Beer #283 - Ilkley Siberia

Ilkley’s Siberia is a collaboration brew between the brewery and renowned beer writer Melissa Cole. Brewed with local rhubarb this saison is now part of the brewery’s permanent range. I’d been advised when I picked this up at the House of Trembling Madness in York to try alongside a curry so having waited for an appropriate opportunity, I cracked it open on the weekend alongside an Indian takeaway from the excellent Kennington Tandoori. The beer poured quite a dark golden colour with a tart aroma. On tasting the beer is nowhere near as sharp as you might imagine or as the aroma suggests, the dominant flavour for me was almost-burnt caramel; the beer is sweet but bitter and I couldn’t really pick up any rhubarb in there. On the whole the beer wasn’t quite what I was expecting, a rhubarb saison sounds pretty intriguing and the beer didn’t really live up to my expectations. That isn’t to say that it wasn’t good, it’s a perfectly solid beer, it just wasn’t as exciting as it perhaps could have been.

Brewery: Ilkley Brewery
Country: United Kingdom
ABV: 5.9% ABV