John Smiths Cask

Brewed by Thomas Hardy (Burtonwood)
Style: Bitter
Burtonwood, England

Sampled at the Lord John Russell, London WC1 14/7/08. Deep amber coloured with a moderate white head. Malty throughout, with some sweetness but not cloyingly so. Pretty inoffensive all round.

Guzzled half at The Tap and Barrel (?), Pontefract. Woodsy, slightly nutty malt snout. Lacy and blanketed. Watery oak, mild-like choc and mushy Malted Milk. Oaty/peanutty afters. Disappointingly, quite an inoffensive MOR caramelly/nutty sessions. How that crap in the cans scores exactly the same as this (2.49) is one of life’s great mysteries.

Cask at Bricklayers Arms, Whittlesea, Cambridgeshire. Amber with a small white head. Malt aroma. Sweet malty taste, slight bitterness. Utterly one dimensional but I rather liked it

Cask at the Lord Russell in Bloomsbury. Light fruity, near cola, aroma. Dark amber with an off-white head. Medium body with light carbonation. Fresh fruit with darkish roasted malt. Slightly harsh like a brown can be. Somewhat watery - flavor washes over all. Pleasant.

A simple, amber bitter with toasted and straightforward malt flavours. Dry and faint leafy hops try to awaken their lot, but mostly get eaten up by the malt’s nuttiness. A fair bitterness nevertheless chimes in. Not bad, but too simplistic to be a lot of fun.

Cask (handpump) at The Blue Ball, York, October 2006. Amber colour with a creamy sparkled head. An entirely plain Northern English style bitter. Low aroma. Dabs of dry malt and dusty hops in the flavour. Light mouthfeel. Not really much to dislike here. Or to like for that matter. A purely functional session bitter in the old style.

cask at White Swan, York: copper colored with half an inch of white head. aroma is sweetish malt. So is the flavor no real traces of hops. watery palate. Not an offensive beer. Just doesn’t have much to offer.

The Fox, Chatham. Nondescript, run of the mill weak bitter with pellet hop finish. Not great.