Burton Baton is a blend of an English-style Old Ale and an Imperial IPA.  After fementating the separate beers in our stainless tanks, the two are transferred and blended together in one of our large oak tanks. Burton Baton sits on the wood for about a month.

Aroma: 10/12

Hops fading into caramel. After a swirl, caramel and oak with just a touch of grain. Only a hint of alcohol underneath belies the hefty 10% ABV. Unfortunately, the hops flavor dissipates fairly quickly, which is a sign of the length of time required to get the beer up to this much alcohol, but leaves me wanting more from something identifying itself as an IPA. I suspect that adjusting time and duration of dry hopping could help extend the hop aroma a bit further, but perhaps Sam wanted to emphasize the caramel and oak more than the hops.

Appearance: 3/3

Gorgeous clear deep amber. Off-white head is of average consistency, and dissipates quickly to a thin film with just a hint of lacing. Average to light carbonation indicative of heavier IPAs. Perfect.

Flavor: 18/20

Strong taste of crystal malts typical of Dogfish Head IPAs, but pleasantly dry in comparison to other of their high gravity beers (e.g. 90 Minute IPA). Nice bitter of a strong IPA is up front but doesn’t linger for more than a minute or two, keeping the aftertaste of the beer from getting unpleasant. The oak flavor is extremely subtle, and I doubt I would be able to pick it out as such if it wasn’t called out on the label. Though it blends nicely with the caramel flavors of the malt to add just a hint vanilla to smooth out the edges of the overall flavor of the beer, I would have liked to taste just a bit more from the oak.

Having been aged, it’s difficult to identify any specific variety of hops (which I usually try to do more by aroma than flavor). The fruitiness and a hint of grapefruit around the edges make me want to say Cascade and Centennial, but that could just be because they’re two of my favorites lately and I seem to taste them in everything with Northwest hops. I suspect (and other descriptions concur) that there are several other varieties involved.

Mouthfeel: 5/5

Body is on the heavier side of medium, with carbonation on the lighter side of average. Both are perfect for the style, especially considering the amount of sugar it takes to make a 10% ABV beer.

Overall: 9/10

This is a great beer.  It is almost perfectly balanced, and has a wonderful hop profile.  The real win about this beer is that it manages to be dry at the same time that it carries a heavy caramel note.  My only nitpick is that the oak could be a bit more pronounced (e.g. newer wood, longer aging, maybe just a touch of American instead of French oak).  I would like to have tasted one of the early batches of this brew.

Would I buy it again? 45/50

At $4/bottle, this beer is definitely not an everyday purchase.  I like it quite a bit more than 90 Minute IPA, which I find to be a bit to heavy on the caramel, and it might be worth the splurge when I’m in the mood for a heavier IPA with a bit more character than average.