Easygoing canned red ale places rotted orange tartness across from roasted caramel sweetness. Crisp tobacco-leafed tea frolic and light pumpernickel-breaded nuttiness absorb ambiguous fruit spicing at midst. Light cafe au lait coffee creaming settles in deep recess. A tad thin, but soothingly smooth.
Fine pint-canned, rust-cleared medium body plies brown pear and yellowed crispin apple fruiting to usual pink grapefruit, navel orange and tangerine tang of standard citric-pined India Pale Ales. Dry-hopped evergreen florality, ginger-like turmeric peppering, raw vanilla bittering, subtle black tea pungency and metallic tinge contrast underlying caramelized butterscotch sweetness.
Ineffective lactose-milked medium body lacks expectant creamy ‘milkshake’ sweetness. Instead, dry dark-roasted black patent malting and light cocoas nibs influence prove ill-equipped to carry the mushy nutty mocha load over its murky earthen bottom. Sour dried fruiting seems outta place. Closer to a thin Irish stout, perhaps.
Calming fresh-watered briskness crisply soothes black-roasted coffee bittering and vanilla-sweetened creme brulee sugaring. Filmy coffee grounds deepen chocolate-covered cherry puree, maple walnut ice cream, tierra mousse, brown-sugared molasses, blackberry, cola nut, pecan and praline illusions over mossy earthiness.
Well-balanced full-bodied IPA spinoff contrasts bright pineapple, grapefruit and orange sweetness against bitterly pungent piney hop oiling and dry yellow wood acridity. Ancillary brown pear, red cherry, apricot and tangerine sugaring receives honeyed rye malting as well as ginger-snapped herbal wisp. Brusque alcohol burn provides medicinal cherry coughdrop background.
Upstart Michigan nanobrewer’s auburn-cleared red lager places honey-spiced citrus zest above leafy hops and pale malts. Flour-powdered cereal grains soak up lemony tangerine juicing, orange-rotted souring and red cherry sugaring.
Smooth creme brulee sugaring leads the way for ‘dark chocolate malt beverage.’ Fudgy vanilla sweetens tertiary chocolate truffle, Ghirardelli chocolate, cocoa bean, espresso, toffee and oily coffee resonance. Minimal hop char embitters mocha tendencies, but soft creamy froth relegated by acrid carbolic aridity and coarsely astringent nuttiness.
Disappointingly overrated golden-hazed English pale ale with under-utilized New Zealand-bound Nelson Sauvin hop astringency feigns unspecific tropical fruiting (kiwi, grapefruit, passion fruit, papaya, guava, pineapple) as simple carbolic lemon spritz covers up bland stylistic moderation. Forget any intended Sauvignon Blanc white wining. Instead, its minor grassy hop spicing tingles the senses but leaves very few citric pleasantries.
On tap at Shepherd & Knucklehead, bold full-bodied Imperial IPA (limited ’14 edition with high hop resin) drapes rye-honeyed fructose tropicalia over tangy grapefruit-orange ripeness, but rigid 11.1% alcohol burn, massive 111 IBU hop bittering and chewy caramel malting completely overload fruity onrush. In skinny 12-ounce can, clay-hopped pine needling sharpens syrupy cotton-candied pineapple, peach, nectarine, tangerine and mango tang.
Gimmicky peanut-buttered brown chocolate theme suffices, if not totally entices (recalling Reese’s peanut butter cup), before picking up astringently distracting hop-oiled bittering. Salty dark-roasted peanut buttering allows ancillary hazelnut, walnut, almond and cola illusions to deepen hard-shelled legume influence above rich vanilla-sweetened mocha malting. Sugary jellybean undertones contrast recessive espresso snip. A fine dessert alternative to nutty brownies.
Novel full-bodied peculiarity enhances creamy dark chocolate malt richness with spearmint-leafed herbal freshness. But its minty influence gets emphasized above meandering mocha mantra and dark-roasted barley flakes. Wavered black licorice, black coffee, dark cocoa, vanilla bean and raw molasses illusions get depleted by creme de menthe and peppermint pattie prods. Spruce-tipped fern and evergreen tea nuances further promote chocolate mint theme.
Smoothly crisp-watered dry Irish stout tosses smoky mocha malts and barley-roasted earthen peat at acrid hop char. Cocoa-powdered Baker’s chocolate, toffee, cacao nibs, day-old coffee, Irish coffee, black tea and burgundy nuances struggle to properly surface. Stylistically murky.
