Es Chi
Marin Brewing Company

This herbal ESB pours a very unique slightly orange, light brown color and is somewhat opaque and fairly carbonated due to the live yeast. It is surprisingly malty and sweet smelling with caramel and toasted bread notes. The initial taste is kind of light, but towards the end and in the aftertaste all the flavor hits you and it’s actually quite a heavy finish. There is a strange combination of caramel, burnt bread, earthiness, orange, and some licorice flavors with a pretty good hop profile, though not as much as many ESBs, that imparts a dry, bitter coffee flavor. This is kind of a weird beer. I usually like a heavy beer, but the flavors here definitely aren’t Zen, they are a little cloying and really stick to your tongue. This is not at all what I was expecting based on the description (I don’t really get a lot of herbal character) and although this isn’t a terrible beer I really think it missed the mark that it was aiming for.