Belhaven Wheat Beer (Bottle)

Brewed by Belhaven (Greene King)
Style: Wheat Ale
Dunbar, East Lothian, Scotland

An orange beer with a fine head. The aroma is strong, sweet, fruity, wheaty with a hint of orange. The flavor is bubbly, with powerful wheat, yet without the sourness that malted wheat usually gives a beer. It is pretty sweet and with only a slight bitterness to balance it.

(Bottle 50 cl) I find the back label’s claim that wheat beer originates in Northern Germany rather amusing. Wonder what would’ve happened during the war if the British general staff had lacked the same sense of geography. Would they’ve been looking for Hitler in the Eagle’s Nest around Flensburg somewhere? Anyways, I remember having this for the first time at the Copenhagen Beer Festival in 2003 concluding that the Scots should keep away from producing wheat beers. After having finished this I haven’t changed my opinion. This amber-coloured, slightly hazy beed has an oddly smoked character - pretty much like whisky-malt. Indeed a very different wheat! 250104

This is a seriously strange beer. Starts with an aroma of cloves and peat, however changes to light fruityness, canceling out the peat, then later on back to peat, with cloves and little wheatyness all the way through. Taste starts harsh smokey peat, however changes as with the aroma to a far smother peaty fruitiness. Reminds me of a scotch ale in some ways, however maybe needs a little more refining.

Bottled: Pours a hasy orange colour. Medium lasting head. Not much going on in the aroma. The flavour is a bit boring as well. Notes of banana and yeast but only vague tones of bitterness in the end.

Bottled. A lightcopper/dark gold coloured beer with a thin lemony floral aroma. The taste is wheaty and a bit perfumed. Drinkable if unspectacular.

Bottled. Gold, thin white head and moderate condition. Sickly sweet aromas with hints of esters. Definite hints of banana in the mouth but over sweet and unbalanced, more like a De Troch Chapeau than a Weihenstephan. Nasty plastic finish with oily mouthfeel.

Well, was not really a Weiss Bier, and they never said so, but it was a little far from the fron flavor, the wheat.

At least this is a better attempt at a style foreign to Scotland than their Pils. Quite crisp and lacking the domination of wheat that some beers of this style seem to have.Not bad at all.