Poorman Honey Blonde Ale
Bayhawk Ales

Pours a hazy orange amber with a nice thick and pillowy white head.

Nose is pure buttered popcorn, followed by hints of honey. Mouthfeel is thin but acceptable in that the beer is a sour. I assume it was meant to be a sour as it appears to be a clean, simple and relatively pleasant example, with light but decent carbonation. A bit lemon/lime-orange soda poppy. Note, if the beer is meant to be a honey blonde ale in the traditional sense and not actually a sour, the beer is a failure. However, if considered a sour it could be a fair example.

Not complex but fresh citrus lime orange sour flavors. Short finish of lemon/lime.

A: Very deep gold. Short lived white head. Average retention and lacing.
S: Malt and sweet honey.
T: More honey in the flavor. The malt is just a base for it. Restrained bitterness.... basically, a honey ale - what you'd expect.
M: Medium bodied and crisp.
D: An average beer. I think the honey cuts down on the drinkability quite a bit as it's kind of unbalanced to a certain extent. It's not sweet, but it's a little bent towards that.

Very disappointed. With this beer, I've basically exhausted the Bayhawk brewery options (it's only a few miles away).

Pours a yellowish color. Taste is strange: like Bud light mixed with a rotten honey after-taste. No real smell, mouthfeel is thin, no carbonation.

Avoid.

Polished brass with a moderate orangish hue and a few healthy lines of bubbles. The lightly lemon-accented bone white head is frothycreamy, although I'm predicting little in the way of lace (I was right for once). This Bayhawk offering looks like a fairly standard blonde ale.

My first thought when I opened the bottle was 'macro lager'. The beer has that cereal grain smell that can be acceptable in some circumstances. After actually concentrating on the nose, it's a little sweeter than I initially thought and a little more lemony. I can't say that I appreciate the honey, though.

The flavor is subpar. Take a standard macro lager, add honey, add somewhat citrusy hops (recognizable mostly as weak, bitter lemon juice), lose some of the graininess, and you have Poorman Honey Blonde. There isn't much malt present, which does this beer no favors when it comes to cutting the tangy sourness that shouldn't be present in a honey-added ale in the first place. Perhaps the brewers would have been better off adding less wheat malt and more barley malt.

I've finally figured it out. PHB tastes like a honey-lemon alcopop, although not quite as sweet. Maybe a cross between a honey-lemon alcopop and a macro lager. I can drink it, I'm just finding it hard to muster up any enthusiasm. The finish is ultra brief with a lemon juice linger.

The lack of malt ensures that the body is lighter than air; a quality that I'm not so sure is a detriment in this case. This is such an unserious beer that the somewhat fizzy, featherlight mouthfeel seems strangely appropriate. Ease of drinkability is high, desirability of drinkability is low.

It's hard to escape the impression that Bayhawk resorted to putting a bikini-clad woman on the label because they knew the beer was less than good. Has there ever been a beer with a nude or barely clothed woman on the label that's been worth a damn? Poorman Honey Blonde Ale is, in a lot of ways, like a dumb blonde. Easy on the eyes, sweet, simple and utterly lacking in substance.

Pours a cold hazed gold with no real head.

Smell is not much except a rotten hop scent. A little sweetness but this smells bad and sour.

Taste is sour with a cloying honey quality. Undrinkable.

Can't stand to swallow enough to even determine drinkability or mouth feel.

I would have never bought this if I knew who had made it.

This is the third straight bottle from this company that is obviously infected. Normally I would not review but word about this brewer needs to get out.

Bayhawk Ales brewers of absolute crap. As far as I can tell they have never even heard of the word SANITATION!

This is a sour candy with a sweet sweeet center.

Nice bottle label with a hot chick in a bikini....no its not art ..this is an actual picture type label...interesting. Found the pour to be very solid. creamy head and an partialy unfiltered cloudy heff type color and body.

Citrusy, with some sour notes..hmmmm some light fruit smells, cantalope, little pineapple. then the first drink...sweet up front but ohhhh the sour notes in the smell take over. This brew grows on me after a while but the sour/sweet combo is off. I just can't get past it. as it warms it actually improves by letting out some more fruity/candy taste but mostly a pucker brew with a hot chick on the label.

Presentation: 22 ounce Bomber recently picked up from Hi-Times in Costa-Mesa during a weekend beer trip. Rather staid looking label, with the word “Poorman” written in a funky looking ‘Austin Powers’ 1960’s hippy-looking text. The second ‘O’ in Poorman frames a picture of a bald headed Surfer Dude. Underneath a rather scantily clad woman flashing her wares….glad to see that Bayhawk have not stooped too low in their advertising here. Described as a ‘Honey Blonde Ale’, made with real honey….hmm, I wonder if they mean the honey in the bikini or the stuff bees make!? Listed at 6.7% ABV.

Appearance: Slightly hazed deep golden body. Thick white head at first, this soon rescinds to a thin broken covering that leaves some nice looking lacing. Lots of carbonation in this one, too much in fact.

Nose: Not that appealing really, funky corn on the cob odor with a sweet grain laden malt aroma. Strangely ‘off-putting’ and not even conducive to further investigation as I may not even get any further with this one if I do.

Taste: Initial taste is sharp. Middles with a dry, yet sweet delicate honey soaked cereal feel. Sweet then Dry then Bitter then Sharp. Nothing spectacular at all here. Finishes with some lemon bitterness that does rescue a 3.0, just.

Mouthfeel: Light feel throughout. The carbonation mixes with the sharp finish to produce a prickly feel, which detracts from the overall Drinkability.

Drinkability: Average bordering on being seriously boring. A very one dimensional Honey Blonde Ale that lacks character.

Overall: Hmmmm, I keep giving Bayhawk brews the benefit of the doubt…..I’m not sure why….they don’t seem to produce anything that even backs up the thought that I may find them interesting one day. Needless to say this is typically Bayhawk……I think I prefer the Honey Blonde *ON* the bottle much more than the one *IN* the Bottle. Dangerously Average!!