Ashland Amber

Caldera Brewing
Ashland, OR

Available: OR, WA, CA, VA, MD, DC

Caldera Brewing Co. is the first craft brewery in the state of Oregon to brew and can its own beer.

ABV: 5.5
ABW: 4.4
Color: amber
Bitterness: n/a
Original gravity: 1054

Pouring a bright, clear orange-amber from a can, Caldera Ashland Amber offers a lovely off-white head that quickly dissipates into a fine lace. Aromas of herbal and earthy hops with a nice mix of malty sweetness lightly waft out of the glass. The flavors are straightforward and direct: good carbonation helps present a nice malt backbone with quite a dose of herbal and piney hops that work very nicely together in a very drinkable beer. Ashland Amber definitely has its roots in the Northwest. And that means a bit more hops than the usual ambers. If you like a malty amber, this one might not be for you. But hop lovers who tend to pass on ambers should check out this southern-Oregon beauty.
- Lisa Morrison

It’s amber right enough, and the dark malts responsible don’t just confine their influence to the color. Caramel and chocolate notes kick off the aroma, but then, as you’d expect from a North Western beer, in come the hops. Sweet, thick malt fills the mouth, but once again the nutty, caramel flavours are grounded by the bitterness of the hops, which eventually take over in the finish, leaving a suggestion of orange blossom. Even though it’s a little too chewy and perhaps a touch sickly in places, I’d certainly sink a glass every now and then if I lived near an outlet.
- Jeff Evans

Lisa Morrison
Morrison, aka the Beer Goddess, writes about beer whenever and wherever she can and also gets to talk about it on a weekly radio show in her hometown of Portland, OR.

Jeff Evans
Author of the Good Bottled Beer Guide and The Book of Beer Knowledge, Jeff Evans is an eight-time editor of the CAMRA Good Beer Guide and one of Britain's best-known beer writers.

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