Smoky Mountain Rocky Top ESB

Brewed by Smoky Mountain Brewery & Restaurant
Style: Premium Bitter/ESB
Gatlinburg, Tennessee USA

I had this on tap at the brewpub in TN but didn’t take tasting notes beyond the numbers, unfortunately. I was there with my fiancee and she gets bored with my details.

This was a pretty nice ESB. Flavors of hops, caramel, malts, and caramalized sugar. Interesting note, which i can only describe as pool water, but in a good way. Long finish

Draft sample at KBJ08. Poured clear golden color with a medium frothy white head that mostly lasting with good lacing. Moderate sweet hoppy aroma. Medium body with soft carbonation. Medium balanced flavor with a moderate bitter finish of moderate duration. My expectations where met.

Draught. Clear golden coloured with a small white head. Fruity aroma of caramel and hops. Fruity flavour of caramel and hops with notes of liquorice. Hoppy finish.

Sampled at the 12th Annual Knoxville Brewer’s Jam. Very cloudy orange, light ring of white head. Smooth bready malts and very light hops in the aroma. Taste is yeasty, bready malt with nice pine hop flavor but little bitterness. Re-rate at the Pigeon Forge locations. Pours a cloudy copper-orange with a lasting off white foam. The aroma is caramel, apples, grassy hops. The taste is mostly the same, caramel, bready, fruit esters, and a decent grassy finish. Original rating 7:4:6:3:13

Cloudy, murky brown, no head. toasty, bready aromaHint of rye, maybe in the flavor, with a lot of toasty notes. Some hints of pine in the finish. Sampled at the 2008 Knoxville Brewer’s Jam

Draught at the brewpub. Pours a copper orange with off-white head. The aroma is herbacious hops and some toasty caramel. The flavor is herbal hoppiness, but it’s sort of awkward somehow. It then becomes harshly toasty, with some hints of caramel sweetness. It finishes with a burnt-toast bitterness and leaves a dry, mildly spicy aftertaste. This wasn’t all that great.

Draught. Pours a cloudy dark gold with a bubbly white head. Nose is floral, like daisies with suggestions of flour and light caramel. Body is on the lighter side of things. This is fairly hoppy, but not really that bitter or citric. Most of the brightness comes out in a floral note or something like water out of a rubber hose. A bit of nutmeg flavor was also noted. All around this is a light bodied easy to drink interpretation of a style I’m not a really big fan of. Nice to see something new though.