Harvey's South Down Harvest Ale - Harvey & Son Ltd.

wl0307

United Kingdom (England)

3.5/5  rDev 0%
look: 3.5 | smell: 3.5 | taste: 3.5 | feel: 3.5 | overall: 3.5

Purchased at the Harveys Brewery Shop, coming in a 500ml brown bottle; BB Sept. 09, served cool in a straight imperial pint glass.

A: pours a clear dark amber hue with moderate streams of large-sized fizziness and a fluffy white head settling fast to a thin blanket.
S: quite sweet, like melted barley candy poured over boiled vegetables, while Harveys' typical yeasty-hoppy mixture stays loyally at the back, laced with hints of leafy herbs and jammy, salty-sweet prunes. "Very Harveys" to me, as a Harveys drinker for years.
T: an interesting swallow of boiled root-vegetable (like lotus roots), lubricating pale malts, honey, citric sweetness and brown-sugar+date+prune infused tea/water is gradually taken over by spicy bitterness of Southdown hops, leaving a rather clean finish that is simultaneously malty, spicy & herbal bitter. Really chewy bitter in the end, as a lively witness to the amount of hops used.
M&D: pretty refreshing, with the hidden depth of tiny fizziness making a bite on the palate from behind. The flavour is somewhat close to Harveys Best Bitter, with maybe a more pronounced input of malts, but the depth of bitterness serves as a decent balancer at all times. Not bad.

Serving type: bottle

01-10-2009 19:22:35 | More by wl0307