Jaipur India Pale Ale

This evening my wife was nipping across the road to our hyperlocal Tesco Express and asked if I wanted any beer – “Of course” was my cry, “what have they got on at the moment?”

What came next still makes me chuckle – “Mad Goose, Old Intentional, Harvester Pale and a beer from India called Jaipur”

Surely she must know by now that our Tesco is stocking ‘local’ beer and that the beer ‘from India’ is actually an India Pale Ale (IPA) made down the road in Derbyshire!

I was quite excited and asked her to ring me and confirm it actually was Jaipur as I had only recently commented on a blog post about it on http://www.Beerreviews.co.uk .

She phoned, it was, so I got four bottles of Jaipur (£1.88 for 330ml) and four Mad Goose (from Purity Ale).

So, here we are, my first taste of the legendary (if you read all the Twitter hype) JAIPUR. Firstly I noticed it comes in a 330ml bottle and not the usual chunky 500ml bottle I’ve becomed accustomed to. Secondly I noticed it poured fairly flat, and I do usually like a good head.

But thirdly, and most importantly the taste … Initially floral, robust with sweetness and then a massive bitter hit that lingered all the way until the next sip.

At 5.9% it’s fairly strong and is balanced well, matching my quest for strong hoppy maltyness perfectly. The only negative for me is the lack of head, and I poured my second bottle from a height in an attempt to liven it up, but the head soon died, leaving me with a glass of ale resembling wine.

I’m enjoying it imensely nevertheless, and not much that I have had so far can match it’s extreme bitter attack on my taste buds! I assume that this is even more legendary from the cask and I’m now itching to get to a local Amber Valley pub that apparently (according to the Thornbridge website) have two casks on at any one time.

I’m also hoping that Simon from http://www.reluctantscooper.co.uk can work some magic and setup a brewery tour/photoblog/vlog at Thornbridge Brewery.

On the label:
Jaipur was first brewed in August 2005 and has won over 30 awards across the UK. http://thornbridgebrewery.co.uk

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Photo taken, post written and uploaded direct from the iPhone while sitting in front of the telly drinking Jaipur!

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