Dark Star Hophead

Brewed by Dark Star
Style: Golden Ale/Blond Ale
Haywards Heath, England

Cask! Golden pour with big white head. Light fruit aroma. Flavor is much the same light fruits with some floral hops and a malty aftertaste with a lot of funkiness to it very belgian like. Easy to drink but wouldn’t call it hophead since hops are very absent mostly just funky maltiness and a slight fruitiness to it.

Funny rating this beer... I didn’t give it quite top marks in every area for one reason... theres always room for improvement, isn’t there???? Old Cross Tavern, Hertford

Cask. Yellow colour, mediumsized white head. Aroma is zest, hops and some caramel. Flavour is grassy hops, some malts and a bit of wood mixed in. Quite harsh and dry.

(cask @ The Old Toad - Rochester, NY) Slightly hazy golden color with a soapy and thick white head. Aroma is rather hoppy with some floral notes and some light citrus. Flavor has a very nice and strong hop flavor and a sweet middle of citrus and a nice and bitter hoppy finish. Alcohol isn’t so high that you can’t drink a lot of these. Very nice.

Cask@HBF2007
Pale yellow color, small white head. Citrus hoppy nose. Flowery, lemony hoppy flavor. Citrus fruityness is nicely balanced with backing malts. Good one.

Aroma was amazing, i perhaps rushed this a little it could have done with another days venting. Citrus lychee mandarin grapefruit touch of lemon, really fuckin good aroma. Taste is not as intence with the hops but seriously refreshing hoppy as fuck, bitter great finish. Just as good as brewers gold.

(Rating 500) Gravity, served by Fin at the Merton BF. Warm gold pour, small but sticky white layer of foam. This is just a gorgeous smelling beer, full of sunny early-summer citrus perfume. Delicate crisp citrus bitterness--a wonderful expression of the hop actually being a flower! A touch of round biscuit warmth in the finish adds depth and balance. Clean, bright palate. An elegant full-flavored but delicately balanced beer. Any fool can brew a hoppy pale beer--it takes an artist to brew something like this.

Cask conditioned at Merton Beer Festival 16-02-07. Poured a golden colour and with a thin bubbly head and looking crystal clear. This beer really was a little belter punching far above it’s weight it was a real star and the first to run out at the festival by a good few hours. The aroma was excellent and bettered only by the Crouch Vale Amarillo, with a wonderful fresh zesty fruit and hoppiness. The taste delivered far more punch and flavour than you really should expect from a beer with such a low gravity, with a wonderful juicy fruitiness with grapefruit flavours dominating and a lovely hoppy sign off. This really was a great beer and at this strength a good session beer, top marks to Dark Star again for squeezing so much out of such a relatively low abv beer.