Vocation Brewery
Life & Death IPA
6.5%
Cragg Vale, Yorkshire, UK

Rightly or wrongly, craft beer in the UK is very much associated with London breweries but there’s plenty of craft brewing scenes further afield. None more so than in Yorkshire with the likes of Ilkley, Northern Monk, Magic Rock, Saltaire and many more including Vocation Brewery. I was recommended the brewery by a friend at work who is from Yorkshire and whilst up in Leeds I picked up a few cans from Tall Boys Beer Market. Somewhere I’d really recommend visiting.

Like I do whenever I try a brewery for the first time, I went with an IPA. In my opinion if a brewery can make a fantastic IPA then they’ve won me over immediately. Life & Death is an incredibly hoppy number and is described as having a “fruit salad” taste on the side of the can. Something I definitely don’t disagree with. It pours a beautiful orange colour and has a incredible hoppy aroma. Pungent and irresistible.

By their own words Life & Death is “ballsy” and “life-affirming”. Bold, but true. I often sit and think about beer. To put this into perspective, I’ve spent the past 4 weeks refreshing Magic Rock’s Twitter handle to see when their cans have been released. Obsessed? Probably. Fascinated? Most definitely. So although it is hard to say beer is life-affirming, I definitely think it has changed my life. Life & Death is the type of beer I’d recommend over and over, the type of beer I’d drink forever and ultimately the type of beer that makes craft better than any other alcohol. If you’re just getting into craft beer then this is a golden generation of brewing, thank the lords for awesome beers, just like Life & Death.

OVERALL: 4.5/5