James Squire Pepperberry Winter Ale

Brewed by Malt Shovel Brewery (Lion Nathan Co.)
Style: Spice/Herb/Vegetable
Sydney, Australia

Thank you Michael, this one is a stunner! smooth sweet wood nose, fruity malt and a classy hint of hop. not too much of a looker, but hey, hazy dark brown, not much of a head. poor bottle got dragged all the way from oz to fulham and then to wimbledon :-)... spicy berry flavour with so,e cellar apple and woody malt. smooth, balanced, and a great keep. worth the years wait! Aged marvelously. great beer xx

This is my least favourite of the James Suqire seasonal releases I’ve tried. I found the aroma to be almost overpowering without enough malt to back it up. Bought a six-pack but ended up giving most of it away.

bottled. copperish with not much sign of a head. some red pepper in the aroma with golden syrup. alas, there was little sign of any malt character to balance the pepper and a lack of and fresh bitterness in the finish and this verged on being nasty

Bottle. Dark copper, no head. Wow - a lot going on in the nose - peppery, piney, chocolate. Reminds me of sarsaparilla. Malty, sprucy - interesting.

With the smell of the Aussie bush with a reddish brown appearance. Keep it in your mouth for longer to really appreciate the flavours of the pepperberry which has a spicy sweet feel. The flavours linger nicely for a beer that is not full bodied. Australia’s gluhwein of beers!

One of the most confusing beers that I have ever had. .... still not sure what i should have expected. Over ripe fruit sarsparilla, spice, weird malt. Thinner body than I thought it might have. One thing is for sure- this is a very unique beer, and I do hope that they keep playing with it in future years.

From notes alone. Tasted back in May this year.
‘Strange oily, tar-like, tyre tread and stewed tamarind aroma comes out, just plain weird. Sparkling Deepest cola brown body with a well retained though thin tannish head atop that manages a little lace-work. Bastardly astringent tongue twisting, awkward, acrid and oily palate of brash nastiness. It does smell of a car doing a burn-out in a confined carpark, but this flavour is just rotten. Smoke, ash, oily fish, tannic tea, road tar and again tamarind, some peat and mouldy cheddar, quite adhesive to the tastebuds and al the way down for a long mixed bag aftertaste. Body is the only thing going for it, fuller than all the other MS beers, but that can’t save it. Not for me, someone should road test ‘Pepperberries’ in a salad or as a garnish to sweet meats, perhaps, before plonking it willy-nilly in an ale. Ugghhh!!!’ (345mL, 17/03/09, Int’l Beer Store, W. Leederville)

This was a nice find. More like a Xmas beer. Manage to temper a malty winter ale with a nice swettish overtone. Not something you can drink too much off - the sweetness does get a little cloying. Nice experiment however.