I promised myself I wouldn’t drink on my vacation and get some stuff done around the house, play with the dogs, etc. I just went over to Kroger to pick up a couple things, and walked past this. How could I resist?
It’s Monty Python’s Holy Grail, and it was brewed to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the comedy legends. It’s 1:00 here now, but since I’ve been up since 5 (another thing I promised myself I wouldn’t do on vacation) I decided to go ahead and drink it. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not really great at describing beer, but this stuff is pretty good. For the aficionados out there, here is the description from Beer Advocate.
Dusty orange-gold with an abundance of fine, suspended bits. The pastel orange tinted, cream colored head is sticky enough to lay down a better than average amount of lace in chunky, concentric rings. A good look.
The nose, unfortunately, isn’t so good. It smells like lightly musty grain with a subtle whiff of English hops. I’m not sure that I want it to be more aromatic because what’s appreciated isn’t all that wonderful.
Things start out promisingly enough on the palate with a fruity, spicy hoppiness. Because of undermalting, the flavor deteriorates quickly to become harsh and mineral-like with a ragged, unsupported bitterness. The beer doesn’t feel flat in terms of carbonation, but flat in terms of flavor. There’s an echo of reasonable hop flavor on the finish, but it’s too little, too late.
I disagree completely. I didn’t see any bits, and the flavor lasts. Little to no head though, which is a downside, in my opinion.
Here’s the official Web site.
Added: By the way, the little blurb at the bottom of the bottle reads: “Tempered over burning witches.” Heh.