Wedgehead Kolsch
Smugglers' Trail Caskworks

Clear gold color. Poured a medium head that took about 1.5 minutes to drop down to a skiff. Medium flow of medium-small bubbles from the bottom of the glass. Left a small patch of lacing.

First smells of light malt, followed by some vegetal hops, and finally some yeast. After a couple of minutes there was also a light barnyard. Swirling the glass kicked up a stronger barnyard.

Slightly sweet with medium bitters that taste much stronger than the listed 25 IBU. The bitters taste more like they are coming from something like knapweed (along with other knapweed flavors) rather than hops, although a light hop floral and a bitter orange peel shows up after holding it in my mouth for a while. The aftertaste is a quick burst of bitter orange joined with some barnyard. Then it fades down to more knapweed bitters.

Light tongue tingling. Light foaming. Slightly oily and left a bit of a sticky feeling.

There are some interesting flavors in there, like the bitter orange peel, that typically don't show up in a Kölsch. However the excessive bitters and the knapweed taste left me not wanting more. I can't imagine that the knapweed was intentional - something must have contaminated the batch.