Wallops Island
Rocket Frog Brewing Company

09/03/21 on bottom of can, smudged. Poured into a Samuel Adams Perfect Pint.

A: Dark brown with 1-finger frothy dark beige head with decent retention and a healthy ring of lacing.

S: Strong roast, medium caramel, and coffee with soft rum raisin

T: Amazing depth of flavor with elements of black coffee, espresso, mocha, medium caramel, toffee, and roast malt, all balanced and combining beautifully. Moderate bitterness with some pine hop character provides further countering of sweetness from the caramel. Very soft slightly fruity yeast esters.

M: Smooth and medium-bodied with lowish carbonation and slight sharpness from the roast in the aftertaste.

O: Rocket Frog Wallops Island is really an amazing American brown ale with exciting depth and complexity of flavor and aroma.

Pint at Pub For the People Reston, VA

First off, like how the can gives away the beer coloring , to a tee. Deep copper that goes to a softer brown in the light. Aggressive pour yielded a modest head. Real quiet brew.

Mild caramel, toffee malt in the front, oat and barley presence that would almost suggest its an oatmeal brown. Some coffee I suppose, but nothing that stands out. Very smooth and, to me, the low carbonation always the subtle flavors to shine. Some burnt malty flavors linger along with some noticeable hop bitterness.

A wonderful American brown. Will be revisiting this often.

Can:
Cracking the can, I didn't get a *pfft* of gas, so I feared it might be flat. However, halfway through the pour, the foam started to spread across the rising liquid. Said liquid is quite a dark brown, while the head is a light tan/beige. Surprising given my initial fear, the head is lasting and creamy and supplies fairly nice lacing.

The nose is nutty and toasty, right in line with expectations from the style. A solid medium toast has a bitter nut companion. Further inspection leads me to believe the American hops are driving the bitterness more than any husky malt influence. The beer is a bit bitter from the get go. I know American browns are more bitterly hopped than English browns, but I do like to get some malt from my browns. This beer doesn't really showcase them much.

A weak but bitter coffee opening that starts turning piney before mid-taste. The hops control things from start to finish. Appropriately fairly light in heft and thin in feel, there's a lively effervescence as well. The boldness of the hops does challenge the palate a bit. Warmth brings a little burnt nut to the coffee flavors, but the piney hops remain in the game.

So, in a few ways, I can see why this has won awards. However, being more of a fan of English brown ales, having this one squarely in the American category with less focus on the malt makes it not as much a winner for me, personally.

 

 

Poured from the can into a nonic pint glass.

Deep hued and beaming dark mahogany with excellent edge of ruby red along the sides of the glass. Light khaki forming head, with a fluffy three finger tall top. It settles down to a thin puck nice and lightly. Very excellent body color presented.

Absolutely solid brown ale killer nose. Large expressive and diverse flavors on the nose. Slight brown bread crust, milk chocolate, and wonderful nutty flavors abound. Hints almost a creamy hazelnut sweet as well to match.

The beer is knocked down mostly on first sip because of mouthfeel. There's a bit of lacking body, that is almost flat mineral water like in feel, but also in aftertaste. However, some of the flavors still transpire, with a rich nutty quality, but still a very mineral and steely like finish. Excellent milky and chocolate like malt flavor transpires nicely, with minimal toast.

There's a real exceptional beer lurking in here, but even with some minor faults, there is a lot to enjoy.

 

Poured from a chilled can into a pint glass.
L: Pours a nice brown color with a very small white/tan head that dissipates quickly to a very small lacing around the glass. when exposed to light the beer has a amber color.

S: sweetness, caramel, some freshly ground coffee, some acrid notes of pine

T: Dark Chocolate, some caramel up front with a nuttiness coming through (possibly coffee notes). Bitterness hits on the back end: pine, anise and kind of herbal notes.

F: Carbonation is good, could it use a little more? Maybe.


O: Is 23 IBU but feels to me likes it's higher. Normally that would be fine in most IPA, APA or even some other beers, but it kind of takes away from some of the maltiness that I expect from some Brown Ales. I bought a 4 pack of this beer an plan to finish all of them and in the modern age of pro-bitter beers, this should be a good one for most fans of craft beer, but I wish the hop profile was slightly more muted for my tastes.