Schlafly Strong Optic Golden Ale

Brewed by Saint Louis Brewery
Style: Scotch Ale
Maplewood, Missouri USA

Serve in Thistle

send corrections   |   shelftag   |   edit barcodes   |   add pic

Smell is sweet and malty. Color is cloudy copper. Taste is malty and sweet with more bourbon notes than scotch though there is a hint of peat smoke. Very good. ---Rated via Beer Buddy for iPhone

(bottle) gold/dark amber with no head. Aroma of whisky, malt, alcohol. Flavor is whisky, malt, alcohol. Body is a bit thin.

UPDATED: JAN 7, 2013 The beer is light copper with a quarter inch of white head. The aroma brings yeast, fruit, malt, sweetness, booze. The flavor imparts booze and mediocrity. Eh...I’m just not sure this whole scotch beer relationship thingy is working out. It’s not you - it’s me. I gotta go.

Aroma is malts and strongly refers to scotch. The flavor is scotch infused, with a mild fruitiness and malts in it. Can appreciate it but just don’t care for scotch.

Bottled as Schlafly Scottish Ale. Pours a golden tan with an creamy head. Aroma of peat, wood, vanilla, some baked bread. Taste starts very sweet, with a lot of malt, but very little to no hop balance. The scotch doesn’t kick in until the end but when it does it is very very prevalent. The alcohol was present but not overpowering, but it did get more evident the more I had. Overall a good beer if you are a scotch fan.

Definitely for the scotch lover. Overpowering any malt flavor when cold, but subtle nuances of vanilla and caramel as it warms up. Would love to see how the boozy nose rounds out with some age.

Bottle as Single Malt Scottish. Hazy golden color, fluffy white edge head. Aroma of anice leary single malt! Whoa! Taste is similar. More whoa!

Had a sample of this from a cask at Hop in the City and was underwhelmed. It was generally full of sweetness with a hint of scotch at the finish. It was sugary and lacked any kind of complexity. Hops were nowhere to be found. This is supposed to be barrel aged and that should help with the sweetness and add some complexity from the wood. With the right barrel it could be tasty but the foundation that i tasted was lacking.

Sampled on tap at the 2012 Schlafly Hop In The City festival, in cask-conditioned form. It poured a medium copper color with lots of chill haze and a weak white head. Aromas of wood, peat, freshly-baked bread, light toast, lots of caramelized sugars, very faint ale yeast esters, virtually no hops. Flavor was too sweet for my taste, too much residual sugar. Some nice toffee, fruit leather, and oxidation, though, perhaps from kettle caramelization. Somewhat reminiscent of an English Old Ale or Belgian Dubbel, but not as nuanced as classic examples. Medium body, low carbonation (the cask wasn’t primed with enough yeast, or it just wasn’t quite ready, in my opinion), some unpleasant hot alcohol, sticky mouthfeel and aftertaste. It struck me as lacking, but not deeply flawed. Nothing that can’t be straightened-out in future batches.

On cask at Hop in the City 2012. Apparently this is a base beer for an upcoming special release. It poured tan / light copper with a small whitish head. The aroma had toffee, mild sweetness, caramel and English ale earthiness. It had a medium / thick body that is very sticky with mild carbonation. The taste is very sweet and alcoholic. This through me off since their ’regular’ scotch ale isn’t all that sweet and doesn’t show alcohol much at all. There was also toffee and syrup coming through. This was a bit too hot for my liking and didn’t seem as complex as I expected.