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Santa Cruz Mountain Amber Ale

Santa Cruz Mountain Amber Ale - Amber Ale

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 Percentile 
26
overall
Brewed by Santa Cruz Mountain Brewing
Style: Amber Ale

Santa Cruz, California USA

bottling
unknown

on tap
unknown

distribution
unknown

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 Ratings  Average  Score  ABV  Style Pctl  Serve in 
292.76/5.02.76/5.05.4%23.1English pint, Shaker
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Commercial Description:
Our Amber is an all grain, close fermented, lightly hopped, handcrafted ale. We steep and sparge the freshly milled grain, in a slow and deliberate process using both a mash tun and a lauter tun, before pumping it over to our kettle. Once in the kettle, we bring it slowly to a boil and add hops in incremental stages, for bittering, aroma and flavor. While in the kettle, the wort must be carefully attended too as it threatens to boil over. After the boil is complete and all of the hops have been added, the beer is slowly cooled through a water chilled cooler and brought to a perfect temperature for pitching our yeast. After a period in closed fermentation, the ale is passed through a filter into a brightening tank where it awaits packaging. Nothing in our brewery is automated, ensuring that each step in the brewing process is hand crafted. We use a hand selected blend of organic malts with a primary base of Briess organic 2-row brewers malt. The Briess 2-row malt is known for it's smooth and mild qualities. We add top-secret amounts of caramel malts to give the ale a richer flavor and colour. The results are clear. Hops selecting in our recipe formulation is difficult since there are so many amazing organic hops to choose from. Again, we use a top-secret blend of organic whole hops in our Amber Ale but we favor an aromatic beer so we use an age old method of 'dry-hopping' - adding a final 'tea-bag' of organic Kent Goldings in the brightening stage. Organic Kent Goldings hops are grown in Belgium from the original rootstock and are known to be one of the finest hops in the world. Check the results for yourself! Stop in and try Santa Cruz Mountain Amber Ale for yourself. We have a tasting bar.
 Most Recent Top Raters Highest Ratings Who's Rated This?  
 Papsoe (14613), Frederiksberg, Denmark
2.8 Aroma Appearance Flavor Palate Overall
6/103/56/102/511/20
Jul 28, 2009  
On tap. Slightly hazy amber with an off-white head. Very discreet caramel notes in the nose. Medium body, sweetish roasted malt and caramel. Hardly any bitterness. 090709


 yespr (11613), Copenhagen O, Denmark
2.5 Aroma Appearance Flavor Palate Overall
5/103/55/103/59/20
Jul 24, 2009  
From tap at the brewpub. Pours almost clear and golden orange to amber with a small white head. Light toffeish aroma. Sweet caramel malty flavoured, vague butterish to the toffeish flavours. Ends roasted caramelish and sweet.


 ratman197 (3135), Arvada, Colorado, USA
2.3 Aroma Appearance Flavor Palate Overall
5/104/54/102/58/20
Jul 14, 2009  
Bomber poured a clear reddish amber with a lasting amber head. Aromas of carmel, butterscotch, earthiness and fruiottiness. Palate was light bodied and crisp with a thin sharp finish. Flavors of carmel, butterscotch and a strange fruittiness with a crisp thin sharp finish. This is the second beer(Dread Brown) in a row I’ve had from this brewery that’s had weird flavor profiles.


 Braudog (3732), Dayton, Ohio, USA
2.4 Aroma Appearance Flavor Palate Overall
4/103/55/102/510/20
Jul 9, 2009  
Draft at the brewery. OK, so here’s the deal with every beer I had here: buttery. Adjust the color and basic flavor component to match the beer otherwise, and that pretty much wraps it up. This had the overall character of caramel candy. (#3583, June 2009)


 hayduke (1616), Eureka, California, USA
1 Aroma Appearance Flavor Palate Overall
1/102/52/102/53/20
May 7, 2009  
This 22 oz bottle came from the local Eureka Natural Foods. I have been somewhat unimpressed with Santa Cruz Mountain beers so far but this was a new one so I decided to give it a try. Big mistake. It poured a cloudy orange to brown with almost no head and therefore no lacing. The nose of caramel and rotten fruit was quite unpleasant. The mouthfeel is totally flat and thin. The flavor is even worse than the aroma with all sorts of really odd nuances. I am not sure what is wrong here but this was undrinkable. I will rate it based on what I got and wait and see if maybe some future rater can explain things, but based on this bottle this should be avoided at all cost.


 chandler0201 (341), Durham, North Carolina, USA
3 Aroma Appearance Flavor Palate Overall
7/103/56/102/512/20
Mar 11, 2009  
Aromas of caramel, and some hops. Smooth finish but kind of flat in mouthfeel.


 illidurit (851), Santa Cruz, California, USA
2.5 Aroma Appearance Flavor Palate Overall
4/104/55/103/59/20
Feb 12, 2009  
On tap at the brewery tasting room. Brown amber color with a beige fluffy head. Aromas of caramel, bread crust, and slightly sour/rotting fruits. Flavor is similar. I don’t think this is a quality control problem, I just think it’s a by product of the fermentation of organic ingredients. I’ve had several organic beers from different breweries that have all had weird off-flavors. This is no exception. Mouthfeel is a bit flat and a bit thin.


 BillKismet (1894), Seattle, Washington, USA
2.6 Aroma Appearance Flavor Palate Overall
5/105/55/102/59/20
Nov 28, 2008  
Pours a good-looking orange-amber with fluffy tan head. Interesting aroma--fruity pungence that is hard to pin down. Prune juice and pineapple and Hawaian punch. Flavor is similarly interesting and complex, hard to decipher. Juicy fruit burst on the finish. Perhaps juniper and raspberry sourness on finish. Rather distasteful.



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