Thursday Night Beers

6.2 IPA by Broughton Ales
I had this on cask earlier tonight in my local Wetherspoons and was very impressed. Broughton Ales have always struck me as a more traditional ale brewery (sorry!), so to see this on the bar was a bit of a surprise.

Bursting with tropical fruit aroma and taste punctuated with a long, bitter finish that lingers for quite a while afterwards this is a very solid IPA. I felt that it could have done with a bit more hoppiness to balance the bitterness but apart from that it was fantastic. I'd love to try it on keg or in bottle. And it was only £1.49 a pint!

Criminales Fraudster by Box Steam Brewery
89p. That's all this beer cost. How good can it be for less than a pound?

The answer is not very. The aroma and taste is a very one dimensional malt character and there's absolutely no discernable hop character.

Drinkable enough for 89p and if I was a bit low on funds and wanting a session I'd consider it. (And then probably opt for homebrew.)

Ghost Ship by Adnams (Beer Bods)
This week's Beer Bods is an absolute classic. It really doesn't get much better than Ghost Ship. It really is an almost perfect beer. I say almost because I'm sure there is something that could be improved, there's no way I could find it though.

It pours a lovely dark orange colour, with a small head which quickly fades to leave just a dusting of bubbles on the top.

It has a rather restrained citrus fruit aroma, it's not in your face but lightly dusts your nostrils with memories of citrus.

The taste is very similar with the citrus fruit juiciness balancing the bitterness perfectly on top of just the right amount of body.

An utterly fantastic beer, words almost don't do it justice. I tried my best though!

Fallen Odyssey

Up until a few weeks ago I didn't have a whole lot of experience with Fallen, despite it being one of my local breweries. One bored Saturday after a tweet to the owner and I was on the twenty minute drive out to Kippen to check out the brewery.

I managed to pick up a few bottles from the farm shop across the road from the brewery, one of which was Odyssey, a 4.1% blonde ale.
It pours a very pale yellow with a huge, fluffy white head that sticks around for quite a while.

The aroma is all spicy Saaz with a little bit of malt coming through at the end and the taste is more of the same balanced on a beautiful, almost creamy body.

This is a wonderful beer and it certainly continues the high standard set by the other Fallen beers I've had recently.

Okell's Maclir

When I saw this beer on the shelf at my local B&M I was intrigued. Two things caught my eye: 'Okell's' and 'wheat beer'. Not many UK breweries have a wheat beer amongst their staples, and Okell's are a brewery which I have very little knowledge of. Two good reasons to pick it up and try it. Not to mention the fact that it was only £1.09.

It pours a clear golden colour with a creamy white head which quickly dissipates to leave nothing more than a few bubbles on top. Citrus fruits dominate the aroma with not much malt coming through. Not a typical wheat beer aroma, for me. The taste is more of the same: decent citrus hoppiness up front followed by a dry and bitter finish with a hint of wheat.

As a wheat beer fanatic, I'm a little disappointed with this beer. The wheat doesn't seem to add anything to this beer and it's left me pining for the bottle of Erdinger I have in the fridge.

It raises an interesting question though: what do we think of when we hear the words 'wheat beer'? For me it's that fantastically fluffy, white head on top of a hazy, golden body in a tall, slender glass. I saw the label of this beer and expected a Bavarian hefeweizen. Instead I got an English golden ale.

Maybe this beer would be better billing itself as an 'English wheat beer'. 'Wheat beer' may be too broad a style, leading each of us to draw our own conclusions

about what we hope to be in the glass.

Maclir isn't a bad beer though. It's well made and really quite delicious, it just wasn't what I was expecting from the label and it left me a little disappointed, to be honest. I'd definitely try this beer again, especially at just over a pound for a pint.

Better go grab that bottle of Erdinger, I suppose.