GB Brews

Post two of Boxtravaganza 2021 lumps together everything from Britain on an arbitrary basis. Let's see what the neighbours are up to these days. 

I was excited to see new Edinburgh brewery Newbarns represented with their Pilsner. This no-nonsense brewer of classic continental styles has been getting good notices and sounds right up my street. The pils is 4.2% ABV, perfectly clear and a very pale yellow. Immediate points off for head retention, that vanished disturbingly quick. The hops are Callista, a relatively new German variety. There's an almost funky, farmish quality to the aroma, a concentrated damp greenness. Nothing so loud in the flavour, however. It's pleasingly crisp, with a snap of cream cracker and gently lemony afters. And that's it. It's astonishingly clean finishing with pretty much no aftertaste. I think I would prefer a little more character, but as an easy-going sessioner I could very happily sink a few pints of this.

From pilsner to witbier, Zomba is next, brewed at Round Corner in Melton Mowbray. It's not fully traditional, including lavender in the recipe. It looks normal, though: hazy yellow; fluffy white head. There's a peppery spice to the aroma with a hint of bathroom cabinet suggesting the lavender beginning to come through. That really takes control on tasting with big perfume and bathsalts balanced by a juicy orange sweetness. At 5.2% ABV it's only slightly stronger than a typical wit but the flavour is much louder, more intense, and runs the risk of turning cloying. This is certainly not a casual refresher and it took me a while to get through it -- very much a bold craft take on the style. It's fine but I'm not sure it's an improvement.

Time was I'd class "mojito sour" as another unusual style but Thornbridge's Kuba isn't even the first I've had from a northern English brewer. They've laid the mint on pretty heavily in this one, present alongside a hint of mineral tartness in the aroma but very much taking the lead in the flavour, both the initial hit and the long menthol finish. I suspect the brewery hasn't used any lime, perhaps relying on the hops to bring the citrus, but they don't. The only ingredients listing on the can is in German and it doesn't mention lime, nor mint either, oddly. There is a clean and tart beer at the centre, and it does its job of being a 4.5% ABV refresher, but it's nowhere near as complex as a cocktail name implies.

And so to the IPAs. The other Scottish representative, and entirely new to me, was Overtone, with a New England job called Love Your Local -- a shout-out to the businesses that kept them ticking through The Unpleasantness. It is extremely pale, the wan brassy shade of pineapple juice. I expected a big kick from the hops as none of Rakau, Simcoe and Galaxy are shy and retiring. Sure enough the aroma is an insanely strong funky, savoury buzz, like long-fermented silage and hot sparks of flint. The flavour goes all out for dryness, an extreme sort of sesame paste with added chalk dust and oily sage. "Earthy undertones" says the label but they're far from undertones, leaving no room for the promised peach, passionfruit and apricot. This is the opposite of juicy and was probably sucking juice from the other cans in the fridge. While I appreciated its boldness and uniqueness of character, it's not my sort of thing at all. Rakau and I don't usually get on, and this is a prime example of why.

By way of contrast, Cloudwater follows that with a self-avowedly "clean and bright" IPA named Volley. It certainly looks it, a fully transparent lagerish gold. The aroma gives little away; maybe a hint of stonefruit and some oatmeal biscuit, but that's it for the nose. At 6% ABV there's a considerable body; almost chewy. I had hoped for crispness but that's not how it rolls. The flavour shows a little of the savoury quality found in the previous beer, though thankfully there are other things going on too. A classic C-hop lime peel bitterness is one feature, and there's a herbal side too: rosemary and dill. The malt beneath is softly spoken, contributing a little candy and cake, but staying out of the way of the promised clean finish. There's no gimmickry here, nor chasing of trends, not even the retro west coast revival. This is a weighty yet balanced hop-forward construction; a calm demonstration of a brewery that doesn't need to shout or pull silly tricks to make itself heard.

One In, All In is a rugby-themed grand collaboration, organised by Siren but with input from White Hag, Fyne Ales and Welsh brewery Lines. It's a red IPA of 6.5% ABV and a very dark shade of copper in the glass. The aroma is a very broad mix of hop effects: dankness, citrus and a fair whack of husky dry savouriness. I was expecting more malt sweetness but had to wait for the flavour to get that. It's not the usual big toffee thing but a more subtle fruit salad vibe, blending seamlessly with the hops. There's a lightness of touch that you don't get from most cloying and sticky red IPAs; I enjoyed the refreshing, juicy honeydew and white grape effect. The savoury aroma remains off-putting all the way through, but hold your nose and it's bob on.

And we're back to the haze with Pressure Drop and 150 Friends which is 6.8% ABV and uses Citra, Ekuanot and BRU-1. The aroma is flamboyantly juicy, with the intense sweetness of passionfruit coming out in particular, plus more than a little pineapple and mango too. In a rare occurrence, two out of these three analogues is also mentioned on the can, alongside papaya. Maybe I don't eat enough papaya to spot it. But while it smells like tropical breakfast juice, the flavour is more restrained. For one thing, the alcohol takes the lead and there's almost a weighty liqueur feel in the foretaste where I expected a happy juice explosion. The tropical side arrives later and it's escorted by a scowling citrus bitterness and a certain fuzzy grittiness. Bitter grit is what you're left with on the fade out. It's still pretty good overall, just not as fun as I was initially led to believe. Plaudits for that aroma, though.

#passiondelivered via our friends at Cloudwater is presumably Rock Leopard telling us in the wankiest way possible that their beer is contract brewed at Cloudwater. I wasn't off to a good start with Type Here To Search, a west coast IPA. It looked to be pouring nicely at first too, pale and clear, before the sediment clouded it up in an un-west-coast way. The aroma is harsh and flinty, formed of Chinook, Loral and Simcoe hops. My apprehension deepened. That mineral quality carries through to the flavour which is slightly metallic; a kind of zinc-like galvanic tang. Balance of a sort is provided by a sickly orange cordial effect. No zest, no zing. It's 6.8% ABV but feels stronger, almost syrupy, with considerable heat. I get an impression that they've aimed for crisp and clean IPA but ended up with a barley wine instead. The flavours aren't jarring or unpleasant, more that there aren't enough of them; it's just a big boozy lump. Takes one to know one, I suppose. Moving on...

Just the one stout in this set. Solitude from Left Handed Giant brings us to the 7% ABV mark and is brewed with coffee, hazelnut, vanilla and lactose. There's no mistaking that from the aroma: it's a very dessertish affogato effect. I thought the coffee would bring a little balancing roasted bitterness to the flavour but I was mistaken. It is a nightmare of pure sweetness; painfully so. My jaw hurt from the first sip. The can gives us full details of the coffee used but that's a waste of time because the lactose and vanilla utterly smother it, with the hazelnut (syrup?) yelling hyperactively too. Nobody would dream of showing off a specific variety of coffee by serving it with all this gunk in it so I don't understand what the brewery is up to. There's a little bit of wafery dryness on the finish which means it doesn't gum up the palate completely but that's small consolation. I've had lots of messy stouts like this before and they do not impress.

Last on the list is a double IPA from Verdant: The Future Is Uncertain. It's a very hazy one, a typical opaque orange-yellow. An all-Kiwi hop lineup had me expecting lots of grass and minerals but it's very juicy all through: tangerine and satsuma featuring big in the aroma, while the flavour is a little more of a complex fruit salad, incorporating some of Nelson Sauvin's white grape in with the pygmy oranges. There's a slight herbal quality in the aftertaste, but nothing more involved than a pinch of spearmint. The texture is relatively light and there's a respectable, and respectful, amount of alcohol on display. I really enjoyed this, particularly how bright and clean the flavours are, devoid of mucky fuzz or savoury twangs. The end result is happy and sunny. This is one for other brewers to take note of: please make your hazy double IPAs like this. For me.

I guess that's an appropriately-named beer to finish on. The normal Hagstravaganza festival almost happened this year so it's reasonably likely it will be back in 2022. Stay out of those Chinese wet markets in the meantime, just to be safe.