Frontier - New Wave Craft Lager

Okay, in my last post you know how I mentioned that I forced myself past the wicked cool labeled beer and picked up a nice traditional, pretty plain looking one??.... Well this time I was utterly, completely, unapologeticly drawn in by the alcoholic "cover art", which you can see for yourself in the accompanying picture (and by checking out our instagram)
Unfortunately, and believe me I hate to say it, the bottle design may have been the best thing about the beer. I am loathed to say it but I was pretty massively underwhelmed. If I was to provide an analogy, which I'm sure you all want me to do, I'd equate it to sitting under an apple tree waiting for an apple to fall into your hand, and having an onion land in your lap.
The bottle sells by saying that the "combination of new world hops deliver citrus and spicy notes to reward your thirst for exploration". Perhaps I'm just lacking in a sense of exploration, because I found the taste pretty tame. There was a certain zestfulness, but this was only noticeable when you really payed attention to the taste. The only plus points I can give it (other than the afor-fawned-over label) are that a) it was certainly refreshing and b) when popping the cap off the bottle, it definitely smells amazing. However, at least from my own point of view, the delicious scent is a harbinger of disappointment.
I therefore give it my lowest score yet, and match my colleague's previous score of 3/10.

Henry

Bacchus Raspberry Beer

Greetings beer lovers! This is my first post and now I realise I have a lot of catching up to do - my silence has been broken so this train is filled up with coal and ready to leave the station. Buckle up!

So here we go, Bacchus is a Lambic beer (though not an entirely traditional one) made in Belgium by Van Honsebrouch brewing company, and for those of you who don't know what Lambic beer is, I've done the research for you: basically Lambic beers hail from some region Belgium and it is just a different type of beer which is left in open vats with wild yeast. Then, in the case of Bacchus at least, it is fermented with fruit.

On to the beer itself - perhaps the best thing I can say about raspberry beer is that it is presented wonderfully, almost like a miniature bottle of wine, all wrapped in fancy looking paper which makes it all feel super classy. So the taste: well it's those first few sips that sell the beer to you and the first thing you notice is that it's somewhat refreshing to begin with but when you wash that away you're hit with a very dry taste with only the slightest hint of raspberry and once you've exceeded 4 or 5 big sips, the illusion of the delightful berry red colour of the beer diminishes with haste.

Overall this isn't what I would call a great beer, maybe a good one or an okay one considering it's a fruity beer, but it's not something that is going to take the edge off after a long day when you crack open a cold one and lie on the couch and in the end isn't that what we all really want?

With all that in mind I'm giving Bacchus Raspberry Beer our first 3/10

Jack

Old Speckled Hen

To restart this blog I felt it'd be good to go for a nice familiar name, so while wandering the beer aisle in Sainsbury's, and having all these interesting and fancy looking bottles calling to me, I eventually landed on a beer that I recognize through countless TV adverts featuring an ever sneaky fox... Old Speckled Hen.
The bottle says that Old Speckled Hen (OSH) is a "Strong fine ale" and that certainly rings true with the flavour. It's certainly got a nice distinguished taste which is both delicious and refreshing. You can tell that OSH is an ale too by the strength of flavour and the beery aftertaste which, although slightly bitter, is very pleasant.
I have to admit that I've been drinking  a lot of the same beers recently, all of them fairly light in flavour and colour (I'm sticking with the English spellings no matter how much blogger tries to correct me). Therefore to be drinking a pleasantly dark, pleasantly strong ale was a very welcome change of pace. Having said that, summer is fast approaching, so I think I will be leaving Old Speckled Hen for colder times, where I want a nice beery wallop.
All in all, I give it a good 5/10
Henry