The first batch of Citra was brewed on 20th November, 2009, the day after the airmail hops landed. The ground-breaking beer received such a positive reaction that it was brewed every other month in 2010 before joining the Oakham core line-up in 2011. I can't even begin to describe the explosion of different flavours that I was experiencing. I often find that this style of beer is all grapefruit astringent hoppiness, but this brew was rich fruitiness/piney, slightly sweet malt with a short sharp refreshing bitterness that just begged you to take another slurp! Influenced by his predecessor’s open-minded approach to hop selection, in 2002 John was the first UK brewer to travel to the USA to witness the hop harvest first hand. By selecting hops direct from the growers, he set a precedent for UK and US brewers alike.

John Bryan, our Brewing Director, is well known for his quirky ideas, his innovative approach and his passion for quality. It’s not just the quantity of hops we use though. The quality of our ingredients is also vital as is the Oakham commitment to quality and consistency. I've only tried 2 other (bottled) commercial single hopped citra beers, 1 being Oakham Citra and the other was Crouch Vale's Citra. Both of which I didn't really like TBH, as I found them over bitter with minimal malt and hop flavour. Also the aroma reminded me of a Tom Cat!! Taste: There's a slight bit of maltiness in the taste but the Citra favours cut through it like a very sharp thing indeed. If anything, the hop flavours are even more well-defined, with some sharper, passion-fruit like flavours mixing it up with the more usual citrus and grapefruit. Nicely dry with a lingering bitterness, and fairly well hop-forward as you'd expect.S: very much like the same brewery’s regular beer, Citra, in that the fruitiness has accentuated so well and smells fresh on the nose, with gooseberry cordial, juicy lychee flesh, pears, and honey-ish sweet but light-bodied pale malts coming in a harmony. If anything, the sweetness comes slightly too sharp on the balance.

Twice “World Champion Cask Beer” at the prestigious International Brewing Awards and winner of many other major awards, Green Devil IPA is very much the big brother of Oakham Citra, double hopped with a huge 2.25 Kg of top Citra hops per brewer’s barrel (288 pints). Citra is now Oakham’s No.1 brand and the driving force behind the brewery’s success in recent years! An innovative and hugely influential figure in UK brewing, John joined Oakham in October 1995. Within weeks he was promoted to head brewer upon the retirement of brewery founder John Wood. Our multiple awards for Citra and Green Devil IPA inspired us to write something more about our love for Citra hops and the story behind it. I may start by tweaking half of a Woodfordes Sundew kit with additional DME and 100g of Citra pellets that I've got.Well of course that followed on in 2011 when the supply of Citra hops increased and Oakham Green Devil IPA made its first appearance. The original recipe and brewing process have changed very little since 2009. John was already using a significantly heavier weight of hops than many craft brewers of hop-forward beers use today, meaning that the beer has been more than a match for the changing tastes of consumers. Citra was named champion golden beer of Great Britain by CAMRA at the Great British Beer Festival in both 2014 and 2019. Green Devil IPA is also aged in a cask for at least 6 weeks to allow flavours and condition to develop even further. Look: Pale, straw yellow with a good fingers-width of off-white, fairly bubbly head. Good retention with some lacing left behind. Not much visible carbonation left after initial pour. That’s around twice the quantity of hops used in Citra – itself very generously hopped for its ABV! .

seymour wrote:I haven't tasted it, but it sure sounds like they simply brewed a bigger version of this:

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T: light-bodied but feeling quite a mouthful at the same time, due to the quality English pale malts applied I suspect, supporting clean & focused flavours of Citra hops (quite like all the aroma elements identified on the nose, albeit less assertively), followed by lightly chewy, tannic and moderate hop bitterness as well as a decent dose of acidity to linger in the long, flowery & lychee-ish fragrant finish.