Santa Barbara Eternal Sunshine

Aroma: 5 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 4 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 6

My first beer of the day, at something of a mini-Belgian Beer Fest at O'Brien's yesterday. Really, it was mostly just a reason for Tom Nickel to unload a bunch of leftover beer from the San Diego Belgian Beer Fest from two weeks ago..., but who's complaining? ;)

Well..., while I normally can find very little bad to say about most Santa Barbara beers, this particular beer just did not work for me. Decent enough flavor, but both undercarbonated and just plain way too thin for my liking.

Presented in a De Koninck glass (one of the default stemmed glasses at O'Brien's for Belgian-style beers), but without much in the way of head or carbonation. Now, that unto itself isn't normally such a deal breaker (I do love Real Ale, you know), but this really needed more life to it to have any chance to go head-to-head against it's inspiration, Duvel.

But while I thought the apearence was only average at best, this beer's biggest mis-step is in the body -- or lack thereof. Way too thin and unfilling in the mouthfeel, IMO.

Which is a shame, too, since the flavor profile of this beer is pretty decent overall. Lots of candy sugar going on here -- perhaps too much, thus explaining the thin/cidery feel to the whole affair? But overall, tasty enough.

Overall drinkability. The mouthfeel kills this beer, I'd say. Tasty enough to be savored, but too flacid in the mouthfeel really want to slow down for this. I found myself checking out the "On Tap" board of beers soon after having given up on this beer. Finishable, but just not all that appealing....
//TB