I have to say it again and again.. I absolutely love the artwork on Beau's beer labels, always something that pops out at you! Today I'm reviewing their Countdown Pale Ale, an organic hop-driven Pale Ale brewed with Cascade and Simcoe hops to give it an aromatic vibe with a clean hop finish. This beer is part of the 2019/2020 Winter Beau's taster pack alongside their collab with David's Tea for a London Fog ale.
This is brewed with organic malts (Pilsner, Vienna, Caraaroma, Acidulated) with organic oats, organic hops (Cascade, Simcoe as mentioned earlier) and German ale yeast. 5.0% ABV.
Appearance: An opaque golden honey appearance with an insanely light amount of carbonation in the body - only a bubble here and there, while the head has a good deal of off-white/beige head on top that diminishes pretty quickly as I'm trying to get a decent photo of this damned beer! It diminishes pretty quickly to leave behind a light amount of lacing on the glass. It felt wrong to not use a Beau's glass in this case, even if it's not probably the right glass, but this is a pretty decent glass!
Aroma: Even before I ever opened this can or received information about this beer from Beau's MB's awesome rep Jack, I knew exactly what to expect from this beer without ever trying it before - it's a malt-forward Pale Ale with a lot of caramel to it to give it a lot of sweetness to it. The beer is mildly toasted to give off a bit of a nuttiness to it, but the hops seem to be the frontrunner of this show - it's a hefty dose of grassy, floral, and eventually bitter hops that seriously smell like you're in a fresh cut alfalfa field.. I know that smell anywhere.
Taste: A toasted malt profile gives off a bit of a nuttiness right from the beginning, as well as memories of shovelling oats out of my dad's graineries when I was 8 years old to give off a good deal of oats and the familiar (to me) presence of oat dust.. Fairly sweet and has a nice amount of caramel malt. The hops are overpowered by the toasty malt this time around but I still do get a light grassy hop profile, not much for floral but the bitterness of Cascade shows up eventually to give a bitter and pine sensation (with a hint of lemon) for the aftertaste.
Overall Thoughts: This really did taste exactly what I'd expect - there was a time when I saw Pale Ale and it was a full on "this should be marketed as an IPA", but then it got to a style that's very malty, a bit nutty and of course, hoppy but not hoppy enough to be an IPA. The oats really poked out, reminding me of a very specific memory of my childhood on the farm. Grainy, grassy, bit bitter, bit sweet and caramelly, something you'd expect bits of oats stuck in your teeth (from experience) but thankfully there are none.
https://beaus.ca/beer/countdown/
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