Julebryg 2010
Amager Bryghus

I drank a 2008 vintage of this in 2012 and it held up well.
Very fruity aroma, first malt flavors and a little fruit from the yeast followed by an intense chocolate.
Pours deep dark brown with a thin tan film of a cap.
Palate: Malt, yeasty fruit, fig, then a burst of chocolate that endures through a long lingering aftertaste.
Moderate carbonation, medium full body, creamy.

 

Let me start off by saying that, while I may not have pegged it as an American Brown, it was a little tough to pinpoint a style. Thanks to Bobby (Alembician) for giving me access to one I might not otherwise have tried.

It is brown, pretty much a mahogany red-brown blend in color. A bit of tan head showed moderate retention before fading to a foam that left some spotty lacing here and there.
The nose is foremost sweet and boozy. A bit of nuttiness comes out off of a candied sugar sort of sweetness and alcohol maintains a strong presence. There's a grainy backbone and a bit of a darker sweetness like a subtle bittersweet chocolate underneath. A little complexity is lost in the booziness, though.
The taste is similarly alcoholic and sweet, with a like candied sugar sweetness as in the nose accompanied by the same bittersweet chocolate reminiscence along with aa strong boozy alcohol over a touch of nut, wood and earth.
The feel is very light and a bit spritzed; it seems the alcohol, along with a dew other contributing factors, really serves to thin this beer out. Smoothness is lost and crispness is apparent up front but fades off.

The nights are closing in here in Australia, and although datewise it's completely the wrong time of year for this brew, the chill in the air suggested that a Christmas beer was a good idea. This bottle was purchased as part of an order from Slowbeer in Melbourne.

It pours a very pleasant deep red-brown colour, with a relatively frothy head of beige foam that doesn't retain as much as it could. Some lacing. Body looks reasonably solid, but it doesn't trap the carbonation, or look particularly gelatinous. Not a bad look though. The colour, in particular, it very nice.

Nose is deep, grainy and subtly sweet, with dark cacao and spice cake coming through. Quite an earthy bent to it, with some leaf mould and woody notes, and a touch of clay. Nice.

Tasty is rather woody and nutty, giving some raw shelled almond characters, with a lightly roasted backbone. Finish has a lightly astringent bitterness to it, almost a touch of spicy aniseed. Feel is a little thin; I think just a touch more body, and a touch more sweetness would really make this great.

Not a bad drop all up, but a little thin after a while, and the astringent characters started to get a bit too pronounced after drinking more than a little of it.

But it warmed me up nicely, and that was the point, anyway.