Hitachino Nest New Year Celebration Ale

Brewed by Kiuchi Brewery
Style: Spice/Herb/Vegetable
Ibaraki, Japan

2005 bottle @ $3.79 a bottle. The beer pours to a lightly hazy dark amber/copper colored body with a huge lasting foamy tan head. Nice lacing. The aroma is orange rind, cinnamon, and coriander. Fruit salad. The flavor is sweet and spicy. Wheaty, cinnamon, nutmeg, cedar, and an aftertaste of orange oil. The palate is spicy, medium bodied, a little dry. Quite nice overall.

Bottle. Intresting brew, very complex. Almost reminds me of an imperial ipa. Very nice aroma, sweet and with character. The flavor is full bodied and has a very pleasant after taste. A good ale I will drink again. Cheers!

2006 bottling. Floral and fruity aroma, some juicy orange, lemon frosting and pineapple with a variety of spices becoming more apparent as it warms. Dessert-like in a unique way. Fiery, hazy orange color, bottle-conditioned and with a lasting, foamy, off-white head. Lightly toasty and sweet malt presence to start, becoming quite fruity, citric and lightly bitter, finishing on a peppery, drying, distinctly spicy and noticeably alcoholic note. Interesting blend of fruity, somewhat leathery, woody yeast character and spices here. A bit confounding at first, but this settled somewhat before the end.

2004. Hazy brown-yellow beer, thin tan head. Aroma is sweet and malty, raisins, cherry. Very sweet aroma, a bit of earthiness. Orangey aroma. Complex spiciness. Less sweet in the mouth than the aroma would suggest, but with a plummy, earthy/woody character. As it warms there are some piny notes. Lingering cherry fruit in the finish. As it warms, loads of vanilla comes forward along with heavily toasted malts. Complex, but well-balanced. Great sipping beer.

Smallish offwhite head over hazy opaque brownish red body. Strange cardamom peppery sweetish malt aroma. Taste is sweetish peppery malts with softly metallic bitter aftertaste. Very strange, very interesting, and quite good. (0.33l bottle.)

Bottle from Super Saver. Turbid copper pour with 1-finger off-white head. Aroma of tart caramel malts, some florals and wheaty fruits. The flavor is caramel malty at the beginning, with spicy, fruity, and semi-dry vanilla and nutty elements emerging as it warms. The palate is on the dense side, and complex.

Beneath the short lived frothy beige head lies a splendid deep orange liquid, a hue that reminds of the delicious flesh of baked yams. As advertised, plenty of spices allow the nose to burst with a healthy vigor: coriander, nutmeg, vanilla, brown sugar, wheat, potato, caramel and lemon join to produce a pleasing slightly herbal and spicy mixture that does not seem so foreign to the Japanese palette despite the uncertainty I had about Asian beer. The flavor is equally enjoyable and reveals a delicious blend of coffee, brown sugar, paprika, black pepper, salt and orange peel. Velvety smooth on the tongue, this beer is yet another proof that fine beers can come from the most unlikely places.

Nice ale,made with red rice.Taste fresh good after taste.I would buy again.