Top of the Hill Big Bertha Brown

Brewed by Top of the Hill Restaurant & Brewery
Style: Brown Ale
Chapel Hill, North Carolina USA

Yikes! Not sure what was going on here, but this was a light/medium brown pour without much head. Didn’t taste much like a brown ale. Sweet, metallic, somewhat malty, but generally not so good. Earthy in a not good way.

Dark brown pour with medium tan head. Aroma of toasted malts and some caramel. Light sweetness and slight bitterness in the flavor. Looks and tastes like a brown ale, so a decent effort.

Dark brown pour with a creamy tan head and lace. Toasted malt aroma with a hint of caramel. Semi sweet with very light bitter. Creamy mouthfeel and decent carbonation. Very nice brown ale.

on tap-pours a tan head and mahogany color. Aroma is medium malt, musty/earthy hops. Taste is grainy/medium malt-caramel/chocolate, musty/earthy hops, some yeast. The highlight of our stop here was getting to share some time with emacgee! Nice meeting you Ethan and good trades too.

On tap at the brewery. Pours a clear copper. Managed to coax a fizzy light tan head. The nose was sweet, malty, leafy, hop character, subdued and one dimensional. The flavor is toasty, nutty, crisp, mild neutral hop bitterness, sweet earthy malt, caramel. Mild bitterness with some residual sweetness on the mouthfeel.

Had this on tap at the brewpub. Dark brown color with thin head. Aroma was faint brown sugar and roasted malt. Slightyl malty without being sweet. Hint of roasty flavor without much in the way of hop flavor or bitterness. Pretty much what you would expect from a brown ale. Decent but not sexy.

Deep copper color with minimal head. Aroma of some caramel malt and toffee. Tastes roasty malty with some caramel, toffee, and brown sugar hints. Medium to light on the palate.

Draught. Appearance, ironically, is this beers best quality. A nice reddish brown with a thin off-white head that produced some decent lacing. Aroma was sweet and one-dimensional with no hop at all. Flavor was also sweet caramel and toffee with little to no hop flavor or bitterness present. Very Coke-ish and almost void of beer characteristics. Dissipointing.