Beer Swap Beer #3 Hopdaemon Leviathan (6%)

Leviathan was the last of the trio of Hopdaemon beers that Pete sent as part of Beer Swap, I had enjoyed the other two (Skrimshander and Green Daemon Hellas) so to say I was looking forward to this was an understatement, the description on the bottle and on the Hopdaemon website sounded right up my street.

A strong ruby ale with spicy hop aromas and a rich malty finish.

Brewed from the finest malted barley and Kentish hops this ‘BEAST’ of a beer is deceptively easy-drinking for its strength and is conditioned naturally in the bottle to produce a sparkle and sediment characteristic of all great living beers.

Leviathan poured a lovely dark malty brown colour, with a lovely frothy white head (once again dispelling the myth that all beers from daan saaf don’t have a head on)

Hopdaemon Leviathan

Leviathan had a lovely hoppy malty smell that was laced with spice and fruit, almost like Christmas cake, it really did smell great, in fact I would go so far as to say it’s one of the nicest smelling beers of the year, this lovely smell only raised expectations, when a beer smells this good you really want it to taste as good as it smells.

I was in luck, it did, it tasted great, the first flavours you get are of malt and caramel, there are hints of spice and smoke and a lovely hop bitterness that make it lovely and deep without being too heavy, mainly because it’s quite thin bodied, but unlike the Green Daemon, it doesn’t detract from an excellent beer, it just makes it really easy to drink, this is also helped by the bitterness and dryness in the finish that just lingers in your mouth for ages and makes you want to drink more.

So that was all of my Hopdaemon beers that came in my Beer Swap parcel finished, If I had to choose a favourite it would be Leviathan, which is strange as I really did expect to find my self preferring the Skrimshander, having said that Skrimshander was a very close second followed by Green Daemon Hellas, which was nice but not as good as the other too.

If you like your Kentish hops, tasty IPA’s or lovely dark malty ales then be sure to track down some of Hopdaemons beers.