Marin Quad

Brewed by Marin Brewing Company
Style: Abt/Quadrupel
Larkspur, California USA

Bottle (3 Liter)... O-Town Throwdown Part Deux... Pours a hazy, deep amber with a small, creamy, off-white head. The nose is acidic, yet malty and wafts caramel, vinous notes, funk and rawhide. Odd flavor of golden raisins and caramel. Sweet, but funky too. Full-bodied with a syrupy mouthfeel and controlled carbonation. Sweet, caramel finish. Thanks to FlacoAlto for shipping this out so quickly for the Throwdown!

Poured from a 3L bottle courtesy of Hopscotch. Pours a beautiful copper color with a small lacing head that clinged to the edge of the glass. Aroma was cnady sweet. Flavor fullon with the dark fruits and candy sugar and caramel.The alcohol had a smal presence.A nice sweet, slight alcohol finish.

Shared from a 3 Liter bottle. Pours red with huge clear bubbled forming sporadically on the surface. Sweet, caramely, rotten fruit aroma. Syrupy and a bit cloying in the smell. Very Barley-Wine like. Full-bodied, sweet, sugary taste with a lot of fruitiness. The taste is a little cloying as well. This is an interesting and unique quad but not really my thing.

Courtesy of Hopscotch. The aroma is a massive concentration of raisins, pumpernickel, fruitcake, brown sugar, spice and malt. Red tinted brown body with a diminishing, thumb thick, tan head. The fore tastes of raisin liquer, black breads, spice, pumpernickel, dark sugar laden fruit syrups, caramel and toffee with a hint of mild spices int he finish. This doesn’t really work as a Quad I suppose, but as a Belgian inspired strong Christmas Ale this would rock. Point blank it tastes very good if you like that sort of flavor profile and I’d love to have some of this again. One of the standouts, for me, of a night of very good beers. It actually reminded me a lot of a Madeira I have been drinking lately and would be a great alternative to a dessert wine.

From 3 L bottle courtesy hopscotch. Slightly cloudy ruby-brown color, disparate soapy head. Thick palate, low carbonation. Candy corn, caramel apple aroma, candied apricot. Fruity and sweet, in other words. Taste is all fruity-sweet fructose with not a whole lot of malt component to back it up. A decent quad, but it lacks the upper levels of complexity.

Courtesy hopscotch. Poured from a 3 liter bottle. Pours a slightly cloudy amber brown with no head. Very malty aroma, some caramel, dark fruits, apples, and raisins. Very, very sweet and malty flavor. Get a good dose of that caramel and brown sugar. Finish is very sweet on the lips. This reminds me more of a scotch ale then a quadrupel. Thanks for supplying this rare beer Eric!

Pours with a frothy, large bubbled, initially fat-one-finger thick, lightly ambered, tan colored head. The beer is a brilliantly clear, ruby, dark cranberry color. The aroma is somewhat light, but is definitely fruit and malt driven. I get notes of berries, raisins, caramel and lightly toasted biscuits. There is an underlying, lightly aged malt character here; at times I get notes of sherry, musty malt and perhaps a hint of damp cardboard. The aroma is surprisingly fruity and the Belgian yeast character is quite muted as this beer smells quite clean.

Thick and rich, this beer has a jam like flavor to it that is a mix of strawberry jam and a blueberry jam; this jam quality is really an interesting combination of flavors that I have not really experienced in a beer so strongly before. Very clean, with barely any funky yeast notes. I am actually quite surprised by how clean this beer is; it has a really clean, sugary sweet malt character to it that one would expect from a clean American yeast strain. Toasty, malty, biscuit-like, caramelized, crusty whole-grain bread flavors mix towards the middle and finish of this beer to add a bit of complexity.

Despite the fact that this does not seem quite Quad like in its flavors, I am definitely enjoying this beer. I really like the jam-like flavors here, it makes its seem dessert like, which at this point is quite appropriate as my last drink of the night. I will say that the flavors are a bit too simplistic, I really prefer my Belgian Quads to be much more complex and yeast driven than this. This really hides the alcohol quite well. This is actually still quite good, despite the age, and I think that the 3 liter bottle format really helps with this.

On tap at the 10th Annual San Diego Strong Ale Festival: Pours a clear dark copper with a thin, wispy-lacing off-white head. One-dimensional aroma of sweet caramely candy malt with a hint of Belgian yeast. Body starts sweet and sugary with a slightly doughy caramel sugar cookie flavor and some Belgian yeast. Could use some more balance and complexity.