Hawkes Bay Amber Ale

Brewed by Hawkes Bay Independent Brewery
Style: Amber Ale
Napier, New Zealand

Serve in English pint, Shaker

Copper coloured with some nutty, oxidative, biscuity malt notes cut against by orange zest like hop notes.

500ml bottle. Looks good in the glass and has tempting aromas as well. Dull amber almost copper colour with a light sandy flat head. Biscuity caramal malt aroma dominates. A little light on flavour with a moderate amount of bitterness. Reasonably light in the mouth and on the palate.

Clear copper/ amber collour with no head, looks flat. Aroma of malty bread and brown sugar.Tastes metallic and flat.

Bottle. Pours a nice golden amber with smallish light beige coloured head. Nice looking beers. Fairly ordinary aromas of doughy malt and a faint hint of toast. Flavours are slightly sweet with faint hop bitterness on the end. Very thin mouthfeel. average beer.

Light biege colored head clear red brown pour aromas caramel fruit a sweetness flavour strong grasssy note very sweet a soapy touch lemon not much caramel weak beer finish sweet grassy mild bitter very ordinary ale

Copper colour with a thin lace. Crisp malt, hop and honey aroma. Thin texture. Rich malt flavour. All a bit rich. Average beer.

Lovely looking beer, tho very little head retention. Aroma is subdued, slight grassy hop. Palate is pretty thin, some fruity malt comes through late on. Finishes quite dry. The only thing that sets this apart from the massed ranks of ’NZ Draught’ is that it isn’t too sweet - however, there’s little hop presence, it’s over-carbonated and uninspiring.

330ml bottle, comes in a very cool looking bottle that looks like a fancy little wine bottle with wine bottle looking labels and with a company logo on the end of a beer (wine?) barrel protruding from it, extra points for appearance. The beers hue is lovely, it does indeed have a deep copper colour and a thick creamy (white to off-white) head as promised... however the head almost fully diminished very quickly, fair lacing. Aromas are not particularly strong but there is light caramel, marshmallow, leather. As it warmed some nice light citrus notes came through briefly. Flavour is light biscuity caramel sweet initially for a short time, short very light bitter finish. Light body, dry watery texture, soft carbonation. Nice enough but needs more substance (aroma flavour and body) to make it a better beer.