Fool's Gold

You can keep your flowery bathwater. 

Loch Lomond Gold really is disappointment in a bottle. It's by TSA, who should know better 'cause they brew a tonne of beers for other microbreweries - including the mighty Fallen - but their golden ale is like perfumed bathwater (see right).

You know what it made me think of? Slices of lime in bottles of insipid Mexican beer. It's an entry level craft beer for people who like shoving waxed fruit down their long-necks. 

I drank Gold last Thursday on my fairly regular Beer and Boardgames night. (I'm gonna do a long, long post about boardgames and beer, but in the meantime I just wanted - no, needed - to share with you how mediocre TSA's Gold is.) I thought it might have been rubbish because I was playing rubbish or because the beer wasn't fresh out the fridge, but I'm having another bottle RIGHT now. It's cold, I'm winning (kids in bed) but it's still packed with citrus floral nonsense. It's in a different shaped glass too, so this taste test can't be more scientific. 

BTW TSA also did a Rabbie Burns beer a wee while back. I don't remember hating that when I tried it.

I also had a Hobgoblin amber too, which I liked. But my top beer that night was the sexy-looking O6 Porter by Otley Brewing Company. Not my favourite porter by a long way, but it had enough of the right flavours and texture and strength (6.6%) to have me all mournful when I got to the end of the glass. That and the fact I was losing to my father in law. 

Anyway, big, beautiful boardgame post to come. You have been warned.