Capital Island Wheat

Brewed by Capital Brewery
Style: Wheat Ale
Middleton, Wisconsin USA

Hazy lemon-yellow with a large, white head that is mostly diminishing. Nice lacing, leaving coral pattern on the glass. Aroma of wheat and lemon zest. Honey, grains, and lemon with a sweet wheat aftertaste. Highly carbonated, pretty distracting. Can’t believe I found this in a can in Wisconsin!

Island Wheat is decent for a wheat, but it’s not my preferred style. They always seem to leave me with a headache, and Island Wheat thus far has been the worst offender. However, it’s good enough that I put up with some setbacks when I’m looking for an enjoyable beer. The nose is beery (that is, quite malty and grainy). The taste is very light compared to Leinenkugel’s Sunset Wheat. If I didn’t get a headache every time, I would say it’s drinkability is very high. Hardly any aftertaste or filling feeling in the stomach. All in all, it’s ok.

More carbonated than usual. Very strong, malty aroma. The flavor, in contrast, is much lighter. The wheat flavor definitely is present, though. Moderate palate, not too harsh. I consider this to be a good, inoffensive wheat beer, but I’ve prefered other wheat beers in the past.

Bottle. Hazy light brown color with a decent head. Pretty vague aroma of grassy hops, hard to pick out much else. Flavor is pretty mild too, a bit of wheat and citrus. This wasn’t bad just pretty nondescript for a wheat beer.

This poured a very slightly hazed golden body with a modest white head. The aroma is somewhat yeasty, soap-like, with soft wheat, a suggestion of lemon, and some mild spices. It’s quite creamy and soft in the mouth. The flavor’s honey-sweetened wheat with a small bit of lemon tartness and light spicing. Pretty decent brew for Summer months.

<font size=-4>Thanks to my esteemed The LoSBD colleague <a href=http://www.ratebeer.com/ViewUser.asp?UserID=1 size=-1>

They were doing a promotion with this beer in Madison at the State Street Bar, and I got a free t-shirt and key chain, but it was really unimpressive. The aroma had hints of dirty socks but little dimensionality along the usual lines of spice and citrus. The flavor was little different, with perceptions of sweet and sour amid a slightly fluffy palate. Hazy, light yellow. Perhaps a bottle with a Duvel glass might help propel the aroma and flavor out, but there was nothing here worth promoting. (on tap at State Street bar, Madison, WI)

Pour a hazy light brown with good head and some lacing. Aroma was a mixture of things and I really didn’t pick anything out. Taste was much better than most wheat beers I’ve had.

This is a decent brew, unlike most of the other Capital Brewery brews which are usually very heavy and dark this one is about as light as they come for summer. The aroma is mildly spicey of some lemon and some sweet honey wheat. The head is a light hazy white, what the beer lacks though is any form of complexity or diversity on the palate. What it smells and looks like is what it tastes like. Leave the seasonal to Leinie’s ;)