6.8

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 6 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7

Hand pull at Grape and Grain. Slightly hazy amber with a fine cream head. Aroma of bread, pears, quinces, flowers, bracken. Smells like a bitter. Creamy texture. Taste is quite sour with bitterness and spices at the end. Apples, twigs, lemon, some berries. Sichuan pepper at the end is mild but lingers forever. Refreshing. First draft beer from 2MT for me. As ever, interesting to drink beer from a brewer proceeding by experimentation rather than indulging in it.Earlier Rating: 1/21/2010 Total Score: 3.2Bottle. 10C. Hazy amber. An inch of stable fluffy creamy-beige head. Modest aroma - some caramel, citrus and woody hops. Taste is sweet with some bitterness out the back. There’s also some wood and sour apple juice character. The hop note at the end is crude and a bit nasty. I’m in two minds about this beer. On the one hand, bits of it are crude and some of the tastes verge on the unpleasant. On the other hand, it has character and - dare I say it - terroir. It has that aliveness and rambunctiousness that good low ABV English styles have that so often seems to get eliminated when things are more refined. So many Australian brewers are trying for good: this is a rough draft of great. But it is pretty rough.