Double Milkshake IPA - Pumpkin Spice Latte
Tired Hands Brewing Company

 

Let's face it - I love Starbucks. No, it's not the best coffee but we have tons around me here in Jersey, I've spent a ton of time in them over the years, and like beer, my taste has been enhanced from everything I've been able to have there. Good beer makes me taste coffee better and good cof-er, coffee there has enhanced my beer experience here at home as well! When I saw this, I wanted to trade for it and see if it was like what I was used to having from there every September - sugar and all. No, this wasn't the best from Tired Hands but it *did* resemble my seasonal favorite from America's coffee house while still remaining a beer at it's essence...

This beer looked like the other Milkshake beers when I poured it out - cloudy, golden, and topped off with plenty of foamy suds that complemented the liquid nicely. A good amount of lacing was left behind with much of it along the back portion of the middle of my pint glass. Loads of pumpkin, vanilla, and whip cream in the nose with some cinnamon, chocolate powder, and cinnamon in the mix as well. Plenty of malt in the body although it was hard to feel the oats in particular, but this was hefty enough to balance out the sugary sweetness that could have overpowered everything else that was going on here. Some pumpkin pie came through in the back as the vanilla and lactose kept this from feeling grainy or crusty.

Hard to believe that there was any alcohol in this as this felt like a dessert come to liquid life. Yes, the booze is here but with such a different and somewhat odd flavor profile, that ended up in the background. Canned on 10/14/17 with YO BRO written underneath it, there was very little sediment at the bottom of my glass as this was slick and lush in spite of it's age. I enjoyed this but the lingering sweetness kept me from wanting another. One of these in a while would be a welcome change from my usual fare!

 

 

pours out a beautiful hazed juice color with a dense and fluffy bright white head. on aroma and palate its just straight up bizarre, but still interesting in some sense. tastes like the spice mix from a psl was dumped into a lactose IPA... getting cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, pumpkin, creamy vanilla notes, some green hoppy character that clashes with the psl profile that in my opinion would probably work better in a sout.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From the Only Void release day. Poured from a can into my Tired Hands pint glass.

L: Typical Milkshake appearance. Cloudy and murky medium golden color with hints of orange. Two finger white head that leaves some lacing.

S: Hmmm. I'm getting some spices, but they are more clovey and allspice in nature rather than cinnamon and nutmeg. Some hints of vanilla sweetness and slight pumpkin.

T: I expected this to be more of a Tired Hands version of Pumking, but there just isn't the cinnamon, nutmeg or graham cracker I was expecting or the overall pumpkin pie flavors. Instead the flavors are heavy with nutmeg, allspice, some slight eggnog (latte?) and a flavor that is remniscient of pumpkin, but not pumpkin pie. Sweetness is heavy as is the alcohol as the vanilla shines through to mix with the pumpkin flavor. Finish dries out a little bit and leaves a heavy clove flavor with some pretty hefty alcohol. I expected way more pumpkin pie flavors as I said before and got very little. Wow, this could have been so much better, it could have been kick ass.

F: On the sweeter side, no bitterness, still pretty smooth and a decent dose of alcohol.

O: So bummed, this had so much potential. Traditional pumpkin pie flavors in a Milkshake beer? Wow, could have been a home run. Instead I got a clove bomb that didn't really didn't particularly care for. This is safe to say, by far my least favorite Milkshake hands down. Oh well, I guess a miss is allowed every now and again.

 

 

 

 

Pours typical to any Tired Hands milkshake. Sludgy, bright golden up to the light, nice carbonation. Smells more IPA and earthy than spicy. Sadly the flavor does not follow the nose. Spices are far too overpowering. Burnt allspice and cloves in the back of the throat. A proper mixture of cinnamon, nutmeg and cardamom would have worked nicely with the layers of vanilla and coffee, but the spices chosen were all wrong. This one just doesn't do it for me and was poorly executed. Very difficult to finish.

Disappointed.