22 oz bottle form Hop City, Atlanta, GA, USA.
Let me say right off the top that I love sweeter beers and beers that are malt based, BUT….this is a disaster in terms of sweetness and taste.
The look is strong. A really nice clarity to the orange amber body and surprisingly good head, retention and lace considering the style. Rather well carbonated as well and a decent mouthfeel.
The nose reveals a solvent like, paint-stripper, alcoholic assault which does not bode well. Sinus clearing and NOT in a good, hop-ridden resionous way, more of a rubbing alcohol way. Nasty.
Given the nose, I was expecting a horrible alcoholic rip of the senses. Actually that did not materialize but a malt soaked, totally sugar drenched, completely unbalanced detergent like flavor DID. Uuuggghhh….even my well developed sweeter liking palate could not cope with this. Awful. As well as the crushing sweetness we get a weird, soap-like astringent bitterness which is probably the hop content trying desperately to get out of the bottle and escape death by sugar!
I found this close to impossible to drink and 3/4 of the bottle went down the drain. It’s giving me a headache just thinking about it. Terrible in terms of the tastes, nose and drinkability (the most important factors). Wow, and not in a good way. Reminiscent of a badly brewed barleywine.