Stone (and company) – Special Holiday Brew

8
Mar0

Yummy spices!

Recently I got my hands on Stone’s/Nøgne-Ø’s/Jolly Pumpkin’s special holiday ale and I am glad that I did. This is a pretty mellow beer that tastes great. Admittedly I was a little hesitant to try this beer at first since the additional spices involved with this beer are: chestnuts, juniper berries, white sage and caraway seeds. With all of these additional spices I was curious to see if the beer tasted good or like someone threw my grandma’s spice rack into the brewing process. Thankfully the spices are not over powering but you can taste hints of additional spices. Another interesting thing about this beer is that it is a compilation of three different breweries: Stone, Nøgne-Ø and Jolly Pumpkin. I could imagine that the logistics of creating this beer was a bit of a pain-in-the ass since the companies are spread throughout the world (Norway, Michigan and San Diego).

On thing I initially noticed is that this beer is fairly carbonated, not to the point of soda but it is definitely not flat. It has a fairly sharp aftertaste but not like what you normally expect from a hoppy beer. I think the sharpness comes more from the caraway seeds but I can’t be 100% sure. This is a darker beer with a small almost non-exsistent head when poured. The beer is supposed to be packing a 9.0% ABV which is fairly strong but it doesn’t taste like a beer that strong or I am just getting used to these stronger beers . As the beer warms up the bitterness almost disappears and the spices become more prominent. Also, at the bottom of the cup you can see white sediment which I am assuming is the white sage. Overall I thought this beer was decent but I think you have to have specific tastes in order to like it.