Niagara Falls Eisbock

Formerly brewed at Niagara Falls Brewing (Moosehead)
Style: Eisbock
Brampton, Canada

750 ml bottle, 2006 vintage, shared with StompBrockmore - pours reddish brown, nice white head. Subtle sweet aroma of caramel and some dark fruit. Flavour is a bit of a let down, everything that the aroma promises is there, yes, but just sort of bland. Yeasty and fruity, but toned way down. Fairly light body. I was expecting great things based on the package/bottle, but I’m an idiot who is continually tricked, and I always forget the old adage, "never judge a book by its cover". Supposed to age well, but I’ll never know because I likely won’t be buying this again.

750 ml 2006 vintage. Clear copper with a thin beige head. Aroma is very subtle, mainly malt, cherries and brown sugar. Taste is pretty sweet, alcohol seems less than 8%, some dark fruits and brown sugar.

750ml bottle, 2006 vintage, shared with VeloVampire - pours a deep copper, with a decent off-white head. Aroma is lightly hopped with sweet malt in dominance. Brown sugar, dark cherries, and some light caramel. Quite pleasant, and promising. However, the flavour doesn’t live up to this, and seems quite thin as a result. You get a bit of that dark fruit, but could be much more robust. The alcohol is hidden quite well but otherwise there is only a subdued earthy, peppery, slightly bready flavour, and this needs quite a bit more body to be fully satisfying. Too light and too thin. The initial bready and malty aroma promised something extra, but in the end, this is average.

Some interesting malty and mineral flavors. When fresh an acceptable quencher but not terribly concentrated or serious given all the brou-ha. Still worth trying very fresh.

750-ml. bottle and 2004 vintage, courtesy of Clark! Translucent reddish-gold in color with a dusty protocol for the head and sandblasted lacing on the sides of the glass. Aroma encourages with brown-sugared golden raisins, brandy-soaked prunes, unsalted pecans, mulled apple spicing, and a smoothness that joins pepper, vanilla and cedar together. Flavor is quite light. Thinning, separated flavor gives us some buttery toffee and diluted caramel. Some nutella accents over oaty whole wheat bread. Pepper and nutmeg are there, but barely so, and apple wood gives it a tiny boost at best. There’s some palate smacking bock traits, but something (stylistically) is terribly wrong. Way too diluted base, leading into caramel, brown oat bread and apple butter over bran flakes unceremoniously closing with a mild, stale pepper ring.

2005 Vintage: Poured a clear amber color with a thin almost white head. Aroma was vegetal. It smelled like old wet lettuce. Ugh. Malty flavor a touch of fruit and some bitterness on the semi-dry finish. Just glad it didn’t taste like it smelled. Pretty disapointed.

2005 Tan thick head over a red brown rusty clear filtered pour. Somewhat skunky hops scent. Slightly watery but of nuts, but of bitter hops. Taste much better then the scent. Some caramel in there too. Lowish carbonation and a dry finish.

Beautiful amber/copper body with light carbonation and a nice off-white foamy head. Pleasant and complex fruity aroma (raisin, dark cherries, apple, orange) with various notes of toffee, barley, brown sugar and spices. Taste is unfortunately dominated by sweetness and a strong presence of alcohol that makes all the nuances barely detectable. It ends on a long and warming bittersweet finish. Decent winter beer, but I would not have two of them in a row.