bottle at home tasting ... copper brown ... thin lacing ... soft toffee malts ... light over fizzy ... small ovaltine malts ... juicy fruits

From the tap at the Local Taphouse, St Kilda on 27/1/2011 (part of a five beer tasting paddle). Light straw in colour. Has a powerful, fantastic aroma of passionfruit, mango and grapes. There’s more tropical fruit in the flavour, though the sweetness is quite muted. Finishes with a quite tart, and even slightly salty, lemony tang, along with some vinous notes. A really interesting, very different and lovely summer ale.

Bottle. Hazy coppery amber, no head. Pleasant floral notes over a mildly toffee aroma. Medium body, well carbonated. Flavour starts with fruit and toffeeish maltiness and has a nice gentle bitter finish. Overall a fine beer.

Bottle. Clear very pale straw with no head. Grassy hop aroma. Light body, strong carbonation. Flavour is dominated by a etallic hoppy bitterness. Overall it’s OK, but a bit harsh and light on flavour.

Bottle. Poured clear dark redish brown with a big beige head. Aroma of burnt toffee / caramel. Medium body but very fizzy. In fact the fizziness ruined the beer. It poured OK, it didn’t look crazily bubbly but each sip turned to a mouthfull of foam making it hard to taste - something wrong here definitely. The flavour was a fairly laid back stout with burnt / dark caramel and some bitterness in the finish. Overall I was disappointed as I expected more of this brewery. The beer was spoilt by the carbonation, but even then it was a fairly modest stout, perhaps redeemed by some interesting bitterness in the finish.

Pours dark amber with an off-white small head.Nose shows lots of peach and passionfruit hops along with more tropical fruit. Underneath is rich caramel malt.Similar flavours but more malty, with a little alcohol showing and a soft bitterness.Carbonation is a little high.

Bottle, label says 7.2% ABV. Cloudy copper with a large light beige head. Lots of tiny bubbles. Powerful aroma of grapefruit, flowers, ripe nectarines, pine, toffee, earth. Somewhat syrupy mouthfeel. Lots of rich toffee overshadows the pears, dried fruit and nectarines and is followed by piney bitterness. It’s quite bitter, but not so much so as to quite dry out the finish. There’s a bit of alcohol burn there too. Second sedimenty pour softened the plain richness of the toffee a bit. Given what I like about normal Hightail is the lightness and liveliness of the texture I was a bit surprised how much I liked this.

Tap. Honeyed amber with a light beige head that disappeared quite quickly. Aroma has mellow medium dark sugars, some fruit cake. Taste has modest caramel sweetness - there’s little dried fruit action - with a quite sharp bitterness that has an unpleasant metallic note. It’s not thin, but lacks that creamy-verging-on-syrupy feel that beers of this sort often have. Not quite bad enough to make the name apposite.

From a 330ml bottle on 11/4/2010. Has a moderate roasted malt nose, with the roasted, toasty malt flavours dominating when it hits the mouth. Has a touch of dried fruit (raisins) to it, a fair whack of bitterness at the end. A decent beer, but just doesn’t quite come together to really satisfy.

[2/10] Stylish 650ml bottle. Half 16C straight glass, (better) half 14C tulip. Barely hazy copper, small fading light tan head. Nose has caramel, passionfruit, lychees, pine, galangal, citrus and surprisingly prominent alcohol. Very soft mouthfeel. Lingering pine and grapefruit bitterness with mainly caramel and biscuity malt backing it. Spicy finish. It’s certainly hoppy, but there’s a (pleasing to me) reiteration of the house style: an emphasis on texture and depth over intensity. [rerate 3/10] , old rating 3.9] The lack of sophisticated malty flavours tells a bit on subsequent samplings.[6/13] Growler. After a few disappointing bottles of this in the new format, liking this as much as ever. Nothing’s fantastic, but everything works together.