Rye Pale Ale - Tasting

I've been drinking this Rye Pale Ale for the last few weeks.  It's a very nice drinking beer - goes down very smooth.  It has a really nice balance between hop and malt.

I have had quite a few commercial beers with rye and I've liked most of them.  This beer has enough rye (20%) to get a good strong rye flavor into the beer but is also little enough to not be overwhelming (and also not enough to cause a stuck sparge).

I think I'll have to try another beer with rye not too far down the road.

Tasting Notes:

• Aroma:
• Mostly hops in the nose.  It is a spicy and earthy hop aroma.  The hops have gotten a bit more subdued over the last month I've been drinking the beer - this current level is very nice though.  Not able to pick out anything that I'd characterize as malt in the smell but the spicy rye and hops could just be blending aroma.
• Appearance:
• Dark gold (picture doesn't do it justice) - very pretty.  Good head with an average pour - lasts for a few minutes then falls down to a thin layer of foam.  This is the first beer I've made that has left lacing on the glass - imagine this is due to the rye.
• Flavor:
• The flavor is a nice balance of the hop flavor and the spicy rye malt.  The flavors meld together very nicely - I'm not sure I can say where the hops end and the malt begins really (I'd really have to try this hop bill without the rye to say for sure).  The finish sports a pretty firm bitterness with the spicy character which is an interesting combo.  No alcohol presence and no yeast character to speak of.
• Mouth-feel:
• Beer finishes very dry - really good gulper of a beer.  It has decent body (also probably due to the rye).  
• Overall:
• It's a really good beer.  Very nice flavor, easy drinking, good appearance.  I'm very pleasantly surprised by the level of balance in this beer after a month.  At bottling it was drinking a bit more like an IPA but it has really mellowed out nicely.  I think this one could continue to be good for several more months.

So, this is one of may favorite beers so far (second maybe to the Fortunate Islands Clone).  It's also one of the few beers I've made so far that I'd be confident sharing with people as something that I think is basically without any flaws.