Tom Wood’s Vanilla Orchid

Formerly brewed at Tom Wood’s
Style: Premium Bitter/ESB
Barnetby, England

Serve in English pint

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Tasted this speciality bitter in the Counting House, Glasgow (JDW) in November 2010. Cask, handpump dispense. Clear garnet red in colour with a thin off white head. Good lacing throughout and thin mouthfeel. Interesting aroma of vanilla ice cream and drinking chocolate powder. Mixed malts give a strong flavour of sweet creamy vanilla chocolate fondant which dominates the taste buds. No fruit note evident. Very little hop resins evident in this for the aftertaste but cloying almost milky sweetness of white chocolate apparent in the finish. Interesting as a one off but too sickly for a session.

On tap at wetherspoons in mexbrough during the beer festival. Amber colour. White head

Cask at the Tyburn JDW. Pours rich copper with a creamy, off-white head. Certainly some vanilla in the aroma, with sweet, bready malts as well. I actually quite enjoy the flavor. Not too sweet, with sort of a vanilla cream character, some toffee, toasted malts and some hints of earthy bitterness. Medium in body, lightly chewy with medium, smooth carbonation. Some sweetan sugary vanilla in the finish with more toast, burnt candy syrup, perhaps some light tobacco roast, and milg, earthen hops in the baclground. I suppose overall this brew isn’t super complex, per se, but it does offer a variety of flavor characteristics. I enjoyed it very much.

[Cask at the Monks Retreat (JDW), Reading] Dark amber, slight off-white head, slight fizz. Vanilla aroma, and lo and behold the flavour is dominated by vanilla too. Fortunately it’s a real vanilla pod flavour rather than sickly sweet artificial vanilla, but it’s still pretty sweet. No orchid that I could discern though! As you drink more, some other characteristics emerge - an oaky base, and a creamy, buttery finish. There’s a hint of citrus in the finish too, like a quick wipe of a scented wipe across your lips, which keeps the beer surprisingly light and refreshing - in other words, the beer has just enough hops to pull it off. There’s no doubt it’s a novelty beer - but I rather liked it! Note: try not to spill this on yourself; several hours later and even after washing my hands I was still getting vanilla wafts from the odd drips that landed on my fingers!

Cask Conditioned Handpump Last Plantaganet Leicester. An amber coloured beer with a whitish head and lacing. This is a nice malty beer with good supporting vanilla throughout. Gives a warm homeliness and a spicy kick in the mouth. A good beer where the vanilla works even though I thought it would need a porter like beer so to do.

JDW Fest Autumn 2010
Cask @ Henglers Circus, JDW. Dark copper colour, off-white head. Aroma is pungent vanilla. Flavour is vanilla, bit of caramel and spices. Light malted and sweet finish. Too generous with the vanilla.

Cask handpull Samuel Peto JDW Folkestone. Magogany colour with thin beige head. A little suspicious of the vanilla title. Certainly vanilla and malt on the aroma. Bit toasty too. Problem is the flavour that has some cardboard that is not entirely pleasant. Finish has a bit more rich malt and a touch more vanilla but the cardboard flavour lingers.

Cask - The Glass House (JDW), Norwich. Brown with a fine beige head. Jam-packed with sweet sweet vanilla on the aroma. Not so forthcoming on the tongue though it’s certainly still there on top of some caramel & a dryish earthiness. Soft mouthfeel, low carbonation, light body and an OK length to the finish.

From cask. Pours clear and golden deep brown to amber with a small tan head. Aroma is distinct vanilla and caramelish. Sweet vanilla flavoured, sweet caramelish to toffee. Sweet and almost sticky finish. Not my thing.

The Corn Exchange, Leicester (Lloyd’s), 84p a half. Always suspicious of the English spice rack, but this hits the spot. Copper with a slim, uneven beige collar. Cream soda aroma. And flavour, for that matter, but with enough underpinning aniseed and curranty, nutty, chocolatey, even rauchmalt (?) interest to carry it off. Reminds me of De Dochter Bravoure. Could be my guilty pleasure of the fest... no idea what others will make of it- in bad nick it would be undoubtedly be a nightmare. Well brewed stuff.