Well, not every craft beer can be good or great. Though I have some negative reviews in my backlog, I decided I'd hold off on writing a negative blog until I came across a new beer I didn't like. By my count, I've tried about six new beers since I started blogging, and number 7 is the first mediocre one. It's name is White Oak, from The Bruery.
The Bruery is a pretty new brewery, not even half a decade old. Surprisingly, they have a pretty wide distribution for such a new company. The founder and head brewer was just a typical home-brewer five years ago, using normal equipment and asking for advice from other brewers on Beer Advocate. Now, his company sells beer in 21 states and parts of western Europe. Not bad, but personally I think he should focus more on the recipes. I seem to be alone in that, however; their beers are generally rated well.
White Oak is an oddity, and at 11.5% alcohol, is not one for the faint of heart. It is a 50/50 blend of a fresh, hoppy Belgian pale ale called Mischief and a wheatwine aged in bourbon barrels called White Oak Sap. A wheatwine is a "wine-strength" (usually over 9% alcohol) ale brewed with a substantial portion of malted wheat. Wheatwines are a fairly new and scarcely made "style" and as such there is a lot of variety. In my experience, brewers make them as either "fluffy barleywines" (brewed mostly with barley, with just enough wheat to lighten the texture) or as a wheat-dominated strong ale, with little barley. I'm not sure which route the Bruery took with White Oak Sap, but the final blend does not work very well. You can read on if you want, but the "Reader's Digest version" is simply this: the two beers do battle rather than compromise on a peace treaty, and my palate is the collateral damage.
The Review
White Oak pours a sprightly-carbonated, slightly caramelized golden hue with just over a finger of white foam on top. Most of the wheatwines I have tried are more carbonated than their barleywine brethren, and lighter in color as well. That is the case here as well.
The aroma brings the two styles to mind; I smell wheat crackers from the wheatwine portion and some light fruits commonly found in Belgian blonde ales (pear, maybe nectarines). Both are extremely restrained, however. This might be a nice break if you are tired of overpowering strong ales, but the aroma is too tame for me. On top of that, the bourbon barrel only comes across as a faint (and cheap) grain alcohol aroma, akin to plastic-handle vodka. Now I am a little glad it doesn't smell overpowering.
The flavor is much stronger....I wish it was the other way around. Mischief is supposed to be a hoppy take on the Belgian pale style, which may or may not be good (I've never had it). Here though, the Mischief just does not blend well with the wheatwine base. The bitter hop flavors are not overpowering, but they are very out of place against the backdrop of wheat and grain alcohol. And yes, unfortunately, that is really all the bourbon contributes here. None of the vanilla or honey flavors that good bourbon barrels occasionally impart on beer manage to get through the noise.
The texture of the beer is not any better, unfortunately. Wheatwines can be all over the place in terms of mouthfeel; some are dry, some are sweeter, some are almost creamy, some are very bubbly and some are mildly carbonated. Typically, the idea in a beer is that the hops and malt are supposed to balance out, so that the beer is neither too bitter (hoppy) nor too sweet (malty). This beer is bitter and too dry, not bitter and sweet.
I'm thinking that a hoppy Belgian pale like Mischief was the wrong choice of beer to blend with a wheatwine. Belgian pales are known for being drier than their American counterparts. If they wanted to blend it with a hoppy beer, they should have chosen an American or possibly English IPA. As it stands, the final product right now is two component beers that conflict with each other rather than complement each other. I don't like my taste buds being collateral damage in a battle.
Hypothetically speaking, this might get better with age. There are a handful of beer styles that can be cellared like wine, and wheatwines are one of them. Being half of the final beer, it might be enough to improve it with age (especially once the hops calm the hell down). That being said, this is on the pricey side of craft beer; a single 25-ounce (750ml) bottle costs $15 plus tax. I don't think the potential improvement will be worth the cost.
I'd recommend passing on this beer if you see it on the shelf.
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