2016 Advent Beer 4: Ticketybrew Rose Wheat

Another creative, non-hoppy beer, this time from England's delightfully named Ticketybrew Company. It's a wheat beer, the tabula rasa of the microbrew world, and very suitable to all sorts of flavours and tinkering. In this case, there is not only live yeast in play, but they have added rose petals and fresh ginger!

I opted to swirl the bottle a few times and decant some of the yeast sediment I could see in the bottom of the bottle, and ended up with a glass full of a cloudy, straw-coloured beer, topped by a thin layer of effervescing head.

In terms of smell, the yeast makes its presence known very quickly with its signature tanginess, followed by lemon citrus, the zip of ginger, and definitely the hint of some floral qualities, but nothing I could discern as particularly roselike.

The first sip definitely on the sour side of things, but not unpleasantly so. The live yeast gives it a pucker factor that is reminiscent of Alley Kat's Cloudy With a Chance of Lemon (lemon hefeweizen). If you prefer your beverages less tart, I would suggest a gentler pour and leaving the sediments undisturbed.

The wheat beer component is smooth and unassuming, and the ginger gives it a sharper finish, like a punctuation mark. The rose element is understated, and not perfumey in the least. Perhaps it would be more appreciated by someone with a more sophisticated palate or finer-tuned olfactory system.

The mild carbonation gives the whole affair a very pleasing tingle at the end, offsetting the initial rambunctiousness that sour brings to the back and sides of the tongue.

All in all, a very pleasant experiment, and refreshing quencher of a beer; a nice alternative to something hoppier. A great summer lunch experience could be had by serving up Ticketybrew's Rose Wheat with a grilled chicken caesar salad. Best of all, a bit of an adventure in the early days for this 2016 calendar!