Ding Points: 66.00

Pour: 80.00, Nose: 60.00, Palate: 60.00, Mouth: 70.00, Global: 70.00

Tasting Notes:

These notes are an amalgamation of two different bottles, almost exactly 12 months apart, and that is reflected in the two different labels over the course of a year. This year, the bottle was taken from the mixed, ‘Hop Tour’ six pack that BBC is putting out, with Noble Pils and Whitewater IPA being the other two beers. A year ago, Latitude 48 either came as a single or as part of its own six pack.

Deeply pitted head with a darker than expected pour. Lace is first class. Nose offers some lightly hopped sweetness, quite bland and ordinary.

Latitude 48, 2012 version

Tastes are quite dry and very, very earthy. The beer is not especially hoppy, but it does feel really quite aggressive. The earthy nature of the brew is very apparent and the bitterness is not especially fruity. No grapefruit or citrus here. Did I say it was earthy?

Latitude 48, 2011 version

This is not a very hoppy beer per se, but it does seems quite bold and aggressive. There’s an edginess to it and a dry, grating, tiring note that keeps on coming. It does a number on the palate, and not really in a good way that a big hoppy beer might be inclined to do.

Quite frankly this is not a beer for me. It’s too aggressive and too poorly defined, and it seems like it is trying to make a statement about aggression and earthiness just for the sake of it. It’s tiresome on the palate and the earthy component is so strong that the beer ultimately becomes pretty one-dimensional.

Not especially big or bitter, but it seems rather unbalanced to me.

Other: 6.0%, American IPA.