McEwans Champion

Brewed by John Smiths (Heineken UK)
Style: Scotch Ale
Tadcaster, England

Serve in Thistle

Bottle from Tesco. Sour grassy aroma. Dark chestnut brow with beige head. Bitter sweet grassy taste with lingering aftertaste which isn’t pleasant. Unbalanced and too strong.

500 ml bottle from Tesco, Ayr - very strong dark beer sweet aftertaste and easy to drink, but not in large quantity

Pours dark brown with a creamy white head. Aroma is sweet malts, flavor is disgustingly sweet malts. Found it very hard to finish my pint.

Frothy head which dissipated quite quickly, leaving just a circle in the middle. Good beer, rich, malty, nutty taste, alcohol content well masked, very easy drinking.

Bottle, 500ml. Pours ruby copper, with virtually no head. Aroma of caramel and sweet malts. Sweet on the palate too, though not unpleasantly so. Pleasant ale overall.

Bottle. Dark brown, foamy tan head. Sweet, caramel flavor, with a bit of alcohol heat. Molasses and dried fruits. Dries out nicely in the end, from roasted malts, alcohol, and maybe a touch of hops. Finish is quite dry, becoming reasonably bitter as well. An interesting beer, much better balanced and more complex than the McEwans available in Japan. Still a bit too sweet for me, though. Very thick, with a quite heavy body.

Bottle from ASDA. Ruby red with a fluffy white head. Burnt, rubbery malt aroma with dark fruit. Flavour of cereal weetabix malts, hedgerow fruit and a bitter finish. Unusual.

The veritable ’meal in a glass’ Champion is a high ABV darker style beer which lends itself to malt profile rather than hoppiness (in true Scottish Ale style) Definitelty one of my firm favourites and a showcase for the blend of a variety of roasted malts and a delicious creamy head that lasts from top to bottom.