Animal tendencies

The role of animals in the branding of English beers is a fine, and often parodied, convention. I've been in Wetherspoon again, inspecting the menagerie.

Devon's Otter Brewery is first up, with Otter Amber. It's rare that I have any quibble with the beer quality at Wetherspoon, especially in the more upmarket Keavan's Port where I got this, but I don't think it was quite right. There was a definite murk about the pale gold colour, and a lemon tartness that I don't think belonged. That was at least fairly easy to ignore, and beyond it I found a solidly malt-driven bitter, oaty and grainy at heart, with a top layer of candied citrus. I reckon it would be well suited to summer, being easy drinking and only 4% ABV. Only that off-putting twang would prevent me from enjoying a few of them in a row.

I was surprised to discover I'd never tried Nethergate's Old Growler (it's a dog; grow up) before. The name is certainly familiar but maybe just because it's a JDW regular. It's a porter with a decent heft to it, at 5% ABV. That gives it a full body and a wholesome old-ivory head, the same colour as in those vintage ads for a certain Dublin-brewed stout that now pours with sterile bone-white foam. It turns out that the similarities don't end there. This is no chocolate-sweet porter but a drier, bitterer sort, showing the cabbage-and-zinc tang of classic English hopping. It's a refreshing change from the candified tendencies of contemporary porter brewing, and I would hazard a guess that the experience is close to how that Dublin-brewed beer tasted when it was still cask conditioned. This is a beautifully put-together beer: tasty, complex, subtle, and highly satisfying. I'd be quite content if standard porter were more like it.

Last of the cask is Whakahari, a bitter from Welsh brewery Purple Moose. I like this brewery; they make some great beers. This isn't one of them, however. Although it's a beautifully clear golden colour, it has quite a sterotypical soapy bitterness, dry and a little acrid. There is some softer fruit lurking in the middle, following the initial soapy hit -- I got red apple and a hint of juicy satsuma -- and then the acridity returns once more for the finish. It became less shocking and difficult by the half way point, and I'm sure is absolutely as the brewer intended. It wasn't to my taste, however. The name implies New Zealand hops, though I couldn't find any specified in the marketing. My guess is one of the harsher sort has been used, smoothed out by the cask serve but still with a slightly nasty edge. I'm sure somebody is into that sort of thing.

Last year I wrote a bit about Mad Squirrel, having happened across their pub in Watford. They, too, are now on the Wetherspoon roster, with kegged Big Sea getting some point-of-sale promotion. I'm in for a half. It's billed as a West Coast IPA but is distinctly murked, pale yellow and opaque like a Vermont fog (I assume). The aroma doesn't give much away, and the texture is surprisingly thin for 5.5% ABV. There's a broad lemon-zest flavour, followed by a hint of New England IPA's vanilla sweetness. They combine in the finish to leave a kind of citrus chew-sweet aftertaste. I strongly suspect that this has been brewed for the price point (€5.50 the pint on Abbey Street): it has the framework for dramatic hop pyrotechnics but doesn't deliver more than, well, a damp squib. Big Sea looks to have replaced BrewDog's Planet Pale, and that's a step down in flavour, to my mind.

Cask porter is best in show, then. Not a major upset on this blog.