RCH Santa Fe

Brewed by RCH
Style: Barley Wine
Weston-super-Mare, England

Cask@Oliver Twist, Stockholm. Amber colour, small beige head, leaving nice lace. Aroma is sweet malts, caramel, fruits and nectar. Flavour is caramel malts, nectar, mild alcohol and grass. Also some sugary and a bit fruity notes. Very good real ale. Had on Feb 26th, and back at Oliver Twist on Mar 1st to have a few US beers. Afterwards I ended up with a few more pints of this. Just lovely!

Cask conditioned - handpump - Out Of The Vaults Leicester. A mid to dark brown coloured beer with a creamy fruity alcohol aroma. The beer is full bodied with a vinuous fruity taste. There is buttery smooth warming malty alcohol a plenty in this enjoyable strong ale.

Cask (Gallows Bird, Espoo)
Deep orange, glassy. Slightly alcoholic aroma, but a fair dry bitter aroma. Sweet sticky body, very rich and very smooth. Slightly woody, but also pretty sweet malts. Hops are pretty serious too, and stay for a long sticky finish. To be honest, this was a very hard to describe, I even had another one to see if I got more inspiration. It’s a very potent beer but very moreish.

(Same as previous.) Dark copper, thick off-white head. Nose is syrupy malts and herbal hops. Flavor has liqueurish bananas and sweet malts. Finishes drier with spicy & bitter hops, some warming alcohol. Medium bodied and somewhat oily palate. Sahti meets strong ale.

Cask-conditioned at the Bag O’Nails, Bristol 2/1/08. Aroma was of toffee, stewed red fruit and honey, with some grassy hops to finish. The flavour was packed full of toffee and fruit, with a decent hoppy dry finish to provide some balance. Very enjoyable, although a half pint was enough.

Bright orange, soapy off-white head. Really delicate marmalade and rose aroma, dried apricots. Chewy, rather sweet fruit. Just a little malt warmth, but not quite enough to balance the sweetness. Still, the finish is clean enough to keep it from feeling sticky.

Bright bottled at Dover Beer Fest 2007. Mmmm - sometimes bright bottling a fresh cask beer does something very positive to it. A little extra conditioning in an enclosed space. Whatever. The aroma on this is divine. Very fruity. Cherry and pomegranate with a whiff of coconut in passing. Strawberry flavoured sweets. Taste is fairly relaxed - not the mouthfeel you’d expect of a barley wine. Some chocolate bitterness wraps around the sweetness - though the beer tastes fairly well attenuated so there is not a lot of residual sweetness or body. An unusual barley wine. The hops linger quite pleasantly. There’s some yeastiness about this, and a good rub of tobacco. I feel this is more inclined toward a strong ale rather than the character of a barley wine. Good pleasant fruit. Attractive dryness. Enjoyable hop bitterness and character. Lingering resin burn Nice.

Cask@Beer Hunters, Pori
Ruby red color, small beige head. Wood and molasses in the nose. Portwineous flavor and palate. Wood, berries... short finish. Not really a barley wine, more like an old ale.