Oakham Oblivion

Brewed by Oakham
Style: English Strong Ale
Peterborough, England

Cask gravity at White Cliffs BF 2007. As it seems to be always with me, I have an Oakham beer as the first beer of a festival and almost always ends up being beer of the festival for me. Does this one? Not sure yet. Deep chestnut colour with lasting bubbly beige head. Trademark grapefruit. Unbelievably hoppy for a British beer. Good toffeeish malt. Nice mixed finish. Grapefruit leafyness is lovely. Great resiny pine throughout.

Cask Stillage from the upstairs bar at the Ship & Mitre, Liverpool 16/02/2007 Fruit and hop aromas. Dark mid brown coloured with some alcohol present. Fruity bubble gum flavour. Crisp and bitter malt finish.

A Mes rate: cask at the New Crown JDW.
A mid copper colour with a thin white film and excellent condition. Excellent Oakham hoppage in the aroma with a slight sweaty note that I can only describe as the smell of a good woman after a sexual extravaganza. Backed up by some awesome bready malt in the background and a faint whiff of booze makes it a glorious olfactory experience. The flavour is pretty much identical. Yes I can taste lady bits... And all the rest of it too. Damn. This is just excellent. Good developing bitterness in the finish, giving it excellent length. Wonderfully drinkable considering the reasonable happy making factor. Awesome stuff. Hats off to Tom for getting this to the glass in such fine form.

Cask in the boat in peterborough just next to the festival. Alround rating: Fruity yeastyness, appley, alcoholic peppery notes, spicey toffeeness. RERATE: Cask in the new crown. Alround rating: aroma is soo fruity, like plums and pears, lychee and orange. Taste is fuller and fruityness is key. Alround a great beer that was very unexpectitly good.

Cask conditioned at Merton Winter Beer Festival ’08. Brown beer with white head. Now this is the real deal for me, with Oakham you are going to get the hops and this has enough to be an IPA, leafy, fresh, peppery with an oily perfume character. Then there is bitterness and grapefruit citrus notes bouncing around over the rich caramel body. This is a great beer in my book, I loved it.

Cask (gravity dispense), White Cliffs Best Festival. Attractive bronzed copper colour. Big Pacific North-West hop aroma - flowery and aromatic. Powerful grapefruit flavour with some tropical fruit notes. There’s some malt providing and almost chocolate touch in the background. Sharp, resinous hop finish, tending towards astringent. Could easily be mistaken for an American beer and there are not too many British beers you could say that about. Assured and impressive.

Cask conditioned - gravity dispense - Merton Winter BF. I’m slightly concerned by the last sentence of Casey’s rating. Are we really doomed? If so I wouldn’t mind going down drinking this little beauty. An amber coloured beer with the slightest hint of haze. The aroma is wonderful. Beautiful hops, malt and alcohol and all in balance. The taste is also very lovely and full of flavours. Again all superbly balanced and this time there are hints of spice also. Very American in my book. And very very delicious.

Cask, The Criterion, Leicester. Mahogony in colour with a small head. Aromas are toffee malts, berries and lots of floral and spicy hops. Very flowery. Flavours are toffee base malts beneath lots of addictive hops. Also has some fruit. Very dry and bitter towards the finish with more bitterness on the aftertaste. Quite full in the mouth. Very nice.