Boulevard says:
“Nutcracker Ale is Boulevard’s holiday gift for real beer lovers. This hearty, warming brew is a classic winter ale, deep amber in color, with hints of molasses balanced by the “spiciness” of freshly harvested Chinook hops.”
Boulevard Nutcracker Ale
Winter Warmer, 5.8% ABV
Sayeth the Guys:
Ryan: I first came across Boulevard’s Nutcracker Ale last year around Christmas when I was home for the holidays in central Illinois. And it quickly became one of my favorite winter warmers. The dry hopping added a nice, subtle spiciness that I had never experienced before and blended very well with the rich maltiness of this beer. So once my wife and I worked out the travel plans to see our respective families this holiday season I reached out to mine to snag me a six pack when they came up for Thanksgiving. And, as promised, the Nutracker Ale and Schlafly’s Christmas Ale – which we’ll get to soon – arrived at Union Station along with my parents the day before Thanksgiving.
Being a fan of all things Missouri beer that I can’t get in Chicago I quickly inspected both six packs once we got home. The Schlafly beer was bottled on the 11th of November which made it pretty darn fresh for picking it up the week before Thanksgiving. The Boulevard Nutracker was a different story. The best by date on the bottle was 2/15/10. That’s right, this beer was BEST BY nine months ago. Now, I know the beer was probably still going to be ok – and for the most part it was alright – but a beer store should not stock six packs that are from last year nor should a distributor be sending those bottles out. I did email Boulevard to let them know where the beer was bought and how old the bottles were. I’m sure in the grand scheme of things this isn’t a huge deal. But I know how good this beer can be and if someone was trying this for the first time and it was year old beer they may be less inclined to get it again.
As for the beer itself, like I said, it was alright. There was still the strong scent of orange peel in the nose from the dry hopping and a pleasant malty sweetness on the palate. But as you would expect this beer lost it’s sharpness in the year it sat God-knows-where. I don’t want to say much more about this beer because it is an all-star winter warmer when fresh and this bottle is not a fair comparison. I suppose the moral of this story is to check your bottle dates before purchasing them. And I guess I need to give my parents a crash course in that as well.
Andrew: Sometimes life gives you happy mistakes, and this could be one of them. The 2009 Nutracker Ale poured a hazy coppery and brown color with a huge, cream colored thick foamy head and lots of sediment. I couldn’t pick up much going on in the nose other than some slight citrus notes.
The beer tasted like something in between apple juice and apple cider. Not as dense as cider but not as thin as juice. I would suspect that the hops had faded pretty dramatically, as there was just a slight hoppiness to the beer. I also detected some sweet malts and notes of citrus, probably orange.
Again, with this being the 2009 and not having a 2010 to compare it to, I wonder what happened to the hops and if this is or could be a much more aggressive beer…
Karl: Not knowing what the Boulevard Nutcracker is like fresh or straight out of the tap, I can only estimate that after a year of (accidental) aging that this beer is at about 80%. If this beer is a reliable V-6 engine while fresh, one of those sparkplugs has fouled and that single piston just ain’t firing. It’ll still take you places, but you’re very aware of the fact that it’s not getting you there at full power.
Not that it was a terrible beer, it just wasn’t as good as I imagined it could be. A nice hazy glass of beer with a thick pillowy head pours with a noticeable bit of hops even after a year on the shelf. After the bitterness dies off a pleasant wave of candy sweetness rushes in, and then fades away. The body is noticeably watery for a winter warmer, and as it develops it gets even more watery towards the finish. It’s not a mindblower of a beer, but it’s not terrible either. (But if the most ringing endorsement is “not terrible,” take that for what it is.)