Sine Nomine
Paddock Wood Brewing Co.

750ml, caged and corked bottle, dragged back from Saskatoon for me by my stellar colleague (dare I say amigo?) Mark - thanks again, man! Investigation into this offering seems to indicate that it was made (and laboriously packaged) only the once, back in April 2012. We shall see, then, about this brew 'without a name'.

This beer pours (with a massive pop, but no overflow, yay!) a mostly clear, pale copper amber colour, with a teeming tower of puffy, finely foamy, and fairly fizzy off-white head, which leaves some chunky and sudsy layered cloud lace around the glass as it very lazily recedes.

It smells of fruity pale and wheat malt, a bit of testy earthy yeast, candi sugar, a nice honey clover sort of floral character, a further dark Middle Eastern fruitiness, subdued gritty rainbow peppercorn spice, and some plain and sheepish-seeming alcohol esters. The taste is rather sweet and doughy pale and caramel malt, free-range berry sugar, a bit of wheaten breakfast cereal, muddled apple, green grape, and pear fruity notes, now ethereal white pepper dust, fading floral clover, and a still rather respectful in its standoffish nature, well, booziness.

The carbonation is quite active throughout the lifespan of this offering, continuously swirling down below, and producing some near-overflows at times, but mostly just comes off as a gentle frothiness on the tongue, the body a solid medium weight for the style, and generally smooth, with a small airy creaminess. It finishes still sweet, but moderated just enough by a somewhat complex fruity, floral, and warming essence.

I gotta say, given the age of this one, I was a little worried, but it turns out, clover-flavoured strong Belgian ales, made in Saskatchewan, age pretty damned well! Not to mention the bottle conditioning - I'll take over-effusive bubbles over astringent yeast any day. A sublime find, nay gift for this wayward beer correspondent, one that shows that Paddock Wood can brew some fairly heady and interesting stuff.