Russian River Salvation

Brewed by Russian River Brewing
Style: Belgian Strong Ale
Santa Rosa, California USA

On tap at Brouwers. Pours a dark shade of brown with a nice lasting creamy head. The aroma is a nice combination of yeasty esters, dark malt roast and sweetness, and a pleasant spice. The flavor is similar with dark malts, dark fruit, and a slightly earthywoody hop character. A pleasant yeasty spice rounds it out. Light carbonation and a fantastic smooth creamy body.

Draft at Brouwer’s. Pours opaque, slightly grainy black with a dense, creamy, lasting tan head. The nose shows a mild tartness reminiscent of highly acidic coffee beans, though not the deep kiln-roast note that comes with every ready-to-grind coffee bean you’ve smelled. Some semi-neutral dusty or CO2-y note in there as well, probably the booze. Nice creamy body with very soft carb. Sweet black bread, tart coffee, dark nuts, and figs on the mid-palate. Mild black bread finish. Great effort.

Dark brown, dark fruits, roasted malts caramel, grain, yeasty, slight alcohol.

Batch 005 (if I can read my hand writing correctly). A great Belgian that went quite well with the steak I browned and caramalized onions. Pours with a rocky, off-white head covering a near black body. Aroma of rich bananas, raisins, and currants. Taste is quite solid wheat, banana, tobacco, belgian spices, raisins and dark fruits. Light carbonation, very good beer.

25.4 oz bottle, batch 002. Dark, burgundy brown with a thick, dense beige head. Nose is fig, dates, musty caramel and pineapple. Smooth and kind of milky with buzzy carb. Taste is raisin and woody apple with yeast and green blueberries. Nice combination of sweet, half-sour and bitter notes.

Thanks to Electic for this bottle, batch 002. Pours dark brown with a small light tan head. Aroma of cherries, sherry, wood, tobacco, raisins, dark fruits, definitely wears age well. tastes also of sherry, wood, a sort of oaky tartness, cherries, raisins, finishes with a strong wood flavor and blackberries (no, not the phone). Medium bodied, well carbonated, but it’s missing some creaminess in the texture that I’m assuming was once there. Pretty nice though, a very elegant beer.

Bottle, thx Omhper! Dark colour. Special B-malt in aroma. Lots of banana, fruit and candy-esters. Slight harshness (perhaps from a slight overuse of Special B?). Wow, so good!

750ml bottle batch 005. Poured a dark brown almost black with a thin beige head. Light lacing was left on the tulip. Aromas of dark fruits, cocoa dust and toasted malts. Flavor had tons of dark fruits and banana with some spice and Belgian yeast on the finish.