Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Hop Back Summer Lightning Golden Ale

'A trendsetter in the brewing industry; the original Summer ale brewed all year round. An extremely pleasant bitter, straw coloured beer with a terrific fresh, hoppy aroma. This, coupled with an intense bitterness, leads to an excellent long, dry finish. Probably the beer to receive the most awards in Britain!' From www.hopback.co.uk/

This is by far one of the most carbonated beers I have had in recent memory, as soon as I popped the top off it was flowing out of the bottle and spilling all over my counter top! Every pour was a close call and I think I ended up cleaning up as much as I was able to drink down. Very annoying.

I was really looking forward to drinking Hop Back Summer Lightning after I picked it up at Sam's Wine and Spirits. Great label, a decently priced import and golden ales are usually great summer brews. I ended up being very disappointed with the end result. This stuff has some serious bubbles to it that made it not only hard to drink but the burp factor was dangerous to say the least. What little flavor I could discern through the foamy mess was very tart and thin. Not really worth all the effort, which is insane to say when talking about a beer.

Pass on this stuff unless you have a fetish for hiccups. A total and absolute let down.

Musical pairing: the Monkees- S/T (another bummer of a British export)

2 comments:

Erik Huntoon said...

Never had this beer but I have had a similar experience with over carbonation with some Three Floyds Pride and Joy Mild Ale. I recieved a case of that for my birthday last year and after a couple months, the remains of that case all became foam bombs. So bad that over a year later I still had 2 bottles from that case left. I love that brew, but it was unpourable and a small sip made you feel like you just shotgunned a full can. I actually just used one of the final bottles to soak wood chips in this past weekend when I smoked a beef brisket. Gonna save the final bottle for the next grill-out.

Matt said...

Maybe the gremlins in my fridge had something to do with it.