A summer's lease

This bottle of Edinburgh brewery Top Out's Staple pale ale arrived via Steve and I opened it at the tail end of a long hot Sunday of back-breaking physical labour.

It's a sober name for a straightforward golden 4%er, pouring clear with a loose white head. Light but not watery, softly carbonated, it smells of golden syrup plus a slightly worrying harsh plastic or rubbery waft. No sign of that in the taste, thankfully. Instead you get lots and lots of hoppy perfume: intense meadowy floral notes, some lighter peach and just enough grassy bitterness to make it refreshing.

A perfect beer garden quencher.