Schlafly Winter ESB

I don't know about you, but ESBs are one of the hottest trends in craft beer right now, from what I've seen. It seems that most craft brewers -- whether they are nanobreweries or dominating the regional market -- are putting out an ESB or have one in the works. If you're not familiar with the style, ESB stands for Extra Special Bitter. It's a very balanced brew, with neither the hops nor the malts stealing the limelight from the other. And, contrary to its name, it's also not overly bitter.

So, this particular one is from Schlafly, one of my favorite St. Louis breweries. They're not distributing to Ohio yet, although they are soon tripling their capacity, so this may be something we can get here in the future. We picked this up on the summer trip to Peoria, and on the first night of fall, with a definite autumnal chill in the air tonight, it seemed like a great pairing for the evening.

This pours a medium copper color, with some strange sediment floating throughout the glass and a slight chill haze. There was a finger or so of off-white head that dissipated fairly quickly. The aroma is orange and bready notes, with perhaps some peach and caramel floating in there as well. The flavor is peaches, water, and then a vague bread note and some earthy bitterness at the very end. The body is fairly light, and the sediment is not noticed in the mouth. Carbonation on this is average.

It's a little more watery than I expected or enjoy. I'm not as thrilled with this as I have been with most of Schlafly's other offerings. It has great reviews on BeerAdvocate and RateBeer, but it's far from my favorite ESB.

3.8/5 caps

-Jennie

We were just discussing the trends of different styles. I've heard people talking that the Hoppy trend will eventually end, that the trend has hit the peak and another style will come in and take a hold of the market. I hope this day never comes, as I am clearly a fan of the hops (to where my next tattoo will most likely be a hop, or the Gonzo Fist).

I start this while pondering what will happen in the Walking Dead graphic novel (yes, I'm just now getting around to reading them) while I stare at this copper-toned sample. Orange, caramel, bread and almost olive aromas. Olive? Yeah, that's what I'm picking up. Bizarre. The flavor is, as my partner-in-crime mentioned, peaches up front, then wateriness, bready/dough-like tones with some decent hop bitterness at the end. Yeah, I got the same flavor characteristics as Jennie did. Lighter bodied, slightly dry finish with a light stickiness left on the palate.

4/5 caps

-Nathan-