Christmas Crack 2006

This year's new Christmas beer is a spiced Belgian style ale of 5.5%abv.  We started with a classic English old ale grain bill and fermented it with a Belgian ale yeast at a slightly elevated temperature.  The resulting beer is a full-bodied malty brown ale with a characteristic Belgian nose to it.  We then added a special spice mixture to the beer to give it an aromatic highlight with a hint of vanilla that fades quickly, leaving behind a malty moreish finish.

This year's Crack flew out of the cold stores (sorry, publicans, we're sold out!),  although we still have some left in bottles which should age well.  We may bring this one back as a regular winter seasonal in the New Year.

A propos our livery, the kerfuffle over Santa's Butt has not escaped our notice, either. One supposes we wouldn't have a very easy time marketing Christmas Crack over in the US, either.  Especially from a brewery called Humpty Dumpty.