Abbeydale Deception

Gravity, Merton Winter Beer Festival. Very pale gold, small frothy translucent white head. Cinnamon and fruity musk aroma. Grape skin flavor, rather dry, pepper and cinnamon spice, lingering tannic finish. Pleasant, refreshing, solid, though I agree with Fin--the aroma promised a bit more than the flavor delivered.

Cask, gravity at Merton Winter Beer Festival Feb 08 Very light in colour in fact straw coloured I would say stunningly clear and with a lovely white bubbly head, so far so good. The citrus (grapefruit?) are there from the start as are some lovely floral notes, so great looking good, great aroma, but you know the taste is a slight disappointment, don’t get me wrong there is absolutely nothing wrong with this beer far from it but I thought it would be far better than it was. Starts with a good, fresh,sweet floralness and has a nice hoppy back bite it’s tasty, it’s a lovely session beer, and maybe it’s just a bit more subtle than I expected but the aroma and appearance promised so much more, still hat’s off to Abbeydale for a very good beer.

Cask conditioned at Merton Winter Beer Festival ’08. Pale gold with white head. Big flowery and citrusy flavours on a fairly thin and light base. Lots of drying grapefruit notes, tangy and adding to the bitterness with an overlaid flowery sweetness, I didn’t initially get this as elderflower but once it was pointed out then yes it is very apparant. A very tidy beer.

Gravity at Wellington, Brum. A massive smack of elderflower and gooseberry right off, just like a New Zealand S Blanc! Dry, malty, very bittr with mounds of those delicious gooseberry hops and some astringency, this is a rather extreme beer for the UK and a welcome return to form by Abbeydale.