Beak has been a brewery that I have always aimed to try, I usually skip over in order to try more local beers from the North East of England. However, this time I said stuff it and gave one a try. This one is a ‘bright IPA’ called Western Seaboard Project which is part of a series of beers created by Beak. During the course of the review, I will cover the history of the brewery and this beer in particular, the pour, the taste and aroma and finally my verdict on the beer. Cheers
A brewery born in Lewes
Beak Brewery was founded by Danny Tapper who was a food and drink writer who had ‘cuckoo brewed’ his own recipes for UK breweries such as Beavertown, Northern Monk and Burning Sky. This helped him create notoriety and develop a reputation before even founding his own brewery. In 2020, Beak opened up in Lewes which came with its own brewery, taproom and street-food canteen.
Beak is known for its hop forward beers but has branched out into pilsners, saisons and imperial stouts. They have an emphasis on hop character and freshness which often take inspiration from pacific coast beer culture. At lot of their beers are brewed using local ingredients sourced from South Downs National Park.
In terms of the beer, Western Seaboard Project #3 is a 6% ‘bright IPA’ which hopped using four variations of the citra hop(T-90, Cryo, Hyperboost and Dynaboost). This layers and complexity to hop forwardness often described by Beak. The project itself is a series of IPAs which are directly inspired by Pacific coast beer culture.
A golden pour
When pouring the bright IPA into a glass, I notice the golden straw colour which almost glows. This beer has a slight haze but nothing near opaque. This definitely lives up to the idea of the beer being a ‘bright ipa’. There is a small white head which surprisingly did last the whole time however a minimal amount of lacing.
A super fresh taste and aroma
When it comes to the aroma of the Western Seaboard Project #3, it gives off flavours of tangerine and orange which is of course from the citrus nature of the citra hops. The hops also give a pine feel which made it smell somewhat earthy. Overall, this smells juicy and sweet which sounds typical of a bright IPA.
Moving on to the sip now, the aroma mostly followed across to the taste which gave off very citrusy tastes such as tangerine and orange. I could also taste hints of mango too which gave the beer a juicy taste. This beer was basically just the absolute embodiment of brewing using citra hops which gave it many different juicy layers. Towards the end you got a sort of hop bite. Overall, a very crisp and juicy beer which was quite refreshing.
Time for my verdict
This being the first time I have tried anything from Beak, I was not surprised by how juicy this beer was. I had heard great things about from people I have seen on Instagram aswell as from the location I bought it from. This was a refreshing and crisp IPA which really utilised the different forms of citra hops really well. This went down really smooth and crisp and overall it was a great drink. Only issue I have is the appearance as the head wasn’t too thick and foamy however this did not impact the flavour profile. To conclude I will give this a solid 4 out of 5.
Where did I purchase this from?
I purchased this beer from the Raredrop in Low Fell. The service from this shop was amazing and if you are local to it, I would definitely recommend. I think this beer cost £5.
Thanks for reading this beer review. If you enjoyed please don’t hesitate to check out the rest of my beer reviews. Cheers.
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