Long Trail Harvest Ale

Brewed by Long Trail Brewery
Style: Amber Ale
Bridgewater Corners, Vermont USA

Bottle, from Julio’s. Bottle 08/18/05. Good nose, sweet. Nutty, berries, apple, caramel, Little wheat bread, gummy. Clean ( as clean as a beer can get) reddish orange color, small head hat faded quickly. Sweet bitter flavors, like aromas, though a peppery/gingery thing add some zip. Medium body, creamy mouthfeel, bitter finish, pepper thing lingers. Nice easy drinkin amber.

Pours amber with a thin off white head. Smells peppery and malty. Taste is spicey with some citrus notes. Tastes like a weaker version of Double Bag.

This is rapidly becoming one of my favorite American brewers. Dark amber color, small tan head. Malty spicy nose with quite a bit of malt in the palate. A bit of hops to balance it.

Bottle from Lou18. Deep amber in color and clear. Fairly small white head forms, fades quickly and leaves decent lacing. Light to medium bodied, watery at times. Caramel and toffee aroma. Flavor is malt dominant with just a bare hop bitterness at the finish for balance. Run of the mill amber.

This amber brew smells like your typical marzen, but tastes of toasted malts with yeasty cloudiness. Not much head to it. Not a bad brew altogether, but not one I’d go out of my way to try again.

Light brown and orange color. Poured with minimal head. Aroma of yeast and hop. Technically an ale this drank like a weak attempt at a dry Marzen. Had the malty flavor but tasted flat and dry. Mouthfeel was week and uninteresting. Take a pass on this one, too many other good Autumn brews to chose from.

Bottled on 8/18/2005 consumed 9/6/2005. A true amber ale in color. A tinge of very light strawberry-auburn on the edges. Light beige-cream-colored head is one-finger high and there are a few spots of lacing. Lots of bubbles, force carbonated no doubt and very clear. Aroma of berry skins, fruit and nuts. Like a chewy granola bar. Fruity, papery and hard flavored crystal malts. Fruitiness from the yeast, I suppose, and some decent 2-row flavor, but just that good ole’ filtered mouthfeel. Unsubstantial and very quickly finishing. Dry, no real sweet malt and in the at respect, at least it’s not overly sweet. But craft beers shouldnt be filtered and force carbonated. We are trying to move away from BMC, not towards. You heard it from me first ;)

A formidable effort by a brewery that is proving itself formidable. I’m in NJ and have only seen Long Trail pretty recently, but I’ve been pretty impressed thus far. A nice amber, good bit of hops, great color, nice flavor and mouthfeel. Nothing really stands out about this beer, but the overall effect is very good.