Coney Island Sword Swallower Steel Hop Lager

Single from Three Cellars Milwaukee. Nice easy hop and bitter taste. Smooth and very enjoyable.

Appearance: Pours a clear, effervescent, copper body with a thin, bubbly, white head. Smell: Citrusy, spicy nose laden with hops and lesser notes of pale malts, fresh dough, and light caramel sauce. Taste: Pale, caramel maltiness with a medium sweetness and a background hint of grain-packed bread. Juicy, oily tangerine taste. Peppery, spicy, citrusy hop character with a medium-high bitterness. Light touch of alcohol warmth. Long, bittersweet finish. Mouthfeel: Medium-bodied. Medium carbonation. Very slight stickiness to the mouthfeel. Drinkability: A classy, hopcentric lager, it paired rather nicely with a spicy pepperoni pizza and a few Tevo’d episodes of Cold Case. As part of the Coney Island series, it came in third for me after the Lager and Albino Python.

Medium, clear gold, creamy, long lasting white head, quite attractive. Aroma was a big shot of hops, mostly floral, but with quite a bit of spice and faint tropical notes. Lightly biscuity malts are dominated by another shock of hops, this time with some grapefruit notes mixing in with the floral and spice character. I think blind tasting, I would have picked this as an IPA without thinking about it. Not bad, but at one point while drinking it, I actually wondered if it might actually be too hoppy. Possibly the first time that thought has ever entered my mind.

Clear golden pour with nice carbonation streamers and a lasting, creamy white head. Aroma has some nice hoppy notes along with some bisquit/bread. Pilsnerish flavor, spice, herbal saaz notes and a really clean malt background, toasty and grainy. Alcohol is there but muted. Basically a nice, freshly hopped, strong lager with a clean and crisp finish. All around great brew. Surprised it’s rated so low...

(22oz bottle) Crystal clear apple juice body topped by large off-white head. Aroma is medium sweet, bread, some herbal, spice, light apple. Taste is medium sweet, herbal/pine, some bread, trace of alcohol. Pretty bitter. Medium body, light stickiness, fairly drinkable.

Bottle and served in standard pint glass: Clean golden hue with a nice frothy head and spotty lace. The aroma has notes of pale grains and slight toffee, herbal hops, some pear and grapefruit ester, and a hint of DMS. The taste is rather straight forward with mild bitters balanced by mild pale malts and a dash of sweetness. Nice hop spice character about the edges and finish which does add a level of depth to the palate and better than most of the genre. The mouth feel is also better than most, medium-bodied and carbonated. You cold do a lot worse than this beer, all in all it worked for a high end lager.

Tasted at the PP Bottle Shop with wetherel and Sean. Golden yellow color, heavily carbonated with a white head. Grainy lager aroma with some hops spice and a touch of light fruits. Quite sessionable.

Pours a transparent deep golden bronze with a thin, spotty-lacing white head. Aroma of lightly sweet pale malts and a nice, fresh assertive Saaz hop character. Starts with a nice light sweetness and good noble bittering and flavor hop balance before a crisp, smooth finish. A nicely-flavored, quite drinkable high-gravity lager.