Bottle at Chriso’s Kook Tasting 09. Thanks to my colleague Jenny who brought this back from the pub in Stourbridge for me. Black, brown edges. Thin beige head. Decent stout. Very tasty. Really drinkable stout. Dry stout. Lovely UK stout aroma. Fullish in mouth, touch of vanilla, bit grainy on the malts, but good roast malt. Lovely.

Dark brown with a small off-white head. Aroma of fruit, chocolate and coffee with a possible hint of brett. Dry and thin chocolate dominated flavour

Cask @ GBBF 09, Great British Beer Festival, Earls Court Exhibition Centre, London, England.Clear medium brown color with a small, fizzy, fair lacing, mostly diminishing, off-white head. Aroma is moderate to heavy malty, roasted, caramel, licorice. Flavor is moderate sweet and bitter with a average duration. Body is medium, texture is oily, carbonation is soft to flat. [20090806]

Cask at FFTMC Autumn Beer Festival, Oxford 27-09-09 Pours pale golden in colour with a thin white rim for a head. The nose is malty with some honey but there is just the merest hint of chemical (washing up liquid/detergent) I wonder if this glass was pulled out of a dishwasher before the rinse cycle?The taste is also honey, malt, sweetish, some hops and citrus show but again there is a faint taint of detergent in there which whilst not quite spoiling it takes this down a notch or two. A5 A4 F6 P3 Ov11 2.9

Cask at GBBF 2009 ... Brown black ... light roast malt nose ... light blackcurrant ... roast malts ... little charcoal.

Cask@GBBF 2009. Opaque black color, small beige head. Sticky aroma of tobacco ash and glue. Quite sweet: molasses, plums, some dark malts. Sticky flavor, not very plesant. Lingering toasted sweety aftertaste.

Cask@GBBF2009. Deep ambery colour, small brown head. Aroma is hops, roasted malts, some slight wooden notes as well as mild toffee. Flavour is sweet roasted malts, fruits, smoked wood and mild notes of peat.

Bottle that I picked up from Wye Valley garden centre, Bicester, Oxon, 19-04-09 and consumed the same day. Pours amber with a few isolated bubble’s, but this is really quite flat and lacking in much life. There are some real rustic earthy qualities about this beer, a tad malty, some gentle bitterness, its ok. A5 A2 F6 P3 Ov11 2.8

Bottle that I picked up from Wye Valley garden centre, Bicester, Oxon, 19-04-09 and consumed the same day. Pours a murky chesnut brown colour with what I presume was an off white head, I never saw it for long enough as it had all but disappeared by the time that I sat down with this. This is a bit of an ugly duckling, doesn’t start out great but is a real winner. Nice sweet dark unrefined sugar’s, some bitter cocoa and a little dark fruit, primarily fig’s and dates all combine to make this quite a hit in the taste department. The aroma, lest I forget, is also sweet and malty. Throughout there is a nice warming from the alcohol, its a lovely beer. A7 A2 F8 P4 Ov17 3.8 Had this again this time Cask at the Plough, Fish Street, Worcester, 27-06-09 Poured very dark brown with whiteish? head, tasty full of chocolate, quite roasty, dark fruits. It’s a good beer but surprisingly not a patch on the BCA that I had recently. I will leave my BCA score on here as I had that quite recently. A6 A4 F7 P4 Ov13 3.4

Cask (handpump) @ Wellington, Birmingham, England B2.Clear medium yellow orange color with a average, frothy, good lacing, mostly diminishing, off-white head. Aroma is moderate malty, light to light moderate hoppy, spicy - ala peppery notes. Flavor is moderate sweet and bitter with a average to long duration. Very easy to drink but nothing special a bit borring. Body is medium, texture is oily, carbonation is flat. (300708)