Battleground
Mantra Artisan Ales in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, United States 🇺🇸
Witbier Regular|
Score
7.12
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blackisle (5228) reviewed Battleground from Mantra Artisan Ales 5 years ago
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 7.5 | Flavor - 7.5 | Texture - 7 | Overall - 7.5
Cloudy pale straw colour, good frothy white head, fair retention and lacing. Aroma wheat, yeast, coriander, straw, lemon. Taste medium sweet and bitter and sourness, wheat, lemon, star fruit, coriander. More sourness in the finish, orange peel, spices. Medium body, sticky texture, very nice and refreshing blend of saison and wheat beer.
mike_77 (13696) reviewed Battleground from Mantra Artisan Ales 5 years ago
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7
Dark golden colour with quick fading head. Aroma and flavour deliver what is promised. Dry Saison yeastiness and fruity, light banana sweetness.
Alengrin (10989) reviewed Battleground from Mantra Artisan Ales 6 years ago
Appearance - 4 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 4 | Overall - 6
Belgian-inspired ale by this Tennessee craft brewery, bottle from De Caigny - which got it from their collaboration with Billie's Craft Beer Festival in Antwerp. The bottle opens with a hiss, but there is no gushing. Initially rather thick head formation, but loosely structured and large-bubbled, dissolving quickly and visibly into a thinnish, off-white moussy ring and some dots in the middle, sustained by vivid fizz rising up through a hazy, indeed very witbier-looking, pale yellow straw blonde beer with deeper golden tinge. Aroma of withering leek and spoiling cucumber, dusty old coriander seed, soggy old bread, dried camomile blossoms, dried banana peel, moist white pepper, Chinese green tea, potato juice, parsnip, margarine, woodsorrel and, when more of the yeast is added, something not unlike rotten green beans... Crisp, estery onset, banana isoamylacetate but not very strongly so, green apple acetaldehyde too, vague notion of unripe peach, sweetish and sourish but both restrained, with the latter being highlighted by a high, yet somewhat coarse effervescence. Mouthfeel is thinner than the sharpish carbonation would lead one to suspect, with a slick, cereally and soapy body, only very thinly bready towards the end and relatively neutral; the soapiness of the coriander, along with its unmistakable soft-spicy flavour, fills the nose cavity retronasally, though admittedly I had Belgian wit- and other beers with even more coriander effects. The spoiled cucumber- and rotten bean-like aspects, alas, are there as well, alongside a floral, very subtly zesty hoppiness which establishes a soft, very mildly spicy end bitterness. Spicy phenols, as implicitly announced on the label, do play a part in the finish as well, but not in a very outspoken way. Everything is rather restrained here even for what is apparently intended as a mixture of standard Belgian witbier with classic Belgian saison; feels and tastes very convincingly Belgian indeed, as if coming from whatever new 'bierfirma' or microbrewery presenting their very first, simple, coriandered blonde. I admit that if tasted blind, I would readily have placed this in Belgium and not at all in Tennessee or the U.S. in general, so if this was the intenion, well done... From a technical point of view though, this is not such a great success, with the carbon dioxide rather insufficiently 'bound' within the beer, off-putting withering vegetable aromas and even a brief whiff of E. coli infection, though fortunately this remains but a very volatile aspect. If this were Belgian, I would have scored it below 3/5, which to me personally is the boundary of being enjoyable or not; I see no reason to treat an American craft brew any different, even if their intention to create something thoroughly Belgian in all aspects, is successful in this case. I expected a lot more from a brewery which is not all bad at sour ales and the "mixed fermentation" mention on the label convinced me to buy this - should probably have opted for another one, as there is no trace of mixed fermentation here, unless you would consider a suspicion of undesirable (and unintended) bacterial infection 'mixed', of course...
djd07 (26386) reviewed Battleground from Mantra Artisan Ales 6 years ago
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7.5
On tap at Gabf. Pours a hazy orange with medium white head leaving spotty lacing. The aroma is floral, citrus, wheat, yeast. Thin body, citrus, wheat, light dry finish, good.
willisread (9590) reviewed Battleground from Mantra Artisan Ales 6 years ago
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 8
Tap at Craft Brewed. Pours a clearish gold with a full finger of foam. Nice estery nose. Clove, banana bread, light grass. Soft and fluffy on the palate. Medium sweetness. Not as dry as I like but still a solid saison. Solid drop. --- Beer merged from original tick of Battle Ground on 16 Aug 2017 at 21:13 - Score: 7. Original review text: Nice estery nose. Clove, banana bread, light grass. Soft and fluffy on the palate. Medium sweetness. Not as dry as I like but still solid
Travlr (30256) reviewed Battleground from Mantra Artisan Ales 7 years ago
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 9 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7
Draft at the source. Crystal clear golden yellow color, thick white head with good retention and solid lacing, see pic please. Aroma of very light funk and straw. Taste has fruity esters, light citrus. Tasty.
patrickctenchi (4989) reviewed Battleground from Mantra Artisan Ales 7 years ago
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 10 | Overall - 8
Bottle: Cloudy yellow, with a thick, tight, off-white head. Peppery yeast, coriander, wheat scent. Taste is sweet, spicy, lemon, orange, wheat malt, yeast. Nice and lively.....really good.
shrubber (14989) reviewed Battleground from Mantra Artisan Ales 7 years ago
Appearance - 10 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 10 | Overall - 8.5
Bottle. Orange/lemon, coriander, and wheat malt aroma. Hazy golden yellow with moderate white head. Moderately sweet orange/lemon, yeast, wheat malt and mildly bitter hay flavor. Nice body. Yeah, this beer kicks ass - a great witbier-saison blend.