DE14 Flight Suit Orange Pale Ale (Sainsbury's) By @SpectreUK

I had one of those memory lapse moments yesterday. The one's where you're talking to someone about something and you just can't remember a word or name and it drives you crazy. I just knew I'd remember it after the conversation. I was at the gym being a bore as usual about the rehabilitation of my knee after surgery once I'd popped to the shops wearing my old (really, really old) cowboy boots. In the past I've amused Cinabar by walking like the mad robot cowboy in the '70's film Westworld. It's not like a John Travolta strut, it's something far more sinister. Westworld is a great Sci-fi yarn (not for everyone I suppose) about a futuristic holiday resort where the cybernetic robots end up going mad and trying to kill the guests. I just couldn't remember Yul Brynner's name until afterwards. It's all part of being off work for a long period of time and not keeping my brain in gear. Anyway, after parking my car at the shops I had managed scary Yul's walk for about three minutes before it hurt too much, which is pretty good considering up until now all I've managed is a dodgy limp.

I'm away with the fairies much of the time, daydreaming about everything and anything. So that's what this beer is about I guess… Flight Suit is an Orange Pale Ale from the DE14 Brewery in Burton-Upon-Trent. So bring out your fishy and or spicy meals to enjoy with this one, Folks. I thought I had a tuna sandwich tonight, but it looks like I have hot sausage rolls instead! Flight Suit has five different hop varieties for a super citrus burst, and a generous helping of Mandarina Bavaria hops to give this beer a marmalade aroma and an extra orange flavour. I do love marmalade on toast, but I'm not sure I'll get flight clearance to recommend this for a breakfast beer!

On opening the can this rather excitable 5.1% volume pale ale did smell reminiscent of marmalade, albeit a rather beery sweet barley and pale malt version of the breakfast spread. On taste this deep golden orange pale ale does taste orangy. Not the citrus blast I was expecting though. That bitter hoppy citrus often almost face twisting sharpness that can come with some orange pale ales. Flight Suit is pretty relaxing. It's more like Night Flight to Venus by Boney M. Yes, there's citrus bitterness on take off, but it didn't bother me in the slightest. I just sat back and waited for the flight attendant to pour the rest of my drink. The sweet malted barley came almost immediately soothing my tastebuds after the bitter citrus hops, and then the Mandarina Bavaria hops spaceship's thrusters fired, making me realise this is a beer to enjoy without food. And so the Mandarina Bavaria hops merged into the aftertaste with the sweet pale malt spiriting my palate to some far off orange planet allowing me to spacewalk in my Flight Suit with fantastic orange pale ale on tap.