Hida Takayama Dark Ale is a 5% English strong ale from Hidatakayama Beer and is part of their yearly range, unusual for an English strong ale that is considered to be a winter beer and is commonly known as a winter warmer. It’s available in bottles, cans, and occasionally on tap if you’re lucky. Hida Takayama Dark Ale is also brewed with roasted malts to produce the dark, malted colour.
An English strong ale. Someone needs to check the definition of strong again.
Hida Takayama Dark Ale Aroma and Taste
Seeing Hida Takayama Dark Ale as an English strong ale brought me back to memories of seeing my Dad drinking Fuller’s 1845 in the local working men’s club and, on occasions due to the ludicrously high 8.5% abv, Fuller’s Golden Pride. Two beers that are still around though hard to find in Japan. Their malt levels were incredibly high for a wee young boy and smelt like someone had mixed up caramel with hot water. Unfortunately, Hida Takayama Dark Ale failed straight away by having an abv of only 5% – not a bad thing but not quite in the same category as those heavyweights among English strong ales.
It did pour out with a deep-red, almost brown like colour with an off-white brownish head that lingered liked it had just been drawn from a hand pump and someone was trying to short change me of some beer. The aroma was a rich, malt-like pungency that had some detectable hops in there but only the smallest amount possible to take off some of the sweetness. It looked and smelt more like a brown ale than an English strong ale though.
With the brown ale discovery and a quick reading of the style – personally don’t know much about brown ales as growing up they were often dismissed for being an old man’s drink by my dad – this beer really seemed to fit in that category well. Hida Takayama Dark Ale is fruitier than you probably would have guessed and the caramel / toffee flavours merge with some citrus stuff. It finished off slightly bitter with no real other discernable flavours coming though.
Hida Takayama Dark Ale One Line Review
Hida Takayama Dark Ale is an ok beer though with it being mislabelled as an English strong ale it doesn’t help.
Where to Buy Hida Takayama Dark Ale
Hida Takayama Dark Ale can be bought from the Hida Takayama Beer online store here. The only other place we have seen it on sale is from Rakuten on a general search. If you do have it on sale near you, let us know.
