Trois Dames Winter Sour: 6.5 – The ginger and orange is certainly a factor in there, but there is so much tart sour and bitterness. A winter beer should be toasty and inviting, or conversely invigorating – this is an attack dog to your face. Sure there is a bit of spice as well here – which one could use to pass it off as a winter beer, but really this is just too powerful and in multiple ways isn’t pleasant.
Price Average: $7 draft
Website: https://www.sheltonbrothers.com
Oxbow Noel: 6.5 – So when the tags for ‘Oxbow’, ‘Dark Saison’, and ‘Christmas’ pop up – well it certainly piques our interest, but we’d ask you to hold back hype. Oh, of course, this is still a great beer, and we’d expect nothing less from Oxbow at this point. It feels a little porter like, and the small amount of sweet and spice here is enough to make it Christmas-y without being a heavy nutmeg/cinnamon affair. However, it’s overall just a pretty good dark saison and not a true ‘gift’ to the world.
Price Average: $8 draft
Website: https://oxbowbeer.com/
Contee: 3.5 – Along with Schwazbier if we asked brewers to make more of a certain style – it would be Kolsch. We say this to frame the context of this being a poor outing as a great tragedy for us. There is an orange citrus flavor here that overrides so much of the beer you can barely even tell the style, just orange + ale is all you get.
Price Average: $13 for 4-pack
Website: https://www.definitivebrewing.com/
The Mad Elf: 5.5 – Has a bit of an ESB style beer to it, but it’s overall a very unique Christmas style ale – leaning heavily on the cinnamon and clove and other spices. The bit of cherry to this is what makes it a little more than just a pure xmas spice beer – though it still suffers from the fate of really only wanting like 1 of these a season.
Price Average: $18 for 6-pack
Website: https://troegs.com/
DDH Light Speed: 6.0 – That bit of citrus really helps a lot here because this is one hoppy bastard. It thankfully leaves with an aftertaste of said orange citrus in your nostrils, but ther overall bitterness from the double dry hopping is a step too far from it being great.
Price Average: $14 for 4-pack cans
Website: https://www.tgbrews.com/
Green Zebra: 6.0 – It’s overall a nice sour and while it’s got some juice, some tart, and overall good flavor with nothing too crazy going on; it lacks a distinctive character to the sour. It tastes like it’s been blended or even watered down a bit too much.
Price Average: $10 for 6-pack cans
Website: https://foundersbrewing.com
Dragons & YumYums: 6.5 – A few things to note before reviewing. Yes that collab is with the band, and this is a pale ale brewed with a combination of dragon fruit, yumberry, passionfruit, pear juice, and black carrot juice. Which coupled with the art implies that a lot is going on; however, and this is critical – this is NOT a sour.
There is a whiff of bitter, but overall it’s just over the top tropical. With that combo of ingredients and the color of the beer you’d expect it, but it’s truly a sour w/o the sour and just a nice pale ale stuffed with tropical fruit. It’s complex and delicious, and has a theme song?
Price Average: $14 for 6-pack
Website: https://www.dogfish.com/
White Oak: 3.0 – The bourbon barrel aging really has made this a sad excuse for a beer ruining what was good. Overall that sweetness just makes it bad, and any amount of spice or hops or flavor is just overpowered and ruined..
Price Average: $15
Website: https://www.thebruery.com/
Domaine Dupage: 6.0 – It’s not really a sort of highly spiced sort of beer, really more like some toasted carmel mixed with hops. The result is actually kinda nice, and makes for a great fall sort of beer that isn’t going to be a more complex fest beer.
Price Average: $2.50
Website: http://twobrothersbrewing.com/
A Tiny Beautiful Something: 6.0 – It was slightly worrying given Maine brewing companies proclivity for hoppier beers.However while this is as usual for them on the hoppier side for a pale ale it’s not a step too far, but is close to an APA. Given that it’s a mostly standard and forgettable beer.
Price Average: $9
Website: https://www.mainebeercompany.com/