Review: Footprint from Odell Brewing Company

The blog was fortunate enough to receive a bottle of Footprint from Odell Brewing Company to review. With it's recent release in Omaha, we thought it would be good to get our review out there for our readers. Keep in mind, we aren't experts or even certified judges. We are just guys that have had more than our fair share of quality craft beer. We will do our best to tell you what we tasted, and try and reserve judgement for you the readers on the beer itself.

Oh, and by the way...we didn't review this together, nor did we consult each other before writing the review. It was funny to see how we both picked out the pineapple and tropical fruit.

From Odell Brewing Company's website....

There are ten states that make up what we call our ‘distribution footprint.’ Each state made a unique contribution to Footprint. This artful ale is our tribute to these states in which our beer is available. The result is a crafty collective of regional flavors:

Colorado - Hops & Barley
Arizona - Prickly Pear
Idaho - Barley & Hops
Kansas - Wheat
Minnesota - Wild Rice
Missouri - Oak Barrels
Nebraska - Corn
New Mexico – Green Chilies
South Dakota – Barley & Honey
Wyoming - Wheat

9.5% Alc. by Vol.

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Nate's review:

I cracked this open last night for my celebratory beer on my birthday. I knew the premise behind the beer and knew that Nebraska was represented by corn but I forgot what most of the other ingredients were on purpose. I wanted to go into this pretty clean of head.

It pours with a nice white head and a cloudy light pale color. A little lighter then your standard pale ale but pretty close. It was pretty cloudy, though I am guessing that is due to many of the ingredients in the beer including wheat.

It's aroma was pretty crazy full of tropical fruits and mainly pineapple. I also noticed another flavor I couldn't pinpoint right away, but after looking at the bottle later I knew it to be the prickly pear. I am starting to really have a nose for cactus in my beer and honestly I am not finding it pleasant, to each their own.

I had my wife taste along with me and she has a super palate and nose. She pulled out orange, lemon-lime, kumquat and of course pineapple. She loved this beer. The taste closely mimicked the aroma, which is great, no surprises. I did notice the prickly pear a little bit more in the flavor then the aroma, it has a sort of tart flavor to it that is hard for me to explain. I found the beer pretty balanced and it finished pretty dry. I didn't detect much alcohol warmth, which is great considering it's high ABV.

Overall, the aroma is killer and the flavor does a good job matching it. I was not able to pull out the oak barrels or green chili which I kind of expected to notice. My wife loved this beer and would drink a lot of it, myself, I am put off by prickly pear so much that it started to over power the beer for me, which is unfortunate, because it has a lot of great stuff going on. So goes my palate and why it is mine. Go give it a shot and tell us what you think.

Nick's review:

Out of the bottle, the beer is very effervescent with some large bubbles in the head. Great head retention with an “ice cream” look to it as it settles. It’s a gold to light amber color. There was a little sediment at the bottom of the bottle, but not that much. Leads me to believe it may not be bottle conditioned.

The aroma smells of pineapple and other tropical fruit. The tastes is dry and crisp on the palate, with some astringency. The taste is very similar to the DuPont beers in my opinion…maybe they ferment this at high temperatures too. Overall I like the beer, however it’s not very session-able considering it’s dry quality and the fact it’s 9.5% ABV. Also, I really like the “footprint” concept…using ingredients from each of the states they distribute in.