Atlantic Mount Desert Island Ginger

Brewed by Atlantic Brewing Company
Style: Spice/Herb/Vegetable
Bar Harbor, Maine USA

The aroma has fruit, wheat malt, alcohol, spices, cooked vegetables, and some hops. The appearance is amber/gold with a small head. There are lots of little chunks in it. The flavor is like the aroma but astringent with malt and very little ginger. The palate is thin. Not what I was expecting but interesting even if it’s not really that good.

It debarks from the 12 ounce brown bottle a nebulous amber with a modest white head that is spumous in texture, the lace a thin slip to cover the glass. Nose is sweet, hints of ginger, and to me a cinnamon like aroma also present, nice to sniff at any rate, start is quite sweet, nice malt presence, top is moderate in feel. Finish has a nice benign acidity, the hops understated but pleasing to the palate, the aftertaste sweet and dry, a real nice summertime beer, and one that would sell well in arid-zona.

The aroma was somewhat a cross between ginger and sulfides (like in dandruff shampoos). Hazy wheatish gold with flocculent yeast and suspended particulates. Mild ginger flavor makes for a very mellow beer -- while I didn’t like it as well as some other ginger beers, it has some subtlety without being overly complex. A bit of nutty sweetness. Hopping is muted. Medium to medium light body is pithy enough. Finish is fairly quick, except for the residual spice and sulfides. This would be a good one to try with oriental food.

My Sam Adams patriot collection box came with two root beers and no ginger, so I’m drinking this to make up for it. I love a good ginger all (non-alcoholic, soda kinda), but this just isn’t working at all for me. The ginger flavor is light but noticable, but unfortunately it is sitting on top of a miserable american wheat that is way too husky, dry, and dead. In all honesty, if I wasn’t told this has ginger in it, I doubt I’d actually notice. The crappy wheat is just too strong. I wouldn’t call it particularly light, either, even though they refer to it as such.

Cloudy orange body with a small off-white head. Aroma of light wheat, with a hint of ginger. Grainy flavor, some ginger kick and a dry ending.

Bottle: Aroma of ginger and grass. Pours a hazy orange with a minimal soapyl off-white head. Flavor is very grassy up front with a moderate, but slightly watery, ginger finish. Wheat characteristics don’t really come thru. Mediocre at best.

From bottle. Smells only of fresh cut ginger root. Sweet but mostly very spicy and sharp. Light malt undertones and no hops. Dull golden clear with slight haze, topped with creamy off-white lacing head. Medium watery body with medium carbonation. Starts out tasting just like a dry ginger ale, then like a beer flavored strongly with ginger. Lots of ginger root in there, with light malt sweetness. Dregs make it a bit smoother and cloudier, but doesn’t change the taste too much.

12oz bottle. Aroma of spicey ginger and sweet. Dark golden body with thin head that went flat quickly. Chalky sweet spice flavor with some malty sweetener in the mix. Spicey cough syrup aftertaste left on palate. Need a glass of water.