You'd want to be parched

Jordan is high on my must-visit list. Not for the beer, mind, though I'm sure I'd get a blog post of some sort out of it. I've been saved the trouble of looking for one particular Jordanian beer by Jay of Holland's pub and off licence in Bray who has supplied me with a can of Petra lager, courtesy of one of his customers.

It was with no small amount of trepidation that I flipped the ringpull. I've some experience of middle eastern beers, and they're often not great. I've some experience of canned lager in the 10% ABV bracket, and they, also, are often less than stellar. How do they go together?

As expected, I guess. The pour produces an ominously dark amber colour that just screams syrupy tramp juice. The screams get louder on tasting: lots of cloying sweet sugar and heady alcohol vapours. I'm surprised to see that no adjuncts have gone into it: all that booze is malt-generated, apparently. It's scary how quickly one gets used to it, however. Half way down the pint I'm thinking "I could actually drink this". The nasty sickly sweetness gives way to a watery quality that renders the beer something close to drinkable. A beer to treat with extreme caution.