Name: Samuel Smith’s Organic Best Ale

ABV: 5.0%

Bottled/ Draft: Bottled

Bottle Conditioned: No

Bottle Size: 500 ml

Price: £2.31 from Abel & Cole

Colour: Deep Golden

Clarity: Bright

Head/ Bubbles: Slightly artificially carbonated; large bubbles, short lived head.

Mouthfeel: The artificial carbonation gives it a rather ‘soft drink’ feel.

Taste: The bottle describes this beer as “delicately flavoured”, and that’s almost an understatement – a light taste, little maltiness and a subtle hoppiness.

Comment: This beer suffers from a couple of issues; firstly, although it’s announcing itself as delicately flavoured it really takes this too far. I love a light beer, especially in hot weather like we’ve been enjoying, but in this case it’s come at a lack of complexity. Secondly, the carbonation is rather overdone, and you end up tasting bubbles more than ale. This is a common problem with non bottle-conditioned beers (and you’ll probably find me complaining about it often!) but this beer suffers worse than normal for it – this may be due to the fact that it has such a delicate flavour, that it gets easily overwhelmed by the carbonation. I would be very interested to track this down on draft, because with a normal head the light taste might well get across much better – not one to bother with in a bottle, though.