Empyrean Winter Ale

On tap at the Crescent Moon. Pours a dark brown color with a rich beige head that fails to retain its substance. Aroma is slightly roasted, but mostly caramel toffee-like. Slight bit of a chocolate smell. Flavor is a little bland. Plenty of malt sweetness, but no hop balance or spices that otherwise project an identity.

Cask. Cask seems mismanaged...beer is completely opaque, muddy pour on this brown beer...tan head. Actually seems a bit cold for a cask beer. Very little flavor...maybe due to the yeasty pour...reminds me of nitro Guinness: bland, creamy flat beer. Having it side by side with the regular tap version shows that likely the cask was mismanaged...there is some flavor in it, and it is certainly colder than the cask beer at this point...bits of toffee, carmel, a bit of coco puffs or tootsie roll...no hop prescence to speak of, but a decent malt background...doesn’t strike me as a winter warmer...maybe just a winter beer in the likes of winterhook and breckenridge...sort of boring but somewhat malty beer. overall, a yawn. Numbers are for tap version, cask version was not as good.