Winters Bourbon Cask Ale

12 oz bottle via goldtwins (thanks!). Pours a clear dark amber with a large beige head. Nose is malty with some vanila and a hint of wood. Taste is somewhat sweet...some vanilla, some toasted grains, some mellow earthy hops. Thin mouthfeel, watery light bodied, high carbonation.

This beer had an amber color with minimal white head and it smelled like straight up vanilla. It tastes like vanilla all the way through and is overly sweet. The after taste is a slightly bitter vanilla flavor. Overall it’s not bad for a A-B product.

This beer suckered me in because I was doing "last call" at a local store. That night I would have rated it huge because my palate was wrecked. After all is said and done I think that if you blind tasted some one on this then gave them the same beer and then let them know that it was AB you would get 2 very different ratings.

I bought a 6 pack and was looking forward to trying. I didn’t notice the brewer until after I tasted how bad it was. I poured out the other 5 bottles.

With a name like this, if it were from a reputable microbrewer I would be disappointed - but it was actually much better than I expected from A-B. Lots of vanilla flavor, not much else - drinkable but not great. I rated this a little higher than it probably deserves because I feel it is a step in the right direction by A-B towards more adventurous beers.

12 oz. bottle. This beer pours a nice amber color with a decent amount of head. The aroma is an over the top vanilla extract that really turns it up as you attempt to drink this swill. I had to basically chug this beer to get all 12 oz down. Horrible, avoid this one.

bottle - Who bottles a beer and calls it a "cask ale"? Name notwithstanding, I gave this one a try. It was on sale at the bar. First, it pours amber with a thin head. Then there’s the aroma, or rather there isn’t. The aroma is barely there. I just smell a little vanilla. The flavor is very much dominated by the vanilla. There’s some caramel malt in there and I can’t even taste the bourbon that the name indicates is there. The taste is overly bland and the palate is on the thin side. The finish is sweet. It’s not terrible, but this beer really makes me wonder what the thought process at A-B is. I know they have or have had some good brewers there. No really, Stone Brewing hired one away from A-B last year. There must be some ability there. So what happens? Does the brewer make a decent craft beer, but then the execs get a hold of it and say things like, "well, this is alright, but what it really needs is more water!" and "Not bad, but there’s just too much flavor here!" Meh.

12 oz bottle from Woodmans on Gammon Road in Madison, WI (December 2006), consumed at a bit above fridge temperature from a Fitgers pint glass. Jolly what! I say, here are the fine gents at A Busch and sons, ltd, trying their hands at a fine olde English brew! Cheery Charles Dickens and tiny tim and a fine pint by the fire and all that. Well let’s see how this measures up, I must say I’ve got my knickers all twisted over this one! It’s a dull maple colour in the glass with a light bit of puffy head that dies away quickly, and it’s awfully bloody clear, hmm are they putting me on? Something about this makes me think that maybe this didn’t luxuriate in a fine English oak cask for months at a time....well, on to appraise the aroma: well, there’s sodding little vanilla in here, and precious little of anything else, maybe a few buttery toast points but thass about it....perhaps the flavour? well, the vanilla comes out here, plain as my white English arse, but it’s so godawful sweet and syrupy and hit-you-o’er-the-head-with-a-cricket-bat that you can’t taste anything else, except p’raps a bit of sour woody dryness at the finish. You can’t fool me, mates, this is bloody awful and I wants my ’alf a crown back!