Dogfish Head Burton Baton

I try not to ever sound like a pretentious beer snob ever, but I remember trying my first Dogfish Head product when I was like, 21, at Zeno's. It must have been a special occasion, like Tuesday, cause I don't ever remember drinking a beer based on taste during college, but alas, it happened and it was glorious. And since then, Dogfish Head has exploded all over America's beer swilling faces. They have a full blown TV show on the Discovery Channel that is strangely watchable, several brew pub locations in Delaware and the DC Metro Area which are absolutely not optional if you like booze and hamburgers, and a lineup of 26 different beers, both seasonal and regular release, which range from tolerable to outstanding.

Burton Baton is one of those "limited releases" that seems to come around about 3 times a year. It's a hoppy, stinky, delicious pale ale with an old dude on the bottle, giving it at least 4 bonus points on curb appeal, cause the dude looks like he parties. Before reading anything on the label, I thought I tasted a little oak behind all of the hops, and god dammit, I was right. Burton Baton is a hybrid of a traditional English Ale and an Imperial IPA, both brewed separately. Then once they're good and ready, they are blended together in an oak tank where the concoction sits atop oaky goodness for a month. The result is a citrusy IPA with some woody vanilla accents. Oh, and the wood mellows the beer's taste and makes it an amazingly smooth and easily abused 10% APV. Bonus.

I picked up a 4 pack of this at Giant Eagle for 8.99, which is pretty fair for such a strong occasional rarity. It rang up as being 99.99 at first, and it caused a huge 20 minute hold up at the check out line, much to the dismay of the 14 or so hunters behind me buying Schlitz who were undoubtedly referring to me as a "yuppie bitch" or something equally as flattering. You really can only drink four without becoming embarrassing to be around due to the high percentage, not due to being full and pukey.

Drinkability: 8/10
Taste : 8/10
Value: 5/10
Curb Appeal: 6/10

Overall: 6.8/10