Stay in your lane!

I wasn't expecting much from the next in Volfas Engelman's Tastes of the World series, having been disappointed last time out. This time it's a "Belgian style wheat ale" -- so a witbier -- called Blond. That's a mainstay style for the beginner home brewer so a macrobrewery should be able to manage it. Immediate points off for being only 4.5% ABV, though it looks well: the proper bright and hazy yellow with a fine and lasting foam. The aroma is sweetly citric, like candied lemons, and I hoped the flavour would balance that with dry wheat and herbs. It doesn't. Instead it's extremely, cloyingly, sweet and syrupy, taking a weirdly tropical turn, suggesting passionfruit, mango and lychee in their stickiest, most concentrated form. I'm glad I wasn't drinking it on a warm day because the refreshment power is next to zero. This isn't offensive, but it's hard work. You need to have your sweet tooth screwed in firmly.

Time for an altogether more class act. I hope. Bravoro, in its own words, is a pale lager, composed of four hop varieties from German and Czech lands, and "an entire head above". Sure enough, there's the head, right on top as promised. Beneath, it's a cheery and clear medium gold with a faint biscuit aroma but not much else to say, smellwise. It's fairly sweet, in a Helles kind of way, mixing cake and candyfloss on a big fluffy body, entirely in keeping with the 5.2% ABV. Those vaunted hops bring a faint trace of grass and celery to the finish, leaving a cleansing peppermint aftertaste. There are no gimmicks or above-station ideas here; it's a super-clean and enjoyable pale lager in a big can for a very reasonable price. Bravo, Bravoro.

I understand why traditional breweries feel they have to offer diversity. That's the shape the beer market is now, and while I doubt it's essential for survivial, they also have shareholders to appease and a drive to shift ever greater quantities of product to new demographics. I'm reasonably sure there will always be a market for understated quality beers like Bravoro, even when the novelty-chasers have moved on.