A very good friend of mine recently bought a house in Florida, and, on a whim, he decided to bring me some beer. This isn't the first time this particular friend has brought me beer, but it has been some time, and I am forever grateful. He was the one that introduced me to my first barrel aged beer. That experience did not go as well as one might have hoped, but it certainly led to some very good things down the line. Also, he is a SCUBA diver, and he thought this would be on brand.
This imperial red ale is, indeed, red. It produces a respectable amount of head before that head boils down to a thin layer of splotchy bubbles that completely covers the top of the beer. These bubbles are particularly small, and that is unusual for a regular red ale. There's very little lacing going on while the familiar smell of caramel malt wafts up from the glass with a respectable tincture of hops drizzled atop it. There was a time when red ales were a go-to for me. I am remembering what I liked about them.First sip is nice and respectable. It comes in sweet, and it goes out dry. That sweet beginning reminds me of all of the other red ales I've had before, but that end is entirely imperial in its nature. It is somewhat stoic as a finish, but the bitterness from the hops gives it a certain lightness that the otherwise unapproachable dryness would be lost without. Instead, it is a solid sip that's well-balanced.
Tip-in is sweet caramel malt over moderate carbonation burn with a little bit of pine seeping in. The middle becomes floral in the nose as the caramel malt moves forward and turns from sweet to somewhat dry before the finish comes to make things suitably bitter and dry with a floral and pine wake behind them.
Bottom Line: That's a decent beer.
3.0/5