Tuesday, 23 February 2010

• An Enlightened Ex-Beer-ience

  
  

  
  

  This beer, 1554 Enlightened Black Ale, comes to us from the New Belgium brewing company in Colorado. Honestly, this is more or less darker cousin of Fat Tire Amber Ale (which, by the way, is one of my favorite mass-produced, run-of-the-mill American ambers). This beer is brewed in the style of a Belgian Dark Ale, and although it's rather opaque, has a character and quality all its own that differentiates it from the most well-known dark style: the stout. I had some of this on tap this week. Honestly, for a more mass-produced beer my expectations weren't all that high, however, I was VERY IMPRESSED with this beer, as is evident in the breakdown:

  
  
  Pour: Dark brown. Not as dark or opaque as a stout or porter, but pretty dang close. When held up to the light, it's a very deep red-amber color. About an inch of slight off-white head that retained decently and left all sorts of lacing on the glass.
  
  Smell: A combination of caramel and chocolate malts combined with floral, fruity, and spicy hops. A bit of an unusual acidic sour smell that was very faint.
  
  Taste: This is one of the most complex "mass-produced" microbrew beers I think I've ever had. Starts off with a slight bit of a hop spice, moving into a caramel malty sweetness which then fades into a semi-sweet chocolate malt character. The middle of the palate has a dark fruity taste, almost like freshly ripened blackberry. The back end finishes up with a coffee overtone and leads into a mild bit of bitter, floral hop bitterness.
  
  Mouthfeel: Medium bodied, creamy, and with a fair amount of carbonation, and very smooth. Spot-on.
  
  Drinkability: I could sit back and drink these all day. They go down so well.
  
  Final Notes: An excellent choice for a session beer, or to pair with food or even a dessert. This beer has so many potential uses. It satisfies a broad spectrum of tastes pulling from fruity, bitter, sweet, and coffee elements. A great beer to serve at parties and at 5.5% by volume, you can have a few. I'm going to rate this one an "A-."
  
  
  Have you ever tried this Black Ale or anything similar? What did you think?
  
  
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