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I picked up this beer a few months ago when I was in Seattle for work. My cousin really wanted me to try this brewery and we got there at the last second (they were actually closing), but we talked with the assistant brewer for a bit and he let us stick around and have a beer. At the time, I had the NW Peaks Redoubt Red and it was pretty good. I wanted to try more, and since I was flying out the next day, my only option was to buy this bottle and squeeze it into my luggage. The bottle says the beer was bottled for NW Peaks Brewery’s first anniversary in 2011.
Location: Poured into a curved pint glass from the corked 750ml bottle at my home in Bloomington, IL.
Numbers: Unfortunately, no numbers were listed on the bottle.
Appearance & Aroma: It’s a slightly burnt orange color with a good amount of sediment floating in it. There’s also a good amount of carbonation, leaving a thin, fluffy, white head. The aroma is resinous and earthy hops with hints of wood.
Taste & Feel: The body is full and the mouthfeel is somewhat crisp from all of the carbonation, but it’s also smooth and slightly creamy. The flavors up front were sweet, bready, and malty, and just after those flavors came in, the spicy, woody characters from the Palo Santo wood comes in. In the finish, the woody flavors dominate, but some resin and piney hop flavors and bitterness join in. It’s the hop flavors which last for a minute or two in the aftertaste.
Food Pairing: While I enjoyed this beer, I was already having leftover chicken wings and a corned beef sandwich from the St. Patty’s Day holiday. This beer went very nicely with this dinner. In fact, the woodiness in the beer mixed perfectly with the flavors of the corned beef.
Overall Impression: As I mentioned, my cousin was very high on this brewery, so I was excited to give this one a try. However, I was a bit concerned, as the label indicated it was a couple years old (2011), and while it was an imperial, it’s also an IPA with plenty of hop flavor that could fade over that time. I enjoyed the base malt, as the bready and malty flavors were noticeable up front. The flavor of the Palo Santo wood was really nice, and gave it a really interesting flair. The hop flavors had certainly faded a bit, but the bitterness still came through in the finish. Overall, it was a good beer with an complex mix of flavors. I’d be interested in trying some of the more recent anniversary ales, but if they still have bottles of this, I don’t know that they’d last much longer.
My Rating: 
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