roast. Vanilla is so often a part of the stronger barrel-aged stouts that it can be less noticeable. The taste is quite roasty for an oatmeal stout. That and the vanilla give it a kind of marshmallow impression. The alcohol is only slightly stronger than the previous beers, but towrd the end of a pint can, it starts to make itself felt.
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 5 | Texture - 5 | Overall - 6
16 oz. can from mixed 4 pack at Jewel stores across Chicago. Just sorted this out from a previous "Bumble" that was a coffee stout. Pours a deep porter brown with a fizzy tan cola head. Nose is kind of light, but does have some coffee roast malt to pick up. Taste is a bit watery, though, without much malt to it, but a little bit of roast. The Obsurity Christmas beers can be hit or miss, and this one's a miss.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7.5
Mixed 4-pack from Jewel. A much more pillowy head out of the can than the Clayce. Darker amber color, which of course is hard to be sure of looking at my quickie photos. Smell of cinnamon, maple and cherry is there as advertised, perhaps a little too strong, but that’s often what happens with a holiday beer. I get the amber malts again, but surprisingly, there’s also an impression of the same hazelnut from the previous beer, even though I’m having them a day apart. Perhaps that’s from the blend of adjuncts, mainly the cinnamon and the maple. But the spiciness does remind me of perhaps one of the yearly editions of Anchor’s holiday Our Special Ale. Almost spicy like a holiday eggnog.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7
Mixed 4 pack from Jewel. Since I’ve not cared much for nut flavors, I’ll start with this one, since I might be pleasantly surprised. What I first see is a nice amber beer, fitting to my Sam Adams Boston Lager glass, with a nice, stiff head. The nose is nice on malts, though not quite as toasty as the color might imply. I do catch the nut flavor: it’s there, but doesn’t try to be too obvious, so I’m happy about that. Hazelnut comes in a little toasty, and they’ve overcome the issues of oils in nuts, which might have killed the head. Instead there’s some nice amber malts and hazelnuts. A little sweet, but not sugary.