Efes Draft
Efes Beverage Group
5%
Istanbul, Turkey

To me, Efes is a snooker club in Dalston that for a few years was taken over by Hackney and Dalston types. But it also a Turkish brewing company that was founded in 1969 and is one of the biggest companies in the world, in fact according to Wikipedia it is the 12th largest in the world. Impressive.

So, I picked up a bottle of the Efes Draft from my local supermarket mainly because I really loved the bottle. Rather round and large it has something appealing about it. The beer itself, which is the Efes Beverage Group flagship beer is a pretty non-affair. Amber in colour it is not that it tastes particularly bad it just doesn’t taste that good either. I guess these days my tastes have been broadened so much by craft breweries and unique tasting ales a beer like Efes doesn’t excite me at all. Still, at least the bottle is cool.

It is the sort of beer that on a baking hot day lying on the beaches of Turkey you could easily glug bottles of the stuff. It happens to be December and I’ve just come back from a brewery market where my mouth has been stimulated in ways I could never have imagined. I wouldn’t go as far as saying it was up there with Fosters et al but let’s just say I couldn’t really describe its taste. Wikipedia reckons it is “tangy” and has a “bitter-sweet” finish. I don’t see it.

It isn’t very inspiring and genuinely the best thing about it, is the bottle which for someone like me who hoards and collects interesting bottles is great. However, if you are wanting a nice beer then there are so many better options out there, go wild with Meantime, Camden, BrewDog and so on.

Taste: 2
Design: 4
Bottle Top: 2