Sierra Nevada, Celebration Ale 2004 (USA) 
Sierra Nevada's Pale Ale
is one of my favourite US beers, so the chance to taste their Celebration Ale - on sale from November to Spring each year - was very welcome. The beer pours a heart-warming rich, ruby colour with a creamy, off-white head.
It has a wonderfully aromatic nose, crammed with spices, glacé fruits and deep, baked-plum pie aromas. On the palate this luxurious, dark, bitter-chocolate-tinged beer is a stunner, filled with exotic spice and nut flavours,
a huge, hoppy streak of bitterness and all sorts of ebbing and flowing nuances of grapefruit, juniper berries and treacle: it is like fireworks in a glass. By no means a session beer, but what a sensational brew. 6.8% ABV,
35cl, £1.69, Sainsbury's.  |  |
