CARLYLE BREWING

Carlyle Brewing Co.ROCKFORD, ILLINOIS

Sojourned August, ’06, industrial northerly Illinois municipality, Rockford, flaunts one of America’s greatest brewpubs, the astonishing CARLYLE BREWING. Located right in the heart of town, this diminutive no-frills Mecca may have only a few booths, tables, and bar chairs (plus a brief pizza-sandwich-snack menu) but its impressive array of beers will impress connoisseurs.

Listed in order of preference, the best fare included slow-sipping malt-caramelized maple-sapped brown-sugary Blessed Brown (finishing with silken burgundy-brandy-sherry caress), dry piney-fronted hop-embittered hickory-burnt orange-grapefruit-pear-pineapple tropicalia Humulus Lupulus IPA, and malt-candied papaya-kiwi-banana-cherry-drenched Belgian Dubbel.

Nearly as great were pecan-wafted toffee-molasses-sweetened banana-breaded clove-spiced Dunkel Weizen, soothingly sweet vanilla ice cream-like dessert peculiarity Vanilla Cream Ale (with its almond-tinged Scotch tingle and fuzzy citric slip), dainty coughdrop-like coriander-lemongrass-hinted Trigeminale, and Humulus’ lighter version, the creamy citric-lined wood-varnished marigold-tinged carrot-asparagus-insinuated Lil’ Loopy.

Though docile black coffee-soured, dark chocolate-chalked, espresso-milked Stout and lazily fruited, chocolate-backed Scottish Ale fell short of perfection, the terrific Pilsener bettered nearly anything in mainstream market, bringing buttery honeyed wheat segue to sugary cereal-oats midst, creamed corn blitz, and earthen barnyard-hay base.

www.carlylebrewing.com

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