17 January 2015

Southwold Hibiscus Wheat Beer (Marks and Spencer) [By @SpectreUK]



I do love a good wheat beer and it states on the neck of the bottle; "An infusion of Southwold wheat beer and hibiscus flowers", it reminds of a joke punchline in Fawlty Towers by Sybil, Basil Fawlty's wife; "pretentious moi!". In fact there is an illustration of a woman (well, mermaid) checking herself in the mirror with some hibiscus in her hair, that reminded me a bit of Sybil too. She did have something about her, in a way... Even if most of it was scary! And don't get me wrong, I do love Marks and Spencer, but sometimes... "Southwold Hibiscus Wheat Beer", come on... Call it "Mermaids Elbow" if you like! Although that sounds a bit like a swimming injury. However, I did notice fairly quickly that this particular wheat beer was brewed by a favourite brewery called Adnams. On opening the beer I noticed a strong sharpish flowery smell to this energetic bubbly dark amber beer. On first taste I was pretty taken back by the sourness that pile drived straight through any malted or hoppy flavours. There was definitely a flowery taste too, as my nose hairs plaited themselves with every swig. This was probably the most sour beer I've ever tasted, and the gooseberry one was pretty sour as far as I recall. I experienced a certain masocistic fervour when drinking this beer, and strangely enjoyed every nose tingling sip. I'd recommend you give it go, especially if you want to self harm for some reason but don't want to leave any marks! After all this is not just any old Hibiscus Wheat Beer, this is Southwold Hibiscus Wheat Beer brewed by Adnams for Marks and Spencer Hibiscus Wheat Beer!

Information on the bottle;
330ml bottle at 4.3% volume. From Adnams Brewery, Southwold, in Suffolk. Ingredients included; water, malted barley (contains gluten), malted wheat, hibiscus, yeast, hops, carbon dioxide.
By Spectre

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