St. Bernardus Christmas Ale

As January comes to a close and the weather outside slowly gets warmer (I definitely rocked shorts the other day), it brings us to a close of the winter beers. Now I know that there are plenty of more winter brews in the world and I only scratched the surface with my selection but I tried to cover some of the more likely beers that you will find in your local liquor stores. For our last winter beer session I'm going to go a little out of the box and go with a smaller brewery that you may or may not be able to find in your local store. The brewery in question is the St. Bernadus Brewery located in Belgium and produces a wide range of different beers and the one that we'll be looking at is the St. Bernardus Christmas Ale. First off, the beer is not cheap costing around 11 dollars for a 750 ml bottle (about the size of your average wine bottle). The upside to the beer, before actually tasting the beer, is that the ABV of the beer is 10%, which is almost double that of a normal beer. The beer is a dark beer with a very strong and distinct flavor which leaves a lingering aftertaste in your palate. The beer has a strong fruit flavor to it which is dominated by the orange in it but at the same time the beer is very smooth and does not have a bitter taste that comes from beers with a lot of hops. The only downside to the beer is the lingering aftertaste that it leaves that sits on in the back of your throat. All in all, the beer is an above average winter beer that would definitely go really nice after hours while hanging out with a couple friends around the fireside. It is a beer I think beer lovers should definitely try and should get a chance to please but will not be every body's favorite.

Overall Score - 6.0

The next category of beers is up for grabs. I'm looking to do IPA's or maybe wheat beers, not sure yet, if you have any suggestions let me know.

BG

Harpoon Winter Warmer

Now that all of the winter holidays are over we can get back to the grindstone and drink some more beers. Now, we still have some more time before the winter season is over and all of the great winter seasonals (well at least most of them were great) are gone for another year. Now on this "episode" of the The Common Beer Lover were going to look at Harpoon Brewery's Winter Warmer, their winter seasonal. The brew has a nice ABV of 5.9% which, per usual, will keep you warm on these cold January nights. On the bottle, Harpoon sells the beer saying that the beer has a "flavor of cinnamon and nutmeg" making the beer "full-bodied, rich and a classic holiday treat." The beer has a great flavor with a number of different components that just work really well together. First, Harpoon wasn't lying when they said that they used cinnamon in the beer which you can really taste, but before you jump off the bandwagon they do I good job of taming the taste by adding just enough of bitterness which makes the beer very enjoyable to drink. The beer isn't too sweet where you feel like you can only have one or two before you need to stop nor is it too heavy where it fills you up. All in all, this beer hits the spot on all levels and is definitely a beer that you need to go out and try for yourself, one of my favorites of the winter.

Overall Score - 8.6

More beers on the way and I promise there are some microbrews coming.

BG