Breckenridge 471 Small Batch Extra ESB

Brewed by Breckenridge Brewery
Style: Premium Bitter/ESB
Denver, Colorado USA

Draught at Capones. Thanks to Steve for sharing this one. hazy brown body with thin head. Aroma is faint malt, sweet. Flavor is of sweet malt, light hops and a light mouthfeel. Very smooth. A good American version of an ESB.

Pours a reddish brown with a firm white cap. The nose offers a slight floral hoppiness offset by a load of caramel and cookie malt. Chewy body. Lots of earthy and bitter chocolate notes here. Finishes nicely hoppy with a blast of citrus and pine. Good, not great.

on tap @ Capones. Hazy Amber in color. Aroma is caramel, toffee, and floral hops. Taste is malty with caramel, toffee, with a nice dose of floral hops and moderate bittering finish. pretty well done.

On tap. Poured a deeper amber/copper color with a smaller sized off white head. Aromas of citrus, caramel, and floral. Tastes of caramel, citrus, toffee, and some pine. Nice an hoppy!

A dark clean copper color with a medium off white head. Aroma is malts, spices, light clove, ripened fruits. Flavor is quite bitter. Mild smokey malts, bitter hops, spices, and fruits. Finish is very dry.

Pours a dark red/slightly brown, with an off-white head. Aroma is on the fruity side with some caramel and toffee under all the cherries, plums and dates. Taste follows the nose pretty much exactly, with a little more earthy bitter flavors, but the dark fruit tastes become a bit much. Finishes bitter with some lingering grapefruit and flavors and something like bitter pears. Good texture and feel to this beer though. It’s not hot that I can notice, but the flavor is more like a 1.5 ESB than a double, because to me it shares more with Fullers than a double ESB would. Pretty decent, but there’s a couple too many oddities.

Bottle. Head is initially average sized, frothy, off-white, mostly lasting. Body is clear medium to dark amber. Aroma is lightly to moderately malty (toasted grain, caramel, husks), lightly to moderately hoppy (grapefruit), lightly yeasty (dough), with a note of black tea. Flavor is moderately sweet, lightly acidic, lightly to moderately bitter. Finish is lightly sweet, lightly to moderately acidic, moderately to heavily bitter. Medium body, watery texture, lively carbonation, lightly to moderately alcoholic. It sure doesn’t seem like 7.8% wrt the mouthfeel and richness...it’s surprisingly underwhelming (thin and watery for its size). Rather rough/clumsy (grainy and yeasty, kind of raw) in the nose, but otherwise decent. More than ample bitterness, but the thin body and lack of malt richness makes that aspect a bit stark and unpleasant. All in all pretty good for Breck but in the grand scheme of things a pretty average brew.

Poured an amber color with a large, off white head that left nice lacing on the glass. Aroma of floral hops, citrus fruits, toffee, toasted malts, a bit of caramel, and some grapefruit. Taste of caramel, more toffee, grass, some bread, withn citrus, piney resin, grass, and a moderately bitter finish.