Mostly Harmless
Annex Ale Project

L: Pours a hazy yellow lemon juice color with a small white head and fingers of lacing all around the glass.

S: Notes of thyme and rosemary mixed with a strong lemon rind bitterness.

T: Strong lemon rind and a medium bitterness from the lemon rind, some thyme, and rosemary.

F: Light body creamy mouthfeel, though not as creamy as I'd expect from a NE style beer.

O: Very strong lemon taste in this beer, mostly rind, but quite nice.

650ml bottle - a 'New England ISA', with a very cool, Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy inspired name. I will try to provide more information about this offering than that.

This beer pours a murky, medium golden yellow colour, with two fingers of puffy, loosely foamy, and mildly bubbly bone-white head, which leaves some decent old forest growth pattern lace around the glass as it quickly dissipates.

It smells of bready and grainy cereal malt, dank pine resin, plain Ritz crackers, a muddled tropical fruitiness, some tame damp minerality, and further leafy, musty, and herbal green hop bitters. The taste is gritty and grainy pale malt, a none too subtle hint of buttered white toast, faded generic fruity notes, some stale yeastiness, wet rocks, and more understated earthy, herbal, and musky floral hoppiness.

The carbonation is average in its palate-satiating frothiness, the body a so-so middleweight, and not particularly smooth, as a weird clamminess arises pretty much from the get-go. It finishes off-dry, the lingering malt trying to understand what the hell went wrong (thanks, The Pursuit of Happiness - yeah, I got my own reasons to drink now!).

Overall - mixed cultural references aside, there's just something a bit off with this one, with the hoppy, under the norm ABV brew eclipsed by that buttery, big 'D' thing, I'm afraid to say. So, I guess that this one needs a slight tweak in the marketing department - 'Almost Mostly Harmless'?