Quads & Rockers
Beau's All Natural Brewing Company

 

Pours deep brown almost black with a disappointinglt thin parchment coloured head. Aroma: sweet - treacle and raisins Flavour: adds caramel, dried fruit, dates and some alchohol heat. The finish is licorace and spice - clove? A little to the cloying side with not much balance against the sweet so the effect is s bit two dimensional. Good, really good, but does not compete with Belgian imports.

 

600 mL bottle from the LCBO; one of four included in the 2016 Best of Beau's pack, and the last of three that I still hadn't reviewed at the time of purchase. Bottled Oct 28 2016, served at cellar temperature, and poured into a goblet.

Pours a deep brownish-burgundy with ruby-red highlights; good clarity, with one finger of creamy-looking, beige-tinted head placed atop. It seeps away over the next five minutes or so, leaving behind a foamy, bubbly mat and decent-sized collar of similar composition. Fairly saccharine aroma; I'm getting lots of candi sugar and raisins, as well as dates, prunes, and a hint of vanilla. Somewhat herbal and moderately boozy, but at 10.5% I can't really hold that against it.

Rich and sweet; caramelized sugar and candi syrup sweetness are an unwavering, borderline cloying presence, but are not so intense so as to be seriously off-putting. Beyond that, it's dominated by dark fruit flavours - not unlike a fruitcake loaded up with dates, raisins and cherries, with subtler touches of cocoa, vanilla, and spicy rye bread. Earthier, herbal hop flavours rise to the surface in time for the finish; suggestions of anise/licorice and clove, with a boozy-sweet, gently spicy/yeasty aftertaste that gradually fades. Medium-full in body, with low carbonation levels that barely even register on the surface of the palate; this quad feels smooth and slick, but a little flatter than I prefer from this (often bottle-conditioned) style. A strong effort, as far as domestically-brewed quads go.

Final Grade: 3.83, a respectable B+. Quads & Rockers is a fairly smooth sipper, but I feel that it's lacking in depth compared to most of the imports - and I don't think there are any arguments out there that would convince me otherwise. A two-dimensional beer; the flavour profile is approachable, but fairly straightforward and leaning a little too strongly on the sugary sweetness and dark fruit elements for my tastes. One of the top 2 brews in this 4-pack - along with Dark Helmüt - but there's certainly room for improvement.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

600ml bottle (c'mon, where's the other 50ml?), part of the Best of Beau's mixed packs currently available around here. I assume that the name has something to do with motorcycle culture?

This beer pours a hazy, dark orange-tinged brown colour, with two fingers of puffy, loosely foamy, and bubbly beige head, which leaves a bit of rocky shoal lace around the glass as it quickly blows off.

It smells of bready and doughy caramel malt, gooey toffee squares, spicy Belgian yeast, some muddled dark orchard fruitiness, brown sugar syrup, and a tame earthy, leafy, and mildly perfumed floral noble hoppiness. The taste is fairly sweet, pastry-adjacent caramel/toffee malt, a still edgy Low Countries yeastiness, some cherry and plum fruity notes, a bit of indistinct earthy spiciness, demerara sugar, faint cocoa powder, subtle earthy mustiness, and more plain leafy, weedy, and floral hop bitters.

The carbonation is fairly tame in its barely supportive frothiness, the body a decent medium weight, and mostly smooth, with a small creamy nature evolving as things warm up a tad. It finishes off-dry, the caramel, fruit, and yeast essences lingering on into that good night.

Overall, this is an agreeable enough and approachable version of the style, with a rather well integrated 21-proof alcohol measure. Not the most complex iteration out there, but quite good for what it is, and that would be easily sliding down my waiting gullet.

 

 

600 ml bottle served just above fridge temperature into a tulip. Batch 5646 and bottled November 1, 2016.

Appearance - dark mahogany color bordering on black. A finger of tan head that recedes moderately quickly. Thin wisps of head on top. Not much lacing.

Smell - brown sugar, cherries, faint oat smell too. Cane sugar and some funky yeast. Very sweet to the nose.

Taste- big boozy with chocolate covered cherries. Some toasted brown sugar and loads of sugar cane. Rather sweet with a slightly ashy flavor to finish. Rather sweet on the whole.

Mouthfeel - smooth, good body, solid carbonation and a textured feel. Spot on.

Overall - a great addition to the winter tasters pack and a well crafted quad all around. A little too sweet for my liking but really solid quad. Certainly worth a try. Also a beer that continuously improves as it warms.

 

Excellent quaff. Excellent Quad!