Elysian The Wise ESB

Poured golden’amber with a nice tan head. Descent lace. Smell has graitfruit, caramel, apple cider and courant. Pretty nice taste with all of those things intertwined. Quite a malty example in my opinion. Quite good.

(22 oz bottle: $3.80 at Liquid Solutions in Tigard, OR) This wise ESB pours a tall and very rocky light-tan head which sits atop a deep ruddy-amber body. Boy, this is some flavorful stuff, nothing shy here. Very malty and earthy, with a moderately roasty flavor and a solid, grapefruity hoppiness in the finish. The roasty, earthy malts are actually too strong here for the style, but it’s tasty nonetheless. But the aroma, wow, talk about a strong, earthy maltiness. Not really getting much else in the nose. Medium body is fine for the style, but seems thin compared to the amount of flavor. Head retention is solid, slowly receding to and maintaining a thin but full layer. Cheesecloth lacing covers much of the glass. So, though it is overpowering for the style, it’s hard to fault a very tasty and flavorful beer.

Deep red with an off-white head with impressive lasting power. Nose some caramel, woody, tartness. Flavor has some of the usual woody/caramel/toffee notes, but has a very strange citric bite to it, kind of jumps from ESB to IPA with no transition. Bit sour. Wondering if this was getting infected, as with the other things from this I-apparently-can’t-be-bothered-to-actually-clean-my-equipment brewery. Not that that’s annoying or anything.

Cask at GCBF. Very yeasty beer with a strong resiny dry-hopped aroma. Moderatly woody aroma with a big shot of yeastiness. Flavour is a bit light, woody and earthy with some notible piny hops. Like a walk in the woods. Faint coppery note on a lingeringly bitter finish. Nice PNW interpretation of an ESB. Would be better if the cask had had more time to settle.

On cask @ Elysian- Pours a red amber color, almost no head. Aroma is spicy and sweet. Flavor is more spiciness to it, caramell and nutty toffee.

Thanks go to Andre for this sample. Pours red with a thin pinkish quickly dissipating head that after a few seconds diminishes to a few remnants around the rim of the glass. Smells of yogurt, grapefruit, and other citrussy elements. Tastes peppery with some mild caramel notes and a bitter blood orange. A bit thin on the mouthfeel. Finish is a bit metallic. Good, but I’ve had better bitters than this.

Bottle. Pours a clear, deep reddish-amber color with a dense and creamy khaki head. Fantastic lacing is left behind. Aroma is nicely malty with a fruity and floral hop background. Medium bodied, very creamy with a soft and pleasant carbonation. Full malty caramel flavor that is balanced extremely well with a fruity hop presence. Slightly drying with a medium hop finish that lingers. Quite nice. The tap version I had of this beer recently was very sour in flavor so perhaps some infection problems were happening.

Pours a hazy ruby orange color that is topped by a two finger thick, light tan head. The aroma is a mix of sweet malt, herbal hops, and fruity notes of cherry currants and raisins. The taste is sweet up front, but quickly moves to a sharp biting hop note. The finish has a solid bitterness to it that comes to dominate the beer. I was really quite surprised by the bitterness found in this beer, it is actually quite nice, I just had to readjust from my initial expectations. There is a definite red currant note here, that seems to be hop derived, as well as notes of pine, light citrus notes of grapefruit. The sharp hoppy bitterness of this beer really dries out the finish and makes you want to take another draught. As the beer warms up it begins to pick up some sweetness in the finish that is a mix of fruity and caramel/toffee notes.

<font size=-4>Purchased via mail order: <a href=http://www.liquidsolutions.ws/main/>Liquid Solutions<font size=-1>