Hitachino Nest White Ale

I Name: Hitachino Nest White Ale

Brewery: Kiuchi Brewery, Japan.

ABV: 5.5%

Style: Wheat beer

Season: Summer!

Availability: Unknown - currently stocked in M&S, Waitrose & served in Wagamama restaurants.

Price (I paid for it): £2.50 at Waitrose.

Try if you like: Blue Moon, Estrella Damm.

This is most definitely a sublime summer drop: I can't taste this little beauty without wanting to be basking in sunset, sat aside a glowing barbecue watching the night draw in. This 'White Ale' is a real treat from the land of the rising sun: it's aroma is reminiscent of a high quality European lager (German more than anything with its malty hop nose) and it is certainly enticingly familiar.

It pours out a golden straw colour with adelightfully  light fizz which betrays it's somewhat smooth mouthfeel but shows off its credentials as a wheat beer. However, I hate wheat beers: they tend to taste somewhere off the coastline of banana bread and thankfully this little brew doesn't even bedalie with that: it is very light for its heady 5.5% (I certainly felt it creeping up on me!) and the delivery is sweetness: honeyed oranges with a bitter-sweet finish ending with the floral happiness. The bottle boasts that it is made with orange peel and orange juice and that certainly makes its way through the sip and is what puts this beer perfectly in the hands of summer with an orange-citrus sweetness prevalent throughout the drinking. This pint really made me smile: it's delicious and if you can find one, just grab it - don't even think twice. The White Ale has bags of character and is a lighter way to appreciate delicately crafted ale. Before the doldrums of endless overcastes monopolise your days, savour a cold bottle of this wonderful drop on a hot summers day...or any day really: get stuck in!

Gem: Perhaps the greatest beer ever brewed.

Name: Gem

Brewery: Bath Ales

ABV: 4.8% (bottle)

Style: best bitter

Season: All year long!

Availability: Available all year: Waitrose have a steady supply it seems.

Price I paid for it: £1.90 at Waitrose. Sainsburys also seem to have a healthy supply!

Try if you like: Doombar, Rebellion Red, Abbot Ale, bitter, sweet malts.

Don't let the title of this post lure you into thinking this is delusional hyperbole: this has to be one of the most perfectly executed pints I have ever sipped. Normally, when people talk of a 'good all-rounder' they usually mean a 'jack of all trades - master of none'. Gem is an outstanding all-rounder and is in no way, shape or form a 'master of none': it is a 'master of all'. 

The colour of this beauty from Bath is a deep-set chestnut amber with comparisons easily made with the sublime Sharps Doombar from Rock in Cornwall. The flavour also is reminiscent of that same drop: malty, morish, bitter-sweet but with absolutely no sourness or tannin tack at the back of the palette: the flavour eclipses Doombar in one respect and that is in that it refreshes at the first taste. It is rich, however, for a bitter and potent at 4.8% and a few of these at The Rec has had me very merry before the half-time whistle! This, however, does not put you off wanting another - the taste of almost caramel-hinted sweetness tempts you in again and again.

This beer is an award-winner (winning silver and gold at the International Beer Challenge) and when drinking it, you can understand why. It is everything you want from a beer: rich tasting, well-hopped and surprisingly light on its feet for its strength, this coming from the combination of Goldings Hops from Kent and the floor-malted Marris Otter Barley. The brewery's website calls this offering 'quintessentially English' and it certainly is, I think, our nations best expression of its brewing standard. Try this beer at any point in the year and you'll be rewarded with flavour and texture to die for. This brewery just goes from strength to strength and you can tell that their exceptional work stems from the solid foundations of this exquisite pint.

Imagine taken from: https://www.bathales.com/our-ales/aid/gem/