Drink Along - Ossett Yorkshire Blonde

The Oval test match getting washed out, evening runs in the pouring rain, taking an umbrella to work just in case, is it really the middle of August? A golden ale like Ossett Yorkshire Blonde almost feels out of place today, maybe something like a strong stout is more suitable. Anyway, no use complaining when there’s important work to be done ...

Yorkshire Blonde is a 3.9% “Lager-Style Beer” that’s hopped with “a generous late addition of Mount Hood hops”. In the glass it’s the colour of lemon peel, pale and bright; there’s a small little head that doesn’t last long.

Here’s a question: why make a “Lager-Style Beer”? Why not just make a lager?

The aroma is very subtle to me, maybe I’ve got the beer too cold but there’s very little to smell at all. As it warms up I get some lemonade aroma and, call me crazy, but ammonia. Ammonia like the smell you get with hair dye – if you’ve ever spent a morning waiting for the other half in the hair dresser, you might know what I mean. Weird.

In the flavour there’s some initial sweetness, this is broken up nicely but the bitterness in the finish. I’m not sure what happened to that generous late addition of Mount Hood, but they don’t seem to have made it into my glass. There’s a lemony tang going on; with the sweetness and thin body it reminds me of lemonade. I said this about one of the other beers we’ve tasted, but if you told me this was a lager top, I’d probably believe you.

There's a biscuity, toasty, malty character that comes through pretty strongly in the finish.

This beer is kinda just there. The ammonia, hair dye thing is odd, but, that aside, it’s difficult to really like or dislike a beer like this. It’s just there.
I bet it’s much better from cask.

Thoughts?

Find out more about the Drink Along here

Drink Along - Hewitt's Un-Hung Hero

So the piercing-blue eyes of a fella stare me down from behind the decapitated heads of two horses. Sometimes the bottle label grabs you and pulls you right in, other times it doesn't.

Un-Hung hero is a 5% pale ale that's brewed with Cascade and Northdown hops. The bottle text warns off those that like their beer fizzy and bland; ironic really because this is one of the most carbonated bottled beers I think I've ever drunk. The head is billowy and pillowy in the White Shield mould and sticks around throughout.

The aroma is great, it screams CASCADE at the top of its lungs, lots of really fresh hop aroma, grapefruit pith and peel and freshly squeezed juice. It's one of those aromas that you don't focus on long because it makes you just want to drink the beer.

But that's where the positives kinda end for me. The taste is dominated by a fruity sweetness that moves into green apple - a sure fire sign of acetaldehyde. Usually formed through oxidation or an incomplete fermentation, acetaldehyde is a compound that's almost always unwanted in beer. Imagine biting into a really crisp, cold, fresh green apple; that's the exact flavour I'm tasting here and that's the flavour of acetaldehyde.

Right in the background there's a husky, cereally, biscuit flavour that's coming from the grain. It's nice, but not enough to turn this bottle around.

Faults like this in a beer can be limited to a bottle or a batch. Just because the bottle I got wasn't perfect, doesn't mean the others were the same. How was yours?


Find out more about the Drink Along here

Drink Along - Hawkshead Red

I've just been out for a run. London is hot tonight - the sun might be in, but it's still mighty hot out there. This beer is in danger of lasting about thirty seconds because I am THIRSTY.

Anyway, this one stands out in the case because it's Hawkshead. I've heard a lot about Hawkshead, but I'm yet to try their beer. 'Red' is 4.4% ABV and is made with "English hops, malted barley and yeast". Could mean a lot of things then.

Today's glass is a nod towards the trip to Pilsen and Prague that I'm just back from ... in case you were wondering.

The aroma here is full of sweetness, hard-boiled candy sweetness, some caramel, toffee and burnt sugar. This follows through into the taste, lots of hard-boiled sweets and caramel; it feels sticky and sweet and like a whole shed-load of crystal malt was used to make it. There's a slight spicy, grassy hop note in the background that I immediately associate with English hops. It then finishes with a slight burnt sugar dryness and a bright, short-lived, punchy bitterness. There's some metal right at the end there too.

This reminds me of the Shepherd Neame beers I used to drink back home. It reminds me of them a lot!

Decent. Not really my sort of thing, but pretty decent.

And, to end, a question. Is this a summer ale? Drinking this one I'm instantly cast into autumn: browning leaves on the ground, the fire being lit down the pub for the first time - a beer that's not quite a winter warmer, but one that's nudging you in that direction.


Find out more about the Drink Along here

Drink Along - Dark Star Sunburst

Dark Star are one of my favourite breweries. They're one of the best breweries in the UK. It's a shame therefore that some of their best beer never makes it into bottle. Sunburst, however, does.

Sunburst is brewed with Maris Otter pale malt and a multi-cultural blend of Cascade (USA), Styrian Golding and Challenger (UK) hops*. It's lager-gold in colour with a slight haze which, when you consider it's a filtered beer, is a little confusing. I get that grapefruit flavour that's synonymous with Cascades right at the end of the tail, before that comes lots of lemon, like lemon balm or lemon curd maybe, lemon but thick in texture, lemon muted by sweetness. Lemon sherbets before you get to the fizzy bit! And then after all that hop comes a grainy finish, a little like biscuits, a little cereal, right at the end there as it starts to dry out. I think that grainy flavour is a product of Maris Otter malt, it just seems to have character about it that other pale malts don't.

The bottle says "enjoy from the fridge for extra sharpness". I've read that two or three times and I'm still baffled by what it means and how it could be true.

More of that lemon sherbet is showing up as the beer warms, it's interlaced with that Cascade grapefruit flavour and it all sits on top of that biscuity malt. Very nice indeed. As it gets warmer I'm either going mad or there's a kinda almondy, marzipan like aroma there. That will sound nuts**, but if you're drinking along, it might make sense.

This is a solid, pleasant, well made beer. The fact I'm not going mad for it is because it's Dark Star, and when you're drinking Dark Star your expectations are raised a notch or two.


* Note: Cascade are actually grown in the UK too, so there is a chance that they aren't from the USA. I always imagine Alan Partridge when I think of Sytrian Goldings - an interesting bit of trivia about Styrian Goldings is that they're actually derived from the Fuggle hop, not the Golding hop. I always imagine Partridge attempting a joke about "Styrian Fuggles" to an audience that just looks bemused in response whilst he chuckles to himself. Just me then ...

** Pun most definitely intended!

Drink Along - Lymestone Foundation Stone

This is another one that stood out from the summer-case-crowd through the strength of its branding; simple in design but well executed with a modern feel to it. Foundation Stone is a 4.5 % pale ale that’s made with pale and crystal malts and Boadicea and Pilot hops.

It’s lager-golden in colour, really pale, the aroma is quite muted but there’s some malt there, bready and biscuity notes from the malt backed up by some toffee and caramel. The flavour is dominated by the finish and comes and goes quickly. There’s not much up front at all and then in sweeps this pretty hefty bitterness towards the end; it’s a sharp, bright, punchy bitterness that reminds me of something you’d get from a noble hop. Right at the very end it dries out and you get some of that malt coming through, sort of grainy, sort of cereal and then it’s gone.

Perseverance brings a gentle peppery hop note that appears just before the bitterness, you have to go looking for it though. And, whilst we’re looking, I get a slight lactic tartness too, in the flavour and then in the aroma as a sort of yoghurty, sour milk character.

I’m struggling for things to say about this beer, help me out ...


Find out more about the Drink Along here.

Drink Along - Meantime Wheat

German hefeweizen (or wheat beer if that’s easier) was a bit of a gateway beer style for me. They don’t tend to be very hoppy or very bitter, they’re usually quite sweet and they’re different enough from lager to get make you curious. I guess approachable would be the word I’d use, enough to pique an interest but not palate-shocking enough to scare you off.

Meantime Wheat is a decent enough example of the style, brewed not in Germany but in East London. It’s 5 percent ABV and uses wheat and pale malt, perle and northern brewer hops.

Wheat beers should be drunk with the yeast in. I find this adds a richness to the feel of the beer and gives it a thicker, more velvety texture. When served from a bottle in Germany, the beer will be poured almost completely into the glass before the last few drops are swirled around the bottom of the bottle to pick up as much of the sediment as possible, this is then thrown in too. When pouring, it’s also important to be quite aggressive, you want to create a big pillow of head to sit on top of the beer.

Meantime Wheat is a glorious, glowing amber colour with a white fluffy cloud of head on top. I’m thinking that more must be at work in this beer than wheat and pale malt – how else could that colour have been achieved? The yeast-driven phenols are there but they’re not easy to pick out as one of the traditional banana, clove or bubblegum. I get some orange notes and a sort of hummy, pear drop flavour that I’m really struggling to describe. The body is a little thin, there’s a caramel, toffee sweetness lurking in the background and it feels like it needs more body for that to be brought forward. Combined with the heavy carbonation, I can’t help but think of seltzer water.

I don’t really drink much wheat beer these days; that’s the thing with a gateway, you tend to move on into the house. When I do though, it’s more often than not with food. Wheat beers work really well with desserts I think and one of my favourite combinations is a banana-forward wheat beer with banana pancakes, delicious.

So, am I being a bit tough of this one, what do you think?


Find out more about the Drink Along here.

International IPA Day

"On Thursday August 4th, craft beer drinkers across the social sphere and across the globe will raise pints in a collective toast to one of craft beer’s most iconic styles: the India Pale Ale."

You can find out more about the first ever IPA Day here, and you can stock up in preparation here.