-
Stop lurking! Log in to search, post in our forums, review beers, see fewer ads, and more. — Todd, Founder of BeerAdvocate
Spruce Almighty
Alley Kat Brewing Company
- From:
- Alley Kat Brewing Company
- Alberta, Canada
- Style:
- Herb and Spice Beer
- ABV:
- 5.2%
- Score:
- Needs more ratings
- Avg:
- 3.89 | pDev: 6.17%
- Reviews:
- 1
- Ratings:
- Status:
- Retired
- Rated:
- Aug 28, 2016
- Added:
- Jun 28, 2016
- Wants:
- 0
- Gots:
- 0
No description / notes.
Recent ratings and reviews.
Reviewed by biboergosum from Canada (AB)
3.89/5 rDev 0%
look: 4 | smell: 3.75 | taste: 3.75 | feel: 4 | overall: 4.25
3.89/5 rDev 0%
look: 4 | smell: 3.75 | taste: 3.75 | feel: 4 | overall: 4.25
650ml bottle, the first in line of Alley Kat's new 'Back Alley Brews' series, wherein they allow their brewer(s?) to do whatever it is that pleases them. Here, that apparently means that they went into Edmonton's river valley and plucked a near metric shit-ton of local spruce tips, to make this particular spruce beer. Neat-o! And great punny pop culture reference in the name, BTB!
This beer pours a mostly clear, medium golden amber colour, with three fingers of puffy, rocky, and somewhat creamy off-white head, which leaves some layered splotchy and sudsy lace around the glass as it lazily recedes.
It smells of gritty and bready caramel malt, mixed conifer tree notes (pine, spruce, and sap), a subtle muddled citrus pith astringency, ethereal yeasty notes, and more leafy, weedy, and floral green hop bitters. The taste is bready and doughy pale malt, a lesser grainy caramel sweetness, some ephemeral yeasty notes, a weakening lemon and orange peel-led citrus edginess, and more consistent, if laid-back sprucey and piney green forest floor detritus.
The carbonation is quite active in its probing and otherwise sassy frothiness, the body a decent middleweight, and more or less smooth, with a wee airy creaminess taking stage as things move away from those fridge temperatures. It finishes off-dry, the base house malt not about to cave in just yet, as per usual, with a now at least perceptible acrid green spruce needle thing sort of both assaulting and caressing my tongue - that's a good thing, right?
Overall, this is a brew that, between its marketing hype, and its actual execution, pretty much works out flawlessly (but is still not godlike, unfortunately). I'm getting a minorly scaled-back Full Moon Pale Ale character under the relatively benign spruced-up greenness, and that's a-ok - it only makes for a pleasantly drinkable version of this (typically northern) pale ale sub-style. Go on and seek it out before it's gone, is all I can further declare.
Jun 28, 2016This beer pours a mostly clear, medium golden amber colour, with three fingers of puffy, rocky, and somewhat creamy off-white head, which leaves some layered splotchy and sudsy lace around the glass as it lazily recedes.
It smells of gritty and bready caramel malt, mixed conifer tree notes (pine, spruce, and sap), a subtle muddled citrus pith astringency, ethereal yeasty notes, and more leafy, weedy, and floral green hop bitters. The taste is bready and doughy pale malt, a lesser grainy caramel sweetness, some ephemeral yeasty notes, a weakening lemon and orange peel-led citrus edginess, and more consistent, if laid-back sprucey and piney green forest floor detritus.
The carbonation is quite active in its probing and otherwise sassy frothiness, the body a decent middleweight, and more or less smooth, with a wee airy creaminess taking stage as things move away from those fridge temperatures. It finishes off-dry, the base house malt not about to cave in just yet, as per usual, with a now at least perceptible acrid green spruce needle thing sort of both assaulting and caressing my tongue - that's a good thing, right?
Overall, this is a brew that, between its marketing hype, and its actual execution, pretty much works out flawlessly (but is still not godlike, unfortunately). I'm getting a minorly scaled-back Full Moon Pale Ale character under the relatively benign spruced-up greenness, and that's a-ok - it only makes for a pleasantly drinkable version of this (typically northern) pale ale sub-style. Go on and seek it out before it's gone, is all I can further declare.
Spruce Almighty from Alley Kat Brewing Company
Beer rating:
3.89 out of
5 with
4 ratings
We love reviews (150 characters or more)! Check out: How to Review a Beer. You don't need to get fancy. Drop some thoughts on the beer's attributes (look, smell, taste, feel) plus your overall impression. Something that backs up your rating and helps others. Thanks!