Naughty Or Spice Holiday Lager
Jack's Abby Brewing

 

This beer pours a clear, very a very mild haze, orange/tan body with a white head.

Nose is very interested. It really does smell like Christmas. You have all the normal pumpkin pie type spices, cinnamon, nutmeg, etc, but then there are also all these other floral spices. Cardamum and honey. Really one of the more impressive and unique holiday spice smells.

Taste is light bodied with an immediate bitterness and spice backbone. Very interesting, like right off the bat you get hit with an overload of bitterness that seems like a cross between hops and spice. There's a nice clean caramel malt backbone, but the spice bitterness really overpowers the malt. Ends with a lingering spice note.

Drinking this beer in February sort of misses the point. :-) But I gotta say, it's a great winter holiday beer. Not my favorite from Jack's Abby, but still a strong beer.

edit: Interesting side note I found out while chit chatting with the peeps at JA at the brewery. This beer was actually a blend of Jabby Brau and Copper Legend (the Octoberfest) with spice thrown in. How funny is that? :-)

Tap at BBC in Walpole. Wasn't sure what to label this as they don't have anything on their site, and I only see it classified as "winter lager".

Very light fizzy head as the beer is filled to the brim, crystal clear golden tan honey color.

Nose starts with spices, xmas spices, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg?, cardamom, ginger, some honey, then light sweet amber malts and hint of lager fruit, with just a touch of floral grassy hops.

Taste starts more malty, nice semi sweet crisp amber malts, hint of reddish malts, juicy malts as well. Then spices, again xmas, cinnamon, clove, cardamom, allspice, ginger, hint of orange peel, and even tingles with a spicy feel. It gets a bit pumpkin pie like spices. Light bready malt taste backs up the spices, before the hops kick in with a light earthy hop and hint grassy with light bitterness. A very light juicy crisp lager with hints of lager fruit. Finish comes a bit more bitter as the lingering spices and hops combine a bit as it dries, and hops turn a bit spicy. Bit sticky on the finish as well and not as crisp as I hoped.

Mouth is med to a bit lighter bodied, decent carb, but lacks the crisp finish and a bit sticky.

Overall nice, I'm not usually a huge spice beer fan but this one seems to do it well. The spices dominate but somehow don't overpower. light lager crispness, as well as malts and a bit of hops help the drinkabilty and keep the spices from running away with the beer.