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beer reviews

Pleasant Surprise from Greene King

We didn’t have high hopes for a non-bottle-conditioned Greene King beer in a clear bottle, but Suffolk Springer (6%) is actually very decent.

Our bottle wasn’t skunked (luck of the draw?) and the beer was as dark and luscious as any Belgian dubbel. There was sweet, milky chocolate to start, followed by cherries, dates and Christmas pudding. It was also a touch sour which suggests to us that there’s a slug of something complex in the blend. Turns out we were right — it’s blended with some of their famous 5X old ale.

So, thanks to Bailey’s dad for the tip and the gift!

Goes to show you should never write off any brewery altogether.

Here’s what Des de Moor thought; and a slightly Gothic review at the Bottled Beer Year.

5 replies on “Pleasant Surprise from Greene King”

GK are much maligned and rather unfairly I often think. A bit like Tesco. But then I’m biased. Size seems to be an issue for many. I accept they do suffer from quality problems in some pubs but that’s more down to the pubs than the brewery side of the business.

Paul — we had a similar conversation about Wadworth with some people on Twitter the other day. If every pint of GK IPA we’ve had in the last five years has been boring at best but, more usually, rotten (i.e. stale or off), when do we stop feeling sorry for the poor brewer whose beer is being badly treated by nasty landlords, and start thinking it might just be shite beer? Then again, I’ve heard that hops are a good preservative. They could try putting some of those in it….

TBN — especially as, in this case, the beer is so dark it looks like it’s in a brown bottle anyway.

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