Willie The Wit
Grain Bin Brewing Company

 

650ml bottle, named after Willie de Witt, a Canadian Olympic boxing medalist in the 1980s, who spent his formative years in Grande Prairie. And now he's a judge on the Court of Queen's Bench of Alberta - wait, what?!!!

This beer pours a slightly hazy, yet bright medium golden yellow colour, with a teeming tower of puffy, rocky, and fizzy off-white head, which leaves a bit of dissipating fog bank lace around the glass as it slowly sinks away.

It smells of bready and doughy wheat malt, muddled domestic citrus rind, an earthy yeastiness, subtle black pepper spice, and some mild leafy, weedy, and floral noble hop bitters. The taste is grainy and crackery pale malt, an equal to the task cereal wheatiness, still mixed and matched plebeian citrus esters, a winsome yeasty character, ethereal dirty spice, and more weak leafy, musty, and dead floral 'verdant' hoppiness.

The carbonation is average in its palate-prickling frothiness, the body a decent middleweight, and mostly smooth, just a wee yeast incursion mussing up the new paint job, maybe. It finishes off-dry, the grainy and fruity notes lingering like they got no particular place to go.

Overall, this is a refreshing and well-made version of the style, simple, and yet rounded enough to keep one's attention. And with a sense-preserving 4 points of alcohol, you won't have to worry about being put to the mat early on, in the manner of the titular pugilist.