Pen-Lon Cottage Torwen

ABV: 4.5%
Origin: Llanarth, Ceredigion, Cymru
Website: www.penlon.biz

This is an expanded review of a beer that featured as a fruit beer on the bottled beer review page in the August 2010 issue of BEER magazine, sent free every quarter to CAMRA members, who can also view it online. The magazine is also available in selected newsagents.

This beer's namesake, a Torwen sheep.

Tiny farmhouse brewery Pen-Lon Cottage, founded in 2005 in the wilds of Ceredigion by former home brewers Penny and Stefan Samociuk, is one of the few British breweries devoted exclusively to real ale in a bottle, with no cask, opting instead to sell through specialist food shops and markets as a quality artisanal product. The range is impressive, and the commitment to local origin is exhibited two beers featuring local fruit, pale Torddu and dark Torwen, both named after Welsh sheep. The exact fruit used varies according to season and availability.

I sampled a plum version of Torwen, darkened with roasted and flaked barley and hopped with Target. The beer poured near black with a thick creamy beige head. A fresh, lightly roasty and tarry aroma had fruity coffee and new plastic notes, leading to a full but lively dark malt and coffee palate, with a slightly chewy and tannic plum note emerging and both fruit sweetness and acid subtly present in a complex mineral-tinged mix of flavours. More marked fruity flavours emerged on the finish over firm dry chocolate and coffee, with more tannins developing later, a well-judged use of fruit in a thoroughly decent beer. 

Buy this beer from AlesbyMail.com as part of a special pack containing all the beers featured on my beer review page in BEER this month. BEER readers receive a special discount by entering the voucher code shown in the magazine.

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Read more about this beer at ratebeer.com: http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/pen-lon-cottage-torwen-blackberry/87701/