Tasting Notes: New Glarus Fat Squirrel

Appearance: Pours an opaque, hazelnut brown, with a thin head, which leaves nice lacing, but dissipates from the beer fairly quickly.

Aroma:  Malty, bready.

Mouthfeel: Pretty light for a brown ale, and very effervescent carbonation feeling.

Flavors: Coffee, bread, almonds, hazelnut.  Pretty balance between the coffee, the malty/bready notes, and the nutty flavors.  Finishes with a crisp hoppiness, and a lingering hint of coffee.

Overall:  Pretty balanced beer, and not as heavy or full bodied as one might expect from a brown ale.  The bottle-conditioned effervescence give it a lightness on the palate which make this a great beer for even a hot summer day.  All the flavors one would expect from a nut brown, without the heaviness that usually keeps me drinking these only in the winter.

Tasting Notes: Monk's Cafe Flanders Red Ale

Appearance:  Pours a dark, opaque red-brown.  Very large, very airy light brown head, which lingers and gets more frothy/foamy.

Aroma: Tart cherry, a little bit of butter.

Mouthfeel: Pretty light bodied, although lingers a bit on the roof of the mouth.

Flavors: Cherry, only mildly sour, a little bit of butter/creaminess.  Finishes with a very strong metallic, iron note.

Overall:  Decent Flanders red.  Not as mouth-puckeringly sour as some, but also not overly sweet.   A little creaminess/butter from lactic acid, and pretty drinkable for a sour.  Overall, not my favorite example of the style, but a good, balanced, drinkable sour.