Terrapin Thirty Strong

Brewed by Terrapin Beer Company
Style: American Strong Ale
Athens, Georgia USA

Date: April 11, 2009
Mode: Draft
Source: Brewery
Appearance: cloudy burnt orange, fine beige head
Aroma: sweet dark caramel aroma, touch of chocolate, spicy hops, light earthyness, growing oak
Flavor: rich malt flavor, rich dark caramel, nice chocolate, big oaky character, nice balancing earthyness without being hoppy, touch of vanilla, light herbal spicyness in the finish

Date: May 08, 2009
Mode: draft
Source: taco mac kennesaw
Score: 3.8 to 4.0
Aroma: light spicy oak aroma balanced by dark malts
Flavor: oak flavor dominates with the rich chocolate and caramel malts playing catch up, malty sweetness comes in a second wave to add richness and balance, touch of alcohol at the bottom of the pint glass

Date: May 11, 2009
Mode: cask
Source: taco mac va highlands
Words: fuggles dry hop
fuggles takes over the base beer with too much woodsy earthyness,

Date: May 11, 2009
Mode: cask
Source: taco mac va highlands
Words: pearl dry hop
picking up more of a sweet fruity character that does a good job complementing the base beer,

Date: October 04, 2009
Mode: draft
Source: taco mac kennesaw
still rich and oaky, not much change over five months, a rare treat to find a lost keg on tap,

Aroma: 7/10; Appearance: 7/10; Flavor: 8/10; Palate: 7/10; Overall: 17/20
Rating: 4/5.0
Drinkability: 8/10
Score: ***+/4

Initially sampled in delightfully copious amounts at the Terrapin Anniversary Party back on April 11th. Now, I’m enjoying it down at my local Taco mac in Kennesaw. Appearance: Obscured, brownish-amber body with a frothy, off-white head that yielded a nice coating of lace on the way down. Smell: The aroma presents an elaborate multitude of both malt and hop scents all bound up with a tidy bow of piquant oak wood. Each visit to the nose is a little bit different, at times it’s a bit spicy, sweet-scented, bready, or even earthy. Taste: All at once, a dizzying, complex array of malt flavors blitz past the tongue: some toasty, grainy, bready, caramel-coated, roasty, and, yes, there’s even the anticipated touch of spicy rye. Overall, there’s a fairly subdued sweetness. The addition of oak is noticeable, but certainly is not a stand out flavor -- heck, with so many ingredients and so much going on within the beer, none of them were. There’re plenty of various hop flavors to be found as well, some earthy, citrusy, fruity, and some even downright pithy. Medium-high bitterness. Farther down the 20 ounce mug, fruity hop tastes of tangerine and grapefruit began to shine through a bit more. Finishes dry, warming, and with a slight lingering spiciness. Mouthfeel: Medium-plus body, thankfully neither too thin nor grotesquely heavy. Medium carbonation. Drinkability: It was great fun watching various tasters at the anniversary party try to interpret and correctly decipher the 30 ingredients. I safely assumed "water" was included, sort of like the "FREE" square in Bingo. Also, I fully felt an inclusion of oak wood and rye was another safe bet as, well, Terrapin likes both the oak and rye. I recall hearing everything from maple to smoked malts to chamomile to honey (which, I’ll admit, I thought may have been included). Another interesting creation from Terrapin, and here’s to many more.

Rating #1900.:: Tap @ TacoMac. Terrapin’s offering to their 30th Birthday. 30 F’n ingredients!!! Cloudy, deep copper \ orange \ light brown color. Creamy almond colored head. Huge lacing down the length of the pint glass. Aroma is of everything in this world that is good. From honey to wood, caramel to straw, freshly milled malts, honey roasted malts, big citrus hops, some light grass. Light raisin and some apple, nice vanilla, and more honey. Flavor is a big predilection of sweetness. Big sweetness that some would call cloying. Superbly balanced. Nice hop. Calming bitterness with a hint of citrus essence and spice. Flavor is out of this world. It is beers like this that makes American Brewing #1 in the world. Full bodied. Smooth, sweet and creamy. Heavenly. This beer even finishes with a hint of Pinot Grigio fruitiness. Thank you, SPIKE!

Pours a hazy copper color with a tan head. Aroma is caramel, oak, vanilla, some crystal malt, and earthy hops. Flavor is chocolate, roast, caramel, toast, and a bitter citrus earthy finish.

On draft at ACBF09. Pours a cloudy orange/brown with a small head. Aroma of grassy hops and caramel malt. Flavor is quite sweet with lots of caramel and sweet malt. No hops in the flavor though. Hmm, I was let down by this one. 7/4/6/3/13 (3.3/5)

Draft at Taco Mac Highlands. Pretty interesting offering here. It took me a while to decipher and narrow down the individual flavors and aromas going on. This is a pretty complex one. Aroma at first was floral and sugary. It gave way to a raisin and fruit character and finished off with a bit of vanilla from the oak treatment I imagine. The flavor was dominated by vanilla and wood throughout which was a little one dimensional considering the kitchen sink method used to brew here. There is touch of caramel malt chewiness and a very faint bittering hop experience but not enough to get past the oak flavoring going on. It is almost too much going on to have any one element stand out in either the aroma or flavor. If anything the oak treatment/aging is reminiscient of other offerings from these guys and readily apparent here as well. There is plenty else going on too to keep you occupied in figuring out the 30 ingredients.

On tap at Taco Mac Metropolis. Happy Birthday! Pours a cloudy orangish brown with a soapy tan head that shows decent retention and lacing. I had to let the beer warm up a bit before I could smell anything, and when I did it wasn’t overpoweringly aromatic. There were hops up front but with tons of caramel malts and lots of different fruits that I couldn’t differentiate between. The spices became more evident as it warmed as well. The taste was a better and more powerful version of the nose. Where to start? There was an initial floral hop bitterness that almost immediately gave way to a wildly varying array of sweet fruits, caramel and vanilla sweetness and plenty of different spices. I’d be kidding myself if I said I could figure out half of the things I was tasting. I definitely do think I got some rye spiciness and some tobacco in the finish though. The mouthfeel is medium to full with a sticky thickness from both the sweet aspects and the hops in the flavor that lingers for a while. Well, I really think I need to sit down and have another glass of this one as I know it’s a good beer, but I had trouble getting a cohesive beer with all the things going on. That said, I really think it would come together extremely well over time...if only they had bottled it.

Draft at the Terrapin Brewery. Pours a cloudy brown with a tan head. Aroma of sweet honey, caramel, oak and malts. Lots of malts in the flavor. Full bodied with a ton of sweetness, honey, caramel, molasses, maple syrup and a ton of malt. Nice beer and thanks to the guys in Athens for making sure I got to taste it.