Beer New England Brewing Co Mango Smoke

Sometimes, when you come across a particularly odd combination of ingredients in a beer, you wonder how brewers develop their ideas. Are they thinking on an entirely different plane to the rest of us? Do they lose hours scouring the depths of home brew forums for inspiration? Do they just write down random ingredients on scraps of paper, put them in a receptacle, randomly pull out a few and figure out how to make it work? Whatever method they used, the brewers at New England have conspired to create a smoked mango beer. And it’s actually not quite as odd as it might at first seem.

It’a a light amber coloured ale, so looks near enough to how a mango-infused beer perhaps ought to look in the eyes of many. But it’s the smoke that hits you first. They built it around malt that was smoked using cherrywood and ironbark, the nuances of which are likely to be lost unless your olfactory system is au fait with the aromatic particulars of burning different types of wood. With that malt added to other German smoked malts, the charred character it puffs out is intense but comes with a slightly sweet tinge at the edges. Then, on the palate, the mango flavour comes roaring through, ramping up the sweetness significantly in a way that’s enveloping and lingering rather than sharp or acute. With sweet fruit and supple smoke throughout, Mango Smoke combines two distinctly contrasting flavours in a way that’s balanced and strangely enjoyable.

Nick Oscilowski