High Plains snifter

Right, I'll skip the usual bit about American beers and irritating tiddly bottles. We'll take that as read.

This post is about three beers which have just appeared on the Irish market, hailing from breweries headquartered in Colorado (though yes, I'm aware that one of them has recently moved all production to the east coast, but it took me ages to come up with the title of this post and I'm not changing it now). I'm told they're being imported in minuscule quantities for strictly limited periods, and will be replaced by other American craft brews supplied on the same basis. Sounds fun, for as long as it's kept up. To business, then:

Flying Dog's Old Scratch is an amber lager and, as such, I was expecting something from the same general gene pool as Samuel Adams's Boston Lager. While the taste is some way similar, this beer is a darker, redder affair. I was disappointed by a lack of body, but then I guess you're supposed to be drinking this by the six-pack. At the end of the flavour there's a strange, but not at all unpleasant, estery taste with a hint of raspberries and similar summer fruit. Not a bad beer, but I won't be hankering after it when it disappears from the shelves.

American IPAs being what they are, I was expecting a hop attack from the bottle of Snake Dog. Instead I got a rather easy-going beer, paler than most IPAs, and with strangely sweet bubblegum and toffee notes. Approachable and eager to please, this is my sort of IPA, though probably a hophead's worst nightmare.

At the other end of that spectrum is the rather less accommodating Hercules Double IPA from Great Divide. I served this at cellar temperature and was immediately struck by how harsh and alcoholic the aftertaste was, with very little up front. Those big hops flavours just didn't sit well with the other notes and the end result was quite discordant and unappealing. I thought perhaps I should have been drinking it colder, to take some of that blunt edge off, but as it warmed I found it became smoother, rounder and infinitely more drinkable. The bottom line, however, is that this is more effort than I'm willing to put into drinking a beer. Hercules lacks the interesting and complex flavours to justify the exertion required on my part.

So, the next batch is supposed to include Anchor Christmas ale, but the next batch was also supposed to have arrived last week. This is me not holding my breath.