The Brass Rail
White Oak Brewing

I'm sorry to be harsh, but this tastes like homebrew gone wrong. Smells like vomit and mulch. Like, not only wood chips, but that specific moldy wet mulch smell. Highly drinkable consistency. For me, typically I like to taste the toasty darker roast on the malted barley with a red ale. This beer's strange flavor (along with a slight bitterness without any of the delightful citric or pine-y facets of hop flavor, and literally zero aroma hops to my nose) overpowers all of the other flavors in the beer. I like IPAs, so it's not simply the presence of hops rubbing me the wrong way. There is a flavor I can't identify, but have tasted in homebrew before. It's a bit like plywood and something acrid (like, perhaps, vomit?) Maybe I got a bad batch? If this was homebrew, I would say, "Did they sanitize everything correctly?" No idea. Not the worst local beer I've tried (the worst was from C-U, not BloNo) but it's not a beer I would revisit for any reason.

Picked this up at Walmart in Lincoln, Illinois when I was out that way not too long ago. Lovely can design as this was the first brew that I ever saw from White Oak and it was a nice take on the style that checked off all of the proverbial boxes without breaking any new ground or being particularly notable.

This had a nice, dark amber hue to it that was a bit hazy and contained just a few bits of dark sediment that quietly stood out. Lots of uneven, tan head topped this off as the lacing left behind was quite unique. A thin ring stuck around at the top of my glass with deep, layered rings along the bottom half once I took my sips. A nice toasted, caramel, bready, and woody nut aroma filled the nose as there was some peat moss, chestnut, and dark fruit in the taste. Plenty full, softly sticky, and highly carbonated, this needed to be tweaked just a bit but was just fine and fun on it's own. All that was missing was just a stronger hop presence!

Not much alcohol here as I warmed up just a bit while drinking this, but could have easily cracked open my other remaining can once I finished this off. Dated Aug 10 with "WE DIDN'T START THE FIRE BUT A MEDAL WOULD" written above it, I wish I had this more fresh although it was still sufficient enough for this review. While much a Vienna Lager as an American Amber/Red Ale, there was lots to like here as this fit the bill of a nicely crafted, blue collar staple. Glad I get have one more of these here at the house!