Beer – #22 in a series – Hawkes Bay Amber Ale

C/- Hawkes Bay Independent Brewery who talk it up a bit:

“A rich malt body with mild hop characteristic adds complex fruitiness and a pronounced bitterness to this deep amber ale. Batch brewed using traditional methods and cold filtered to give a smooth, crisp finish”

Well it initially smells fantastic, and the initial taste is somewhat pleasing. However, it’s fleeting and, for me, has that “pale ale” after burn which that I tend to shy away from. Not to say that it isn’t a pleasant beer, but I’d be wary of going back for more.

The taste falls away very quickly with this beer, which is something rather unusual, and not something that I recall happening before. It doesn’t sit in the glass well either, and seems somewhat flat and lackluster. Of course the next mouthful I have changed again, which means that this is either very complex or just odd!

They’ve also changed the bottle shape on this, and the two that I picked up have different labels and lids. Looking at this review. I’m a bit miffed that I didn’t get the unique unique bottle and not the pint size one that I have that, although the one I have is very reminiscent of a wine bottle in shape.

I’ve struggled to find a “good” review for this beer, and that in itself was odd, although to be fair it is a local beer for local people so the quantity of reviews is smaller than usual, however they’re all pretty much a much, this isn’t a winner.

So, to the pdubyah-o-meter for this, Despite it’s 500Ml (pint sized) bottle of 4% ABV it’s disappointingly well average and struggles to make a 4 out of 10 arbitrary stars.

You’ll not again that I learnt a bit from the last debacle of being artistic with the tilted glass with a cunningly lit beer, only just though, nearly ended badly and expensively.

Thanks to the people at New World in Albany who have a rather fine range of beers to choose from.