Camerons Christmas Ale

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 6 | Flavor: 7 | Overall: 7

One of several bottles picked up while on a business trip here in Dayton, OH. I was gifted quite a few awesome beers too..., so that means I need to lighten my carry-on bag for my flight home tomorrow... And what better way to do that than to pop a few open in the hotel room the night before, eh...? :)

First of all, if this is not only a Winter Ale, but a self-proclaimed Christamas Ale, how come the Best Before date is 31/10/2005...? Is this a left-over from Christmas 2004, or just a weird dating of this beer?

Secondly, not sure I buy off on this being a Winter Warmer, of any make or model. Really missing a lot of complexity for such a beer. Rather, this beer is really rather calmer and more sedate, more along the lines of a standard English Pale Ale or maybe ESB. Some vague fruity highlights in the flavor and nose, but really all together calm..., and (dare I say it?) dull, to be honest.

Really, a rather unchallenging 50cL, with nothing really knocking my socks off, but nothing disgusting me, either. Just seems rather lackadasical and overally-mellow.... Maybe this really is from 2004, and it's lack of pep and pizzazz is just from an older sample? Hmmm, the plot thickens.

But in the meantime, this was an okay first beer of the evening, after coming in from a long (13-hour) last work day over at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. But would I purchase this again? Nah -- too many more interesting Brit X-Mas ales out there to want to bother with this one.

The label has a rather bored looking St. Nick on the front. I'm with Santa -- let's blow this joint and paint the town red with a real Winter Warmer, eh...?!

Music: Talking Heads' "Stop Making Sense".
//TB

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 7 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 6

Very dark brown and red coloring. A medium sized slightly yellowish head. Aroma is honey, peanuts and strawberry jelly. Light mouthfeel with a fair amount of carbonation. The taste is bubblegum with iced tea and some slight cinnamon mixed in. This tastes like a spiced up bitter. Very drinkable.

Aroma: 7 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 7 | Flavor: 7 | Overall: 7

The reason I give this newbie to the site such an average rating is because this tastes more like an English Bitter or a Vienna Lager than it does a Christmas beer. Cameron’s Christmas Ale has a dark amber to brownish body that holds up a sudsy one-inch head that dissipates quickly. Clear fresh malty scents emit from the pint glass. It has a nice mild malt character to it, with not much, if anything at all, in the way of traditional Christmas spices being detected. I had this one in March. Could it be that it lost its full flavor over the months? No wonder I only paid $2.50 for it! At any rate, the finish had a small bite that was unimpressive. It's a pretty good drink, and the bottle is very festive, but I am not so sure Cameron's holiday beverage fits the Christmas Ale category.