Ukulele
The Bruery Terreux

 

Here's a beer I thought I would hate but didn't. Somehow this beer has a worse rating than Melange 11. Consumed Jan 3, 2016.

Pours a mundane ruddy brown with beige head 1/4". The aroma was all over the place, but it was an interesting journey at least. Ginger, bourbon, chili pepper, tea, brown malt, vanilla, caramel.

Good woody peppery and slightly sour intro to the first few sips. This is interesting. I don't hate it. The heat from the peppers is just right. Hides the alcohol amazingly well, I was outright shocked to see that the abv is so high here, but you don't get that sense from the mouth feel. When the passion fruit comes out as it warms, I was left almost dumbfounded at the mish mash evolution of this.

I don't think I'd want to drink 25+ ounces of this at one time, but its quite the thought provoking beer that lends itself to sharing and discussion alongside lots of food. Its like a beer Dogfish Head would make, but Bruery would make good.

 

A: Poured into a snifter to a ruddy brown topped by a dense two finger light tan head which fades quickly to a collar around the edge of the glass. They say to pour this one into a rocks glass or tumbler and I just can't.
S: Smells of passionfruit with some ginger, chili peppers, and bourbon barrel notes with a little caramel and vanilla
T: Taste is sweet passionfruit and ginger up front with some caramel and vanilla. Hints of oak as well but the ginger and ghist peppers come in hard toward the end. Still somewhat fruity though. Swallow is warming chili peppers, ginger and passionfruit with a little bit of caramel and vanilla.
M: This beer has a thick and syrupy feel on the palate. Carbonation is slightly prickly but as I drink more it's harder to distinguish between prickly carbonation and pepper heat. Swallow is a little drying but there's still a lot of residual sugars.
O: Overall there's just too much going on with this. It's interesting and it tastes good but I feel like it's just trying to do too much. The peppers are definitely stronger as I drink more of this which will make it a challenge to finish instead of the high abv.

Brew appears brown in color with a khaki head.

It smells kinda like cranberry meets ginger with a sort of tang and booze mixture.

It tastes of fruity ginger and almost like cedar with tang and lingering peppery burn.

Medium in body with modest carbonation. Not as terrible as I was expecting but not something id want to drink more than 5oz of either.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Probably one of the worst beers I've ever had in my life. No idea what the bell the Bruery was going for here. Tastes like hot, spicy, boozy sour wine that someone dumped a bunch of rotten ginger into. Awful. Domed the bottle just to see if I could. I did, but it wasn't pleasant to say the least. I regret everything.

 

I'm not sure what this is supposed to be, other than a hot mess (I know it's supposed to be a cocktail beer). It looks like V8 out of the bottle, smells like boozy Tabasco, and tastes like 3 different beers at once. Starts off with a promising fruity, sour taste, but that quickly gives way to a ton of bourbon and chili notes. The chili hangs around for about a minute after a sip.

For fun, I combined it with one of my coffee stout homebrews. It made it drinkable, otherwise it would have been a drain pour.

 

 

 

750mL bottle acquired through The Bruery's Society. Bottled 9/15/15. Served in a Bruery snifter.

Pours a ruby tinted tea brown with a two and a half finger cap of parchment hued head. The loose froth rather quickly crackles away, leaving a large amoeba like center haze and wide uneven collar. No lacing.

The initial aroma is an almost sickly sweet passion fruit Jolly Rancher which opens up to include ginger ale, peppers, faint spoiling produce and intermittent barrel notes.

After what seemed a promising opening, something goes terribly wrong with the flavor. Abrasive, vegital, sugar-soaked ginger, overripe passion fruit, overly hot yet somehow unflavorful bourbon, fetid old peppers, stale hay and a whisper of sour blonde ale. There are several things going on but my palate doesn't latch onto any of them- either it can't or, more likely, it won't just out of abject refusal.

Syrupy thick feel with understated carbonation. Luckily the medicinal, rotting wood and old produce finish fades quickly.

Yikes. Ukulele is just another example of a brew I'll have to agree to disagree with The Bruery over. It looks pretty good, smells interesting and has a body I could enjoy but my palate just does not find this is fit for human consumption.