Hello beer lovers and welcome to another edition of the
NorCal Beer Blog's brew review.
Tonight’s featured beer is Stone Brewing Company Vertical
Epic 12.12.12.
Commercial description: “As with any good epic, herein lies
the promise of larger-than-life experiences, heroics, and twists and turns as
the adventure unfolds. This bottle-conditioned ale is chapter eleven. Now is
the time to enjoy it in a “vertical” tasting side by side with its ten Stone
Vertical Epic Ale brethren! Each one unique to its year of release. Each with
its own “twist & turn” in the plot line. Each one released one year, one
month and one day from the previous year’s edition. This year’s Stone Vertical
Epic Ale is the very last one. Yep, this is it. The final chapter. Or as they
say on the last slide in some old films: “Fin.” No worries though: this edition
is particularly well-suited for prolonging the experience, as it’s as
cellarable as any in the series, or more. In this, the final edition, you can
expect a perfectly balance *womp* of spices: cinnamon, ginger, allspice, sweet
orange peel, clove (only a little!) and rosehips, all in the context of a dark
Belgian style abbey-ish beer…but not as sweet. Dry even. Stone style. Thanks
for coming on this Epic Stone-style journey with us! You can rest assured there
will be new adventures to come…”
Let’s get started!
Appearance: Pours jet black with a dark brown frothy head
and a bit of lacing.
Aroma: Baking spices – cinnamon, clove and allspice mixed
wonderfully with Belgian yeast scents, banana, caramel, molasses, toffee and
roasted malts.
Taste: Spices hit my taste buds first – cinnamon, allspice,
nutmeg and clove followed by Belgian yeast and banana. Citrus hops, chocolate and roasted malts and
molasses.
Overall: Complex with excellent balance, Stone Brewing
Company Vertical Epic 12.12.12 is amazing.
At 9% ABV this beer is perfect for these colder months and definitely worth
picking up. I plan to buy a few for cellaring
purposes. This one IS epic!
Cheers!
Mark Harvey
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