First I must apologise for my extended absence. A combination of problems with our middle son, some very long work days and a death in the family sidelined me for a while.
I now have time to write up the results of my first batch of tasting which I actually did quite a while ago!
I arranged a blind testing for my wife who frankly has a better palate than I do, so I knew which beer was which but she did not. We both tried the beers and I have to say that they were all good although mine was severely under carbonated (which didn't add much to the beer!).
The final positions relate to how close to the sample bottle of Hobgoblin the beer was (in our opinion).
Closest was....Yettiman. The comments were:-
Spot on colour. Good head. Close on aroma. Close on flavour and excellent mouthfeel.
Next was.... Mally. Comments.
Good colour. Okay head. Slightly weaker aroma. Close on flavour. Good mouthfeel.
Next was.... Yeasty. Comments.
Slightly lighter colour. Okay head. Weaker aroma. Slightly too bitter. Low carbonation.
Finally...me.
Slightly lighter colour. No head worth mentioning. "Perfumed" aroma. No depth of flavour. Very low carbonation.
As mentioned previously, mine out of the keg is properly carbonated and a much nicer drinking experience.
I realise from reading many, many posts from PP that this sample is much too small to draw any real conclusions from. Having said that, I prefer my usual version of a ruby ale based loosely around Hobgoblin to this one, even though this is closer to Hobgoblin! It is also my second least favourite beer that I have brewed. (The worst was a Boddingtons clone, what was I thinking?)
I still have the second taste test to do so we will see what difference time makes to this beer.
Until then, good job fellas,
just don't copy mine!