Review: Hefeweizen – Aledvent Calendbeer 7
Beer: Hefeweizen
Brewery: Stewart Brewing
Type: Wheat Beer
Served: Bottled
Alc: 5.5% Vol
Aledvent Calendbeer Number: 7
The thought of a beer from Stewart Brewing doesn’t leave this reviewer particularly excited. Having sampled its other brews including Edinburgh Gold and Copper Cascade, I’ve often found their beers a little characterless and lightweight. But since Christmas is the season of goodwill and generosity I thought I’d give the Edinburgh based brewery another crack of the whip with its rather more upmarket Hefeweizen.
Another beer with a very powerful nose, it hits with the aromatic force of walking into a proper sweetshop for the first time. There’s a lovely, overly sweet smell of those foam banana sweets emanating from its nice frothy white head.
The head contrasts nicely with the luscious body, a very opaque brown, hay colour.
On the taste is straight up proper banana of the fruit variety which dominates all the way through the sip. The foretaste is of bright buttercups and this leads to hints of elderberry and a bitter pear flavour. The whole thing is reminiscent of the smell of a summary farm yard. The sweetshop creeps back in on the mid-taste which slightly evokes high quality pink marshmallows.
Its a very clean cut beer; there’s almost absolutely no aftertaste, which is a pleasant sensation in its unusualness, like the taste is suddenly cut off with a sharp razor.
So it pays to give another chance, or at least in the case of Stewart Brewing. And while I wouldn’t recommend their regular beers, I’ll definitely be checking out their other, higher tier ales in the future. Hefeweizen has proven to be that nice little Christmas present hidden behind the tree just when you think all the gifts are unwrapped.
Ale to the King. 