Christmas Ale
8 Sail Brewery

Blind-tasted excl. brewery, beer-name and ABV%
L- Pours a lovely red/gold that is quite common also with the Barleywine beer style. Clear, with a storming 15mm cream coloured fine-bubble head. Holding up well at +5mins too. Getting that head on an 8% beer (vs surface tension that wants to zap the foam) is really nice.
S- Brightness and perhaps some apple? [hmmm.... winter congestion...grr]
T- Intriguing, the first note is bright, also something one can find in barleywine ie it comes over as 'wine-like'. I get flashes of Belgian yeast esters but for me that's a background facet. It's bold, and deep in a rich way. Along 'the top' of the flavour is a clear bright aspect that is the hops. That helps balance the richness, and is what lingers into the finish. - Just took another sip > boom, like Pear Drops sweets from the 70s, really estery. Nice.
F- Big, rich, don't let it warm too much as it starts to morph from rich to a bit sweet (my fault, yacking too much). CO2 in the mouth started well, but now less. Likely a good part of it went into sustaining that great looking foam cap.
O- An intriguing beer and one very well suited to be labelled 'Christmas Ale'. I'm not sure I'd recognise this as a Tripel in style, for me I think it's more like a Barley-wine with the added pleasure of Belgian yeast esters. I get another lick of them in even my final mouthful. It's very well brewed, no rough edges and they've given a lot of thought to giving 'this thumper' balance.
Bought from Beers of Europe 330ml £ BB Jan-2026
Review done, now checking bottle. - There is sediment in it, luckily I managed to keep that ex my glass. Ingreds: Barley, hops, water, yeast = good, no short-cuts.