“Bridge Roads benchmark ale, the Beechworth Pale Ale is a beer dominated by its aromatic hop profile”.
We first tried this little bad boy on our trip to Tasmania for the Tassie beer festival. Numerous re-rates of this breweries signature brew has seen us respecting it more and more each time. Served in a shaker glass the ever so slightly hazy golden pour constructed a foamy 2 finger head before eventually settling to a well retained 4-5mm covering on top. Laced well. The aroma displays a brilliant array of spicy hops, resinous pine, yellow grapefruit, slightly tart lemon and passion fruit over a subtle toasted malt backing. Very fruity aroma, really sticking to it’s USA-style roots here. In the mouth it’s just short of full bodied with lively carbonation. Quite a frothy texture with some solid weight to it, gripping the back of the tongue on it’s way down. For such a big hop profile the palate is surprisingly sessional, although it’s quite bitter up front with lashes of grapefruit and a slightly aggressive hop dryness flowing through. The mid develops citrus flavours that sit tight over the biscuity malt base and eventually finish grassy and herbaceous with decent length on the back palate. The 4.8% ABV is a little conservative but the flavours do all the talking. Extremely tasty and super sessional which when rarely fused together provides our taste buds with excitement and our heads with aches the next morning. Excellent example of a top notch Aussie attempt of an APA.