OHanlons Royal Oak

Brewed by OHanlons
Style: Premium Bitter/ESB
Exeter, England

Hazy reddish pour with white head that lingers. Nose is pretty malty, with some earthy/herbal hoppiness. Likewise for the flavors...bready malt sweetness, cookie dough, and caramel with the earthy/herbal English hopping coming up strong in the finish. OK Engish pale ale.

500. Crystal clear dark amber with a fluffy platinum blonde head that leaves tons of ridged sedimentary layers of eggy lace down the sides of the glass. Looks very promising. Shortbready nose. Maybe a little bit of spicy brown bread happening there. So funny to think so many ESBs share a label designation with APAs when they’re such worlds apart. This smells and drinks closer to OSA than it does to any APA I can think of. Watery medium body with soft carb. Light spices, almost pie spices, with maybe a bit of banana and some shortbread. Half a liter of this will start to feel like drinking a loaf of bread, I just know it. Drinkable and well-made, but completely preoccupied with the malt bill, and gets to be a little on the heavy side for the amount of complexity it can offer.

50cl bottle: Hazy, dark red appearance with a stable off-white head. Lots of maltiness in the aroma, toasty, lightly chocolatey. Some sort of fruitiness as well, green apples? The dry, toasted malts carries on in the flavour, notes of raisins and caramel. Very little hop presence. Bittersweet and slightly salty finish - very drinkable, malt-forward and full-flavoured beer.

Bottle. Pours with quite the massive head of foam, taking considerable time to retreat into the shiny bronze beer. For an British ale, this has a remarkably American aroma, with a citric hoppy aroma, if a little soapy. But this drinks with a distinctly European tilt, sweet like tea, and thinner than what most American beer geeks would consider acceptable. Drinkable and flavorful for sure, but defiantly "old school". Hey, I like it. (#3745, 11/19/2009)

Pours a slightly hazy redish amber with a huge light tan head. Aroma is hops with a few notes of grain. Fullbodied and creamy on the palate. Hops taste is first on the tongue and predominate flavor. Not too bitter on the finish. This is a nice crisp ale that can add balance to a meal, especially slightly spicey dishes. Washes down well with chicken fajitas.

Frothy tinge of biege head,red/brown pour,aroma fruity floral,caramel malt,honey,flavour dry at first sweet honey caramel a bright fruit taste mild bitter,toffee taste late on the palate with the fruit and hop bitter,nice ale.

50 cl bottle. Dark copper body with small head. Flavour is malt, fruit and hops.

Bottle ࿒ cl) at Bishops Arms, Vasagatan, Stockholm, Sweden. Clear amber, medium fluffy off-white head. A bit oxidized-like malt aroma with red apples, spicy and citric hops. Light to medium bodied, medium carbonation. Dry, slightly acidic, with medium bitterness. Despite best-before-date being well into 2010, I suspect that this bottle was beginning to get infected.