Brooklyn Monster Ale - Brooklyn Brewery

Pahn

New York

3.88/5  rDev +4.9%
look: 3.5 | smell: 4 | taste: 4 | feel: 4 | overall: 3.5

12oz bottle into Duvel tulip. 2009 vintage.

Appearance: Moderate pour yields 1/2 inch fizzy, off-white head, which quickly fades to a small ring around the glass. No lacing. Color is translucent amber.

Smell: Estery, reminiscent of a strong Belgian golden ale, like La Chouffe. Some faint caramel and toffee, as well as plum and maybe fig. Definite boozy character, which only gets stronger.

Taste: Mildly smokey sweet malt, again reminding me of a Belgian ale, with a burning alcohol ending. Pretty good balance all the way through. There's a small breadiness in the aftertaste, but it gets burned off by the alcohol (pops up occasionally, then recedes into the alcohol fire). Small plum note, and a very minor hop presence.

Mouthfeel: Creamy with a prickly carbonation, and a lot of alcohol warmth.

Drinkability: Well, it feels more alcoholic than the stated 10.1% ABV, but it's not bad. At the same time, given that this beer tastes like a mashup of a Belgian blond and an English barleywine, I think I'd sooner go for a more refined Belgian or a bigger barleywine with a deeper malt profile. Hard to find a place for this beer, but I wouldn't mind revisiting it in the future.

As stated above, Monster Ale, to me, tastes like mixing a Belgian pale/golden ale with an English barleywine. If you like both these styles (I do) and if you don't mind a noticeably high ABV beer (I don't), this isn't a problem, per se. The problem is just that it's a bit harsher and more garish than a good Belgian pale ale, and its malt character is a bit too one-note (or two-to-three note) for an English barley wine. Then again, the fruit notes are nice, the mouthfeel is very good, and nothing (except for maybe the somewhat oppressive alcohol) in the taste or smell fails at delivering goodness or balance.

Serving type: bottle

01-21-2010 00:26:19 | More by Pahn

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