Local Grind
Empire Brewing Company

 

 

Pours light copper with a 1/4" tan head, which fades to a wisp. Light lacing.

Aroma is strong coffee, roast malt, slight smoke.

Taste is coffee, caramel, roast malt.

Thin body, light carbonation. Dry finish with lingering coffee aftertaste.

An ok beer but, seems a bit thin for a Scotch Ale.

 

Despite what this page says, this beer is most definitely not retired (the ink on the bottom of my can is smudged a bit, but there's a very clear "21" at the end of the date so it was brewed this year - or very late last year), nor is the brewery itself "closed". Also, my can reads 6.5% ABV, so their recipe has apparently undergone some transformation. Anyway...

Pour looks like a honeyed-whiskey with a few bits of "stuff" floating about. Could be yeast, could be coffee bean particles. Dunno. Head quickly thins out with minimal fanfare. Smell is crazy coffee; like, even before you stick your nose to it. Smells like opening a fresh bag of whole beans. And... that's really all I get. A little one note, but that one note is admittedly pleasant. Taste... oh lordy. Tastes like one of my french press "infusion" experiments that I invariably let steep too long. That stuff can go sideways in a hurry, especially with coffee beans. And it tastes like that is exactly what happened here. It's not quite as overwhelming as the one I had a few weeks back so it's fading a bit, but this is still almost ALL coffee, with maybe just a hint of your average AAL poking around the margins. Mouthfeel is aggressively carbonated which does not suit the proceedings. Man, this may just need more time for the coffee to mellow, but as it stands, this is not a good beer. If they just soaked this beer on coffee beans, they need to maybe re-think their approach as the coffee flavor is far too intense. Also, soften that mouthfeel a bit. 16 ounces of this may be about 10 too many.

EDIT 9/4/22
I let one of these sit for a year and a half to see what would happen and I'm sad to report that it's still almost ALL coffee. There's a decent sweetness up front, but the back end is all roasted beans. Finishes incredibly dry. Not the most fun thing in the world to drink. If they had marketed this as a hard coffee instead of a scotch ale it'd be a much easier pill to swallow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Strange sour taste didn't really match my expectations. Used to founders backwoods and dirty bastard, other scotch ales........was expecting more along those lines. Very thin body, but the initial taste just doesn't do it for me

 

Pours dark brown. Short, foamy, off white head that fades quickly to a ring.

Smells caramel malt, coffee and grounds, earthy and toasted malt.

Right off the start is a fruity Tang followed quickly by coffee grounds, roasted malts, light fruit and hint of chocolate finish is dry with an earthy linger. Lighter body and fizzy medium carbonation

A bit sour overall for my taste. Not bad, but not a great scotch ale.

On tap at New York Wine and Culinary Center in Canandaigua, NY.

This one pours a pretty dark mocha brown, with a small white head, and a good bit of lacing.

Smells like caramel, nutty coffee, dark fruit, and toffee.

The coffee character on this one is suprisingly really quite nice, it's nutty and mildly chocolatey. It does kind of bury the scotch ale base, I'm not really able to clearly tell much of the character of the base. I do get some nice caramel and fruitiness, though.

This is medium bodied, and pretty creamy, with a good level of carbonation.

I have not traditionally been all that impressed with Empire in the past, but this is surprisingly pretty nice.

 

A scotch ale brewed with coffee. Sounded interesting enough for a happy hour pour.

Dark for the style. Looks like a thin stout. Smells mostly of coffee but a zippy bockyness comes to the fore as it warms.

Tastes like an okay scotch ale mixed with an okay coffee stout. The flavors don't clash but they never really compliment each other.

Hints of coffe are excellent. Kind of flat and not as complex. Still a very enjoyable beer