Review: Shock Top Honey Bourbon Cask Wheat Beer

Review: Shock Top Honey Bourbon Cask Wheat Beer

Review: Shock Top Honey Bourbon Cask Wheat Beer This new Belgian-style unfiltered wheat ale from Shock Top is brewed with honey and caramel malt, then is aged on “bourbon cask staves” (so, not in casks).

What’s wrong with that? Just about everything. The nose offers vague honey intertwined with hospital notes. The body is thin. And the palate is simply bad: Melted Bit-O-Honey candies, quinine, and mints from your grandma’s purse. Wholly unbalanced and unsatisfying, with a funky and sickly sweet aftertaste that’s difficult to get rid of.

A complete miss for the Shock, alas.

5.5% abv.

D- / $8 per six-pack / shocktopbeer.com 

Shock Top Honey Bourbon Cask Wheat Beer

$8
1

Rating

1.0/10

A veteran journalist, the author of four books, a published poet, and an award-winning winemaker, Christopher Null has more than 25 years of experience writing about wine and spirits. He founded Drinkhacker in 2007. He also writes regularly about the science of booze for WIRED and is an occasional contributor to ADI's Distiller magazine. He has been a judge for both the American Distilling Institute Judging of Craft Spirits and Whiskies of the World spirits competitions and often works as a consultant, developing formal tasting notes for spirits brands around the world.

1 Comment

  1. Alisha Heide on June 26, 2014 at 11:02 pm

    I bought this beer with great anticipation. My boyfriend had purchased an IPA aged in Kentucky Bourbon barrels before and it was very good. I got it home, got it chilled and cracked one open. The first thing that hit me was the super sweet smell that emanates from the bottle. I took a sip and it left a distinctly awful aftertaste. I thought maybe it’s what I’m eating. So I tried again and thought maybe I need to let it breathe. Tried it one last time and set it back on the counter. I couldn’t finish it. Now I have five bottles still sitting in my fridge that I have no clue what to do with. Very, very disappointed. And I had such high hopes. :(

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