Crooked River Original ESB

Formerly brewed at Crooked River Brewery (Snyder Intl)
Style: Premium Bitter/ESB
Frederick, Maryland USA

Cloudy copper color with a thin white head. Aroma was spicy and citrusy. Very dry. You could really taste the malts. Really good stuff.

Cloudy orange beer with thin white head. Citrusy aroma with pineapple and merengue aroma. Citrus flavour with firm bitterness mainly composed of the american variety. Dry. Rocks pretty much as an IPA

Thanks Pabobcat. Orange hue with small white head and some lace. Maltier aroma than expected, traditional, good hints of citrus and nuts, aromatic. The is smooth and soft, malts blended with a tone of bitter, clean aftertaste. Quite nice, too bad it may be no more.

Smells like...Hey, I don't smell anything!? (at least it ain't skunked). Anyway, it seemed like an IPA mixed with an oktoberfest to me. Maybe that's what it should be like - a good hop/malt mix. Pretty good stuff.

Pours a deep copper color, with a medium head. Sweetish malty aroma. Taste sweet malts, slightly roasty flavor with a beautiful esb style bitter end. Gentlemen, this beer costs 5.99 at the grocery store up the street, and to me that makes it one of the best values I've seen. This is simply an oustanding esb! I'm not even a great fan of the style and I think this beer is delicious.

I'm not especially impressed with other Crooked River products (save the fantastic dopplebock), and I'm always suspicious of high ratings on this site. But I tried this ESB long before ever coiming across this collection of beer drinkers, and I must say that the high ratings for this beer are no mistake. Nevermind that it is produced in fairly large batches and widely available. This is one of the finest ESBs you'll ever try. There may be better ones, but they are few and far between. Pretty in the glass, it is hoppy and nicely bitter, with a citrus touch. I love this beer with a nice steak or a juicy burger, as it is just robust enough to not be overshadowed by a hearty meal.

Amber color with small white head. Aroma is a pleasing blend of sweet malt and citrus hops. Flavor start out as nice sweet caramel malt, quickly transitions to a citrus taste and finishes with a dry pine-like hoppiness. A good beer!

Light amber color with a medium off white head. Aroma has a nice mixture of citrus hops and sweet malts. Flavor has the same nice blend of hops and malts, with the hops dominating nicely. Caramel very evident, a barley backbone, with a pretty significant dry bitterness in the finish. A very nice brew.