Hazel Nut Brown Ale
The Merchant Ale House Restaurant & Brew Pub

 

Had this on tap at the Merchant Ale House in St Catharines. Pours a dark brown with very thin tan head, small amount of lacing. Smells really nice of roasted hazelnuts with very mild chocolate and some roasted malt. Quite a sweet flavour. Body is quite thin for the style. Overall, this is a pretty decent brown ale.

Merchant Ale House's new seasonal - Hazel Nut Brown Ale - is exactly what it sounds like. Thus making a review kind of a curious exercise. Sampled several pints of it on 2008/01/19. My guess is that, just like the Skull Crusher is more or less a mixture of the Old Time Hockey Ale and the Drunken Monkey Oatmeal Stout, the Hazel Nut Brown is a mixture of the Hockey Ale (and/or the Skullcrusher) with the addition of generous amounts of hazelnuts. Or, more accurately, hazelnut extract. 'Cause this baby overwhelms with the hazelnut flavour. One of the cooks likes to add a shot of creme de cacao to his pints - this should be a guide in terms of what to expect.

Appearance is rather uninteresting, but the place is pretty dark - somewhere between black, brown, and red. Hints of ruby. Less than a finger of head that wilts almost immediately (must have something to do with the extract content).

Smell is one-dimensional. But man that one-dimension is heavenly. Just hazelnuts, hazelnuts and more hazelnuts. So intense that it's obviously extract, but it still smells so wonderful I find myself not caring. If you've ever had Frangelico, you know know what the Merchant Ale House's Hazel Nut Brown smells like. Maybe some malt character behind that, a bit of woodiness, but hard to distinguish.

Taste is... strange. You get tons of the hazelnut, but it comes at you in such a way that it almost seems like the hazelnut is disassociated from the beer - as though the beer tastes like nothing, but you nevertheless taste hazelnut strictly because the smell is so strong. Fairly neutral; malty, I suppose, but no bitterness or anything like that. I honestly can't distinguish any taste beyond "hazel nut extract and vague hints or roasted malt." Cloying.

Mouthfeel is also strange. It's both watery and heavy at the same time, and kind of... oily, for lack of a better term. This pretty much has to be a result of the hazelnut extract, there's no other explanation. Carbonation levels are nice, however, but then the Merchant Ale House is good about that kind of thing.

Drinkability is... well, it's quite high, assuming you like the flavour of hazelnut. I had at least three pints of it. Sure it was one-dimensional, but it was interesting, and did nothing at all to strain my palate.

Unsure on my recommendation. Worth a shot, as most beers are... but man, this one screwed with my head.