Passing for normal

Hungarian brewery Mad Scientist makes one of its sporadic returns to these pages today, with the two most normal-looking things from the most recent tranche of releases. The question before us is: how do they fare at making beer-flavoured beer?What better test than a central European lager, though that should be the easy setting for a central European brewery. To assist, Mad Scientist has availed of the help of Radim Zvánovec, Budvar's global brand ambassador, who should know his way around the style at this stage. The result, worryingly, is called Bohemian Madness. It's properly golden and with a fine white head, although it's also quite hazy: definitely at the unfiltered end of this style. The aroma is sweet and a little syrupy, where I would have liked a fresh grassy bite also. I had noticed the can was a little squashy, and sure enough, the carbonation is very low here; a cask-like fine sparkle rather than cleansing lager fizz. The flavour isn't too cleansing either, loading up on…