Picked up a bottle of this at Green’s on Buford on a Friday morning beer run and then went to the Brick Store the same afternoon to find (to my great surprise) that they still had it on tap there too. Combined review of the two experiences.
On tap this looked great! Had a golden orange body and was served in the specific glass for the beer which is a thing of beauty itself. In the bottle at home I poured it into a Tucher Weizen 500 mL glass and it was brown! Seriously brown like dirty water or iced tea brown. Not very attractive. Both servings had good heads and decent lace. That’s where the differences ended, both serving types resembled one another in all other ways.
Caramelized bananas greet the nose. Nice. A little alcohol too, this is promising. Tastes start with some clove and banana and then this kind of dries up and takes on a whole load of American IPA characteristics – aggressive hops, bittering and somewhat unbalanced. Hefe up front, DIPA in the back. Alcohol is poorly hidden and a little burning to be honest.
I dunno, to me this is an uncomfortable marriage that doesn’t really work. It’s not a bad beer (looked good on draught, much less attractive in the bottle), but the unbalanced hops and very prevelant alcohol both take away from the beer and reduce the drinkability for me. Draught better than bottle. I won’t bother again – great looking glass though!