American Winter Ales

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Winter might be officially over in Ireland and the weather getting warmer but it can still be chilly enough to want a winter warmer. So here are 4 of them from the US that I had last month.

Starting with Goose Island, the first of their beers that I've had since AB-InBev bought them. It pours a murky brown with little to no head. It's called Mild Winter which thankfully this winter was. The aroma was interesting, it smelled of Ryvita (a rye crispbread) as well as nuts and caramel. It actually tasted like liquefied ryvita as well. Now I rather like Ryvita and thought this worked rather well. A strong caramel base with lashings of brown sugar make up the body. I can't say that this bottle was produced pre or post AB-InBev but if it's post; they have not let the accountants near the place as of yet as this is a cracking beer.

Moving from the Mid West to the East Coast now and Broklyn's simply named; Winter Ale pours a lighter murky brown with a hint of red. In all respects, this is actually very similar to Mild Winter. There is one major difference in that this does not have any of the Rye character the Goose Island offering had. Instead it whacks the ABV up to 6.1% and adds a more brown sugar. The extra alcohol is not obvious but I could feel the warming effects so they are not lying on the label, it is 6.1%.
Personally I preferred the Goose Island but this was also very tasty.

Back to the West Coast and Anderson Valley have their Winter Solstice seasonal ale. It would have been nice to actually drink it on December 21st but I doubt the beer tasted any better that day. Of the three so far, this is the weakest. Well in terms of flavour because at 6.9% it's the strongest. Like the others, a strong and sweet caramel base makes up the body but it seems a lot thinner, not quite watery but just a lot thinner. Perhaps some sugar makes up some of the gravity as that would explain the lack of body for such a high abv beer. Some dried fruit redeemed it a little so the beer itself is rather nice but I would think twice about buying it when faced with the competition.

And lastly we move a little North East but stay in California and head to Chico, home of the infamous Sierra Nevada and their Celebration Ale. There are certain things one comes to expect with Sierra Nevada and primarily I find that most of their beers are generously hopped and usually with citrusy pacific north west  hops. This is the 2011 edition and I reckon it needs another year to mellow out a little. It seemed to be lacking something and that something was probably just conditioning. That said, it's still a lovely citrusy beer with heaps of grapefruit etc. It did feel a little thin and certainly leaned more towards the bitter end of the scale so a little more sweetness to balance that hop bite might be nice, again the conditioning will take care of that I suspect.

Now roll on the spring and summer beers!