Name – Southern Tier Harvest Ale
Country – United States
Type – Extra Special Bitter

It’s fall by calendar standards.  Too bad Florida seems to have a hard time receiving the memo each year that it isn’t suppose to be this hot and humid in the beginning of October.  But then again they are pretty behind on a lot of things.  So let’s just treat it like it’s “special.”

This Saturday afternoon I am popping open Harvest Ale from Southern Tier.  I had an eventful afternoon by putting together a DVD case and filling it.  I also hung a few pictures in the house that I have been meaning to for quite a while.  The place is starting to look a little more like a real house.  So now on to the beer.

It poured a very clear amber/copper color into the pint glass.  It had a nice white head that when it starts disappearing leaves some good lacing around the edges of the glass.

Very bright, resiny citrus hops hit the nose.  I’m not really getting a whole lot else on the nose besides those hops.

The taste is a really good mix of a toasted like biscuit taste and some earthy like hops.  It’s pretty cool that that toasted malt flavor really cuts the bitterness and vise versa.

I always enjoy myself a good ESB.  And this one is good ESB.  Of course I compare all ESBs to Fullers and maybe that’s not fair.  Especially since I can get Fullers on cask whenever I wish at the Blue Anchor in Delray Beach.  And man is that heavenly.  But this is a pretty good one.

As I’m writing this my brother came home and gave me a CD called Total Brutal by Austrian Death Machine.  It is an album all about Arnold Schwarzenegger in thrash metal format.  Some of the vocals include a Ahnold voice and it’s pretty funny.  So I will enjoy the rest of my beer to this.

Grade – B (add in Austrian Death Machine and it turns to an A for Arnold)