Just like the 2XIPA, the Southern Tier Live is available in bottles year-round. I've also seen it on draft at the Bulldog and I'm sure they aren't the only ones to pick up a few Southern Tier beers for their taps. The Live is a bottle-conditioned American Pale Ale, coming in at a sessionable 5.5% abv. I know most people consider 5% the cutoff for a session beer, but that extra .5% isn't going to do you in. Especially not the beer nerds out there used to imperial everything.
Live is named due to the "alive" nature of beer as yeast consumes sugars and converts them into alcohol. While the wort is turning into beer it is indeed alive with millions of living yeast organisms. Some beer is filtered and maybe even pasteurized to kill off or suspend the yeast prior to bottling but with the Live they add a little more to produce a secondary fermentation and give this the bottle conditioning they advertise. See, this is an educational blog!
Reviewers: Eric Ducote (BR Beer Scene), Brenton Day (The Ale Runner.com), and Dustin Davis.
Serving: 12 ounce bottle.
Appearance: Kind of like the other two Southern Tier beers, this one was clear and a deep gold. I expected more haze from a bottle conditioned ale, oh well.
Aroma: We all liked the aroma a lot, I picked up some grapefruit, and Brenton was all about the pine.
Taste: Just like the aroma, almost bordering on an IPA hop balance but that was just fine with us. It really had a good hop flavor without an overpowering bitterness.
Mouthfeel: Nice carbonation, good lingering hoppiness... very nice.
Overall: Of the three Southern Tier beers we tried this was the unanimous winner. I'd pick up another 6-pack of this one for sure.
Overall Rating: 80.33
My Rating: 75
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