Thornbridge 'Wye'

Or should that say Thornbridge 'Why'? If you are slightly baffled let me try and explain.

Last week when I wrote the post on fruit and vegetables I had intended to follow it the day after with a write up about the latest Thornbridge beer 'Wye', which the pump clip said had the flavour of cucumber. I had never come across a beer tasting of cucumber so naturally I was keen to see how a beer could accomodate such a subtle flavour. It has taken all week for it to reach the bar in Grove so yesterday was my first chance to give it a test.

It did not hold back in the tasting stakes. At 4.7% it was fairly strong and a mid brown or amber colour. The nose certainly had hints of cucumber there and the taste certainly did. It did actually work as a beer, but as I got further into the glass it seemed to loose the balance between the taste of beer and the background cucumber.

What intrigued me was to how the flavour actually got there. Is there a hop, or combination of hops, that gives a cucumber hint to beer? I certainly don't know of one. Or has someone at the brewery painstaking  peeled cucumbers and used the rind to make the flavour? Possibly. Or is this s step on from dry hopping and whole cucumbers just lobbed into the boil? Who knows.

Whoever thought it up, and however they made it happen, the question is 'Wye'? As a novelty one off I quite liked it, but would not fancy a session on it. Maybe a step too far in the taste stakes.