Dogfish Head Red and White

Time for another Dogfish Head. Rick Lyke spoke briefly about this beer in a seminar he gave at the World Beer Festival. Generically speaking this beer is a Belgium wit beer, but as with most from Dogfish head its much more than that.
The Style: Witbier or wit beer is a Belgian wheat beer, usually very pale, and hazy with lots of yeast. Commonly it is brewed with coriander and/or orange peel. The color is a golden with a rocky white head. Citrus aromas with light spiciness usually shine through. Witbier's are traditionally unfiltered and brewed with pale malts and raw wheat. The most popular witbier is Hoegarden, although another famous brand was made by Peirre Celis who all but introduced this style of beer in the States with his namesake brewery in Austin Texas, that unfortunately was taken over by SABMiller.
The Beer: This beer is so amazingly complex its unbelievable. First off the beer has some traditional notes of being a witbier being brewed with orange peel and coriander. However that's about as traditional as this beer gets. Its then blended with Pinot Noir concentrate, and aged in oak. 11% of that oak being Pinot Noir Barrels, the other 89% being aged on oak staves. The beer weighs in at 10% alcohol and pours a bright cherry color capped with a white slightly pinked tinged frothy head. Over time the head dissipates but leaves behind streams of thick lacing all over the glass. The nose is has notes of coriander, but is full of oranges, grapefruit, and hoppiness. The mouth has oranges, grapefruits, some oaky toastiness shows up as well. The beer starts out quite refreshing and zesty as a witbier should before leaving a mellow complex toasty aftertaste. As the beer warmed notes of wine-yness began showing up on the aftertaste. To me this was a great example of what Dogfish can do, not to much alcohol and an amazingly complex hybrid of traditional and old. For me a solid B+ beer. Here's what the folks at BA had to say.