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Benleva Hotel co-owner Steven Crossland was again the perfect host for this annual event, and laid on all the facilities needed for this tasting refresher session. The attendance could have been better but all the regular completers of tasting cards were present; including Caroline, Bill, Eric, Gareth, and Allan. There was a very relaxed atmosphere at this afternoon event, when compared to the sometimes hectic ‘end of the month’ Tuesday evening tasting meetings. Unfortunately Ian Brocklebank was unable to attend and lead the tasting, but Eric and Bill did a fine job in his absence. The meeting combined the tasting and discussion of a number of beers with Eric and Bill giving presentations on Hop and Malt characteristics. Eric also gave a talk on ‘Beer With Food’ and led a sampling session on other flavours, good and bad, that characterise our favourite tipple, including elderflower, honey: and vinegar!!!!. Being May, the emphasis was on Mild and two local brews were sampled, Mild May from Cairngorm and Dark Munro from the Highland Brewery. The Mild May was considered a taste of beers past, being a true light-bodied quaffable mild: liquorice and light roast notes, and only 3.7% ABV with only limited hop notes. Shame that this style is no longer as prominent as it once was - hence CAMRA promoting this style each May. It certainly brought memories of youth back to your correspondent. The Dark Munro was equally tasty but more full-bodied, and stronger on roast, thus having more of the characteristics of a stout. The first disappointment of the day was Atlas Latitude which was very sulphury in nose and taste. Though sulphur is a character that adds to the flavour profile of some beers; most famously Marston’s Pedigree and the ‘liquor from the well’ beers from Belhaven, it is not a usual characteristic of Atlas beers. Correspondence with Andrew Fulton at the brewery has since confirmed that this was an isolated cask and not a change in the beer characteristic. The second disappointment was the Caley Top Banana. It was generally agreed that a strong astringent banana flavour was not a popular characteristic of a beer, even though a slight hint of banana can be acceptable. At best Top Banana was considered a true specialist beer, and an ‘acquired taste’ one at that. Cairngorm Stag was considered to be a good standard English best bitter, with a well balanced malt and hop character. Hebridean Gold had a surprisingly strong malt character, which is not common in the lighter hued beers. Interesting that the hop character was limited in the nose, but came in with a bang once the taste buds were introduced to it. None of the tasters managed to detect the porridge oats which makes this a speciality beer; something we will have to work on. All in all a very successful tasting and very pleasing to experience the active functioning of the Highland Tasting Panel. Thanks to the host Steve and to all the members who attended for making this a very interesting and useful session. All must have learned something more from sharing individual views on the characteristics of this great British product: Beer.
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