Green King - Ruddles Rhubarb
Dec 12th, 2007 by steve
Purchase Location: My Local Supermarket
Serving: 500ml bottle
Session suggestion: Medium-Good (4-5 bottles, if you can hack it!)
ABV: 4.7%
This is part of my Beer booty experience at my local supermarket, - I’ve picked up some Ruddles Rhubarb because they guy next to me mused it then added 6 bottles to his trolley, “he’s not having it all, the swine!” So like a male jostling for position on the Serengeti I coughed loud enough to get his attention while I too reached for the same beer, …but only taking two, just enough to show him that this beer isle is a wrestled territory.
Well, I should have let him have the lot, now I just feel like a prat for my actions. The Rhubarb is immediately there on first olfaction, it’s a weird smell, a mixture of hops and rhubarb that I found slightly off putting. You know I thought the same of Banana Bread Beer when that first went under my nose, so I was willing Ruddles Rhubarb to follow suit and surprise me after all…
It poured a lovely deep reddish copper colour which, considering what Green King designed it as - a Summer Real Ale, it certainly looks the ticket. An immediate slightly off-white foamy head, that recedes quickly with some high carbonation that relaxes at about the same speed as the pint head.
The taste is too synthetic for me, I’m not a fan of Rhubarb, even having grown up in the countryside eating it regularly I consider Rhubarb an ugly bitter taste, so how this will balance out the bitter taste of the Bramling hops I’m not sure. It does though, for a few seconds, but then the bitterness of the hops kicks back in, it’s like rhubarb, hops, rhubarb, hops on the tongue. There is some vanilla complexity in there, I’m not sure it’s strong enough, perhaps if this was stronger it would mask the confliction between the hops and rhubarb on my pallet at least.
No, not a fan of this one, I stopped after one bottle and carefully placed the other bottle at the back of my special beer bunker in the “try in summer” section. If Green King designed it as a summer ale, “the taste of Ruddles County” they must have a good reason, and so perhaps the moral of the story here is try it when they recommend, and who knows you may well learn to like it. But for now, stood here on a frosty crabby December Wednesday, on personal reflection, I can’t help but think what the hell was that guy in the supermarket going to do with six bottles of this stuff?
My Rating: 4/10 (sorry, just not my cup of tea… or beer.)
Hops used: Bramling Cross
ABV: 4.7%
Visit the Ruddles Brewery Website for more information.
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Haven’t tried it. Enjoyed the Banana Bread beer on draught at the recent Wetherspoons beer festival, but, when I bought a couple of bottles, found it rather overpowering and sickly.
The wife’s been guzzling this. I think it’s awful.
But if you like rhubarb, you’ll love it.
Mmmm, it smells lovely. A bit like rhubarb and custard sweets. I dont actually drink ale though, i did try it, but it just tastes like ale.
I bought a bottle for the wife and she hated it. I tried it and couldn’t finish it. This is not what beer should taste like. I am all for seasonal beers with unusual flavours, but this doesn’t work for me.