Hitachino Nest Beer

I was rewarding myself for a week of hard work by purchasing a 4-pack of Tetley's English Ale and one of those big bottles of Ommegang's Three Philosopher's from the local Brew-Crew, when the above bottle of beer caught my eye. It was the oddly named "Hitachino Nest Beer", which after checking on the internet I found out is brewed by the Kiuchi Brewery in Japan. This was a case of me being lured into purchasing a product solely based on its quirky packaging. I liked the cute little owl. Hitachino Nest Beer? Is it made of nests? Hmmmm.... I was intrigued so I decided to pick it up and give it a whirl. I usually end up with at least one random bottle of novelty beer when I walk out of the Brew-Crew. This time I also had my eye on some 10 year aged ale which seemed to me to be at least an interesting concept. This will have to wait until next time. I cracked open the Nest Beer just a few minutes ago.



Upon popping off the cap I was greeted by a bunch of foam that did not subside for about a minute. This is something that has happened to me with my home brew when I bottle condition it and use too much sugar. As you can see by the cloudy, almost opaque, color of this ale it is obviously unfiltered. There was a nice layer of expended yeast at the bottom of the bottle which in my opinion is a good thing, it shows they are using at very least pseudo-traditional brewing methods. In any event, I blame the foam-up on the fact that this stuff was probably stored at a high temperature at some point during its life and a little fermentation happened due to the presence of some residual yeast. I enjoyed the flavor of this beer, it was nice and not as aggressively hoppy as I expected. The label said JCA for Japanese Classic Ale so I expected the ale to taste like IPA or something. I don't know if I would recommend that anyone run out right now and try to find this stuff. It wasn't bad for a random label inspired pick up though. Hope everyone had a really good Christmas.