Tom Paine Original Ale
Harvey's Brewery

 

 

500 ml bottle, as Harvey's Tom Paine, from Seven Cellars. ABV is 5.5%. Copper to amber colour, moderate white head. Malty aroma, hints of toffee and a slight dark berry-like fruitiness. Malty and fruity flavour, pleasant tingling hops on the tongue, earthy and slightly resinous finish.

Bottle. Clear copper/amber with a thin wispy head.
Rich malty aroma. Toffee notes apparent.
Sweet caramelised sugar upon tasting. Distant leafy hops show themselves. Mildy astringent finish.
Bottle conditioned feel.
Very tasty for the first day in November.

A 275ml bottle with a BB of May 2019. Purchased a little while back from the Harvey's brewery shop in Lewes. The label describes it as a dry-hopped, full malty pale ale named after Thomas Paine - author of 'Rights of Man' and former resident of Lewes.

A: Poured into a tulip. A deep coppery-amber hue with some floating sediment and low carbonation. Produces a smallish head of frothy white foam that lasts for a moment or so before subsiding to a patchy surface layer.

S: Aroma of rich fruity malt with hints of caramel, barley sugar, subtle grain, ale yeast, esters and mild leafy hops. Distinctly malty, with a pleasingly traditional character.

T: Tastes of caramel malt with notes of toffee, barley sugar, grain, subtle dried fruit, ale yeast, esters, leafy hops and stewed husks. Slightly sweet, followed by an understated bitterness upon swallowing.

M: Mouthfeel is smooth and lightly tingly, with soft carbonation and decent body. Mildly astringent. Aftertaste of caramel malt, barley sugar, mild fruitiness, ale yeast and leafiness.

O: Decidedly traditional in character - pretty decent overall. Looks OK, while the aroma and flavour are a blend of caramel malt, fruitiness, leafy hops and ale yeast. Body is alright. Possesses the distinct Harvey's yeast character. Not sure why they call it a pale ale; it isn't particularly pale. Goes down readily enough but probably better on cask. Worth sampling.

From a 500ml bottle.
L: Lustrous, dark amber colour. No carbonation but one finger of creamy head leaves lots of lacing.
S: Caramel.
T: Soft caramel and toffee. Herbal backdrop.
F: Smooth, rich mouthfeel. Coats the mouth. Dry finish.
O: Excellent, intriguing malt base. Has a slightly boozy edge to it despite the moderate ABV.

 

275ml bottle served in a shaker pint. Jun 16 printed on the cap. Pours a caramel hue with a translucent clarity and a thin soapy head that dissipates into a thin, loose band around the shoulders. Nose expresses caramel malt, grains and light medicinal notes. Taste follows nose with a residual sweetness at the finish that lingers betweens quaffs. Mouthfeel is light-medium in body with a slightly oily texture and a still carbonation. All and all, I don’t drink very English Pale Ales, so it is difficult to rate to style; however, it all comes off a bit too cloying and slightly herbal to be enjoyed on a regular basis.

 

 

 

 

 

Pours a light shade of caramel brown. There's a little haze, but plenty of light manages to cut through revealing orange highlights. An off-white head tops it off and reaches only a finger or so in depth. It wasted no time receding. Very little lace remains.

It's pretty light and weak on the nose. It smells mostly fruity. It's an interesting peach scent that's fairly sweet smelling. Light floral hops are noted and give it an overall earthy quality that's not bad at all. There's a lingering malty, sweet smell throughout. A little bit of a biscuit-like aroma emerges late. There's enough to keep it floating above average, but it's close. A little muscle would go a long way.

The flavor is a little better than the nose, but not enough to trigger a bump in score. There is a light fruity, sweet flavor initially. It is a decent peach flavor. Floral hops are prominent. They have a bit of a grassy flavor, in addition to some fruity qualities. It is a little malty and sweet. The hop flavor comes through a little stronger, but there's quite a bit of balance. Alcohol is pretty well lost in the mix and goes unnoticed. It finishes a little dry and sweet. It's above average. Definitely mild mannered with no big standout flavors. Not bad by any means.

The body is on the lighter side of medium and has a semi-smooth feel. Carbonation is well restrained. A little more body would probably help a little. Drinkability is above average. Tom Paine's original has a more than decent flavor and goes down easy. I'm liking it, but not quite loving it. Just not enough flavor to go around.

All in all, Tom Paine's original is a pretty good beer. It's not spectacular, nor does it really stand out in any way. Rather, it's just a straight forward English Pale, plain and simple. I think a little more of something would help add some flavor. Malt, hops, whatever. More of something would improve it. But, it's pretty good as it is. Definitely worth a try.

The cask version of Tom Paine was one of the first beers that really got me hooked to real ales some years back in Lewes, when I attended a local CAMRA branch's social event at the Harveys Brewery. This bottle was also purchased at the Harveys brewery shop two months ago; filtered, BB Nov.09, served cool in a straight imperial pint glass.

A: a bright, reddish amber hue with great clarity comes with a 1cm thick beige frothy head and very faint carbonation.
S: interestingly sour-sweet notes of (wet) bread or grainy/rice wine comes on top of Harveys ales' usual formula (sour yeasts, sweet malts, sweet-lemony+floral theme with a spicy kick of Sussex hops!), with an extra tinge of boiled sweet root-veggie; somewhat subdued on the overall aroma, but the overall impression is still deeply "Harveys"-like, if I may say so.
T: a mouthful of lightly-caramelised & aromatic sour-sweet pale malts and dry-ish hops quickly gives way to a marvellously bitter middle taste, surrounded by a decent level of sour-yeasty touch (endowed by open-top fermentation tanks still in use) and a well-lingering aroma exactly like Taiwanese ooh-long tea (for the slightly toasted yet also tannic and chewy undertones) plus scattered yum-ish sweetness. The level of bitterness remains considerable throughout the drink and the finish is utterly-pleasantly dry, hence a high "quaffability" overall.
M&D: the palate remains smooth, showing little intervention of fizziness apart from only necessary microscopic carbonation to keep a good fresh mouthfeel, yet it's so very clean that this one seems to be better bottled than some other Harveys products I've had. Being quiet in aroma and moderate in flavour, this bottle version is quite different from what I can vividly remember of the cask-conditioned one, which, as a summer seasonal ale, is absolutely boldly-fruity and lively-hoppy, yet just as bitter as this one in the aftertaste. Having said that, the attempt at bottling the "real" Tom Paine, as demonstrated by this bottle, is NOT BAD at all!

500ml bottle bought GapWines, Belfast...

Poured a deep crystal clear copper colour. Slightly off white head poured fairly loose and frothy then faded quite quickly to light patchy covering. No carbonation bubbles at all... light patchy lacing...

Aroma - (over) ripe juicy fruits (pineapples, pears, oranges, some apples), strong marzipan notes, biscuit malts, grassy, some oaky vanilla, floral honey sweetness, sweet graininess, quite bready, toasted nuts, butterscotch...

Taste - Lightly toasted caramel malts mixed with good juicy fruits (bitter oranges, pineapples, pears), decent peppery and grassy hop bitterness, bready, honey sweetness, again some light oakiness, some graininess, faint herbal notes...

M&D - Pretty smooth and creamy with a little oiliness underneath... medium bodied... an extremely quaffable brew..

Overall - A spot on example of an English pale ale... nothing mind blowing just a good drinkable ale...

Poured to a dark amber-brown color with medium thick tan head that lingered well and left okay lacing. Aroma was a very strong mix of sweet malty toffee and raisins. Mouthfeel was fairly thin, and also leaned to the sweet side, with the flavor again accenting hte sweetness of the malt and toffee flavor.

The only drawback to this beer was the watery and almost metallic finish, whicnh led to a poor finish of an otherwise very enjoyable beer.

Apperance: Pours a hazy amber color with a rocky head that retains well and splashes dots of lace

Smell: Very malty, with a burnt sugar and golden raisin/stone fruit character

Taste: Opens fruity and malty, almost like peaches and golden raisins soaked in liqueur; after the swallow, an earthy bitterness joins the fruity flavors

Mouthfeel: Medium to full body with moderate to low carbonation

Drinkability: A lot of English character to this one; very nice

Purchased from beergeek.biz

Presentation - 500ml bottle in a 4oz glass. Hey, the restaurant owner insisted...says it promoted constant head development with repours.

Nose was floral, light, citrus oils of orange, hops, mild. After it warmed a little one of those "developed heads" yielding a wonderful aroma of fresh scratch biscuits.

A rich, warm, brassy orange amber hue that was slightly clouded, the heads (heads?) were regularly a pinky's worth of blonde coffee foam of mixed bubbles that lingered a while, then faded to a thin film. It did lace very tacky, with great curtains of foam.

Its creamy up front, the lite orange/citrus quality is there, its soft, lightly hopped & bitter, a little oily, mild on the pallete as it evens when it warms. The finish is creamy as well, with a whisper of bittersweetness on the throat as well as in the aftertaste that coats the mouth yet doesn't feel filmy, its nice.

I did notice that, with dinner (smoked turkey breast on salad greens with balsamic dressing and dry rub) that every quality mentioned above was amplified, especially that hop peak. This would pair well with a number of dinner items, as well as a nice lite cheddar.

I'm usually not too keen on English Ales, but I really enjoyed this. A nice change of pace, Definitely give it a shot, I will certainly enjoy it again.

Stubby 500 ml bottle on sale at Wilbur's in Fort Collins, CO for $1.99.

Cloudy dark amber under a small light tan head with large bubbles. Looks rather like fresh-squeezed apple juice.

Sweet malty nutty aroma with a note of apricot and some herbal hops. Interesting.

Good, pleasant malty nutty floral hoppy flavor, with a mild piney bitterness. Well balanced.

Mouthfeel is okay.

Nice beer, very easy to drink. This would make a nice session beer for an evening at darts in a good British pub.

If you can snag some, it's worth a try; and if you can get some at the great sale price I got it for, pick up several.