Next to godliness

This was intended to be a general round-up of some recently-released Irish beers, but as I've put the notes together I've noticed an unfortunate theme linking them. Folks, we need to talk about yeast bite.

The first offender was the much-anticipated new one from N17, Summer Ale, brewed at Reel Deel in Mayo. Oddly, the dark-amber beer was perfectly clear but the yeast twang was unmistakeable: a big savoury earthy thing spreading itself indecently over everything else. There are hops just about perceptible inside, tiny sparks of citrus, but really it's a weighty, flabby beast of a beer, not the light summer refresher I was expecting. Oh well, these things happen, I thought. I'm sure the next beer will suit me better.

And I was hugely looking forward to the third in Trouble Brewing's series of SMASH beers: the first two having been among my favourite offerings of the year to date. Vic Secret SMASH (co-starring Vienna malt) could only be a hit. But no. Now, maybe it's the bitterness that's bothering me most here: it is very sharply acidic, to the point of acridity. There's some pleasant spicy oranges in the aroma, but seconds after the first sip I found the harsh yeast flavour rising to dominate everything else, killing the nuances and leaving just the savoury fuzz and acid burn. I brought these observations to the attention of my peers in the pub last week and the consensus was that I'm talking through my hole as regards yeast bite in this beer. Seemingly it's a veritable hoppy delight as far as everyone else concerned. Yeast bitten or not, it's not a beer for me.

Until this theme emerged I wasn't planning to even write about Voyager US, a new IPA from Galway Bay. I didn't enjoy the glass of it I had and I thought I'd let it pass as I've written about the original Voyager before. And the fault, once again, was that gritty yeast effect. I see that a dissenting opinion was offered by the Destrier who found perfumey tropical fruit in there, but I didn't.

Buttinski yeast was something I also found in Kinnegar's Hilly Head Belgian-inspired "Farmhouse Red Ale". I guess I was expecting something clean, sharp and Rodenbach-like, even at 6.5% ABV, but what I got instead was a dense, warming beer closer to a dubbel with its plums and blackcurrants, but with interference from the earthy yeast as well. I like the aroma, though: an autumnal waft of damp orchards and ripe red berries, but you just don't get the same delicacy and nuance on tasting and I blame the yeast for that. Centrifuges for all!

I'm seeking redemption, finally, in a new Irish beer that tastes of yeast and means it: RadikAles's second offering Rubenesque Dubbel, bottle kindly supplied by the real-life Belgian Alain who brewed it at 9 White Deer. It's pale for the style, a clear garnet rather than brown, and the head doesn't hang about long. But visuals aside, this is bang-on perfect. There's a veritable old-fashioned sweetshop in the flavour, all liquorice, butterscotch and kola nut with a pinch of menthol, then liberally coated in unctuous yeast esters adding mushy banana and similar heady ripe fruit. I was skeptical of the decision to package it in a half litre bottle but the lightness of the body and perfectly balanced flavours make it surprisingly pintable, even if the carbonation is a tad high. Fans of the figgier, plummier sort of dubbel may be disappointed but it still hits plenty of classic abbey notes.

Returning to the main gripe of this post, am I wrong that too many Irish breweries are letting yeast get in the way of their beers' better features? Is it just a sensitivity of mine, or perhaps an over-sensitivity caused by too many Lilt-a-like juicy pale ales? I'm definitely not one of the Death To Murk brigade, but if you're going release your beer au naturel I'd prefer something to cover up that yeasty soupiness.

Another look

It's three and half hours on the train from Dublin to Killarney. For the journey I brought some beers that had been sitting neglected in my fridge, to combine leisurely train-drinking with putting a dent in my review backlog. Win-win. All three are from the range Marston's produces for Tesco.

First up, Revisionist Pacific Hop Red Ale, 4.2% ABV and promising Waimea and Pacific Gem hops. It's more copper than gold. Maybe rose gold if you're feeling charitable. There's a waft of vegetal hops on the nose suggesting the Kiwi varieties are a bit of a token effort but really this is an English ale to the bone. My theory is borne up by the flavour too. An assertive metallic bitterness opens its account, seguing swiftly to a dry tannic finish. I wasn't expecting a brown bitter but having been presented with one I quite enjoyed it, though I'll admit I shed a tear for what those New Zealand hops could have been in a different recipe.

To follow, Revisionist American Hop Rye Pale Ale. This time the claim is that Amarillo and Citra are the signature aroma hops but there's more of an earthy Cascade smell I reckon. Not that that's a bad thing. Crystal malt toffee looms large in the flavour though the body is light and it stays drinkable, which is appropriate at 4.3% ABV. But the hops are right at the centre of the taste, albeit in an understated, mannerly way. There's more of that metallic bitterness but some brighter peach and mandarin notes too. Overall a rather simple, fun and undemanding session pale ale.

Transferring at Mallow and on to Revisionist Dark India Pale Ale. It's not quite pure black, but close, with just a reddish cast to it. The aroma isn't up to much but there's a nice balance in the flavour between mild grapefruit hops (Chinook and Citra, says the label) and chocolate and caramel dark malt. The bitterness is low, but no harm. Simple, smooth, sweet and rather tasty. Full bodied too, for just 4.8% ABV.

I liked these. There are no flaws in their construction and a definite effort has been made both at offering something different to the supermarket shopper and explaining to them what makes it different. Dark IPAs and rye pale ales suggest that gateway beers are coming along in leaps and bounds.

Birthday treats

My previous post covered the new (to me) beers available at the Killarney Beer Festival at the beginning of the month. But obviously any big international gathering of beer nerds like this is going to include the occasional sideshow. This post is about a handful of other beers that I encountered that weekend.

It started on the train down where the redoubtable Mr Lamond was passing around a bomber of Southern Tier's Mokah, a 10% ABV chocolate/coffee imperial stout. It was pretty hard going: extremely sweet and with that slightly sweaty taste you get from elderly lukewarm filter coffee, plus nasty wet cardboard. The flatness and massive hot booze effect did nothing for its drinkability either. Maybe the serving conditions weren't ideal for a fair assessment but I doubt I'd be running back to it again. Still, thanks for the tick Steve!

For my part I was carrying a beer that sometime visitor to Ireland from Israel Mr Tom Lahav had brought particularly for Steve's attention. I opened it on one of the festival evenings as things were winding down. It appears not to even have a name on it but seems to mostly go by Tuborg 6.7%. This was brewed by Carlsberg's Israeli arm in Ashkelon to celebrate 67 years of Israeli independence in 2014. And it's a pretty decent malt-forward alt-like dark lager: bourbon biscuit as the main flavour feature, a very slight burnt roast dryness and a nicely crisp finish. Maybe it's just the name, but it does remind me a little of Tuborg's classic Julebryg, though perhaps a little less sweet. Cheers Tom!

On the roster of official festival business was Beoir's commemoration of the European Beer Consumers Union's 25th birthday. EBCU headquarters has issued a 3L jeroboam of St Feuillien Tripel to each of the 13 member organisations, to open at an event of their choosing during 2015. I was there when Poland popped the cork on its bottle last April in Łódź but only realised after the event that I had no notes on the actual beer. I wasn't going to miss out in Ireland. And it's an absolute classic of a Belgian tripel: that perfect combination of floral honey sweetness and piquant yeast spicing with no trace of heat even at 9% ABV and served at ambient temperature. Those who look deep in search of complexity will find traces of aniseed and coconut oils too. It's a great beer for celebrating the drinkers who celebrate the brewer's art.

The Mokah wasn't the only beer I drank on the train to Killarney, however...

Carl Kins (EBCU Executive) pours for Reuben Gray (Beoir Chairman)

To the Kingdom

Ireland got a major new addition to its beer calendar this month with the first Killarney Beerfest, staged by the experienced events organisers of the Irish National Entertainment Centre at the Gleneagle Hotel. The sun mostly shone, trade was quite brisk among the tents and the live entertainment was excellent. Saturday saw an all-star team of international judges put 81 of Ireland's microbrewed beers through a rigorous judging process, with young James Brown taking the grand prize for his Chocolate Orange Stout. But I did a bit of unofficial judging myself too...

First and foremost, Black Donkey's Buck-It comes off the naughty step. This beer really rubbed me up the wrong way back in February, but a switch from a neutral American yeast to something a little more estery has taken those pointy, musty edges off it and given it a smooth rounded fruity character. Well worth a re-visit if you were similarly unimpressed previously. The Roscommon brewery was also pouring a new one: Scythe, a 4.6% ABV... er... well I'm not sure what style category it belongs in. I suppose pale ale is a start: it's a murky orange colour and the aroma is pure peach flesh. That fresh and zippy New World hop thing extends to the flavour but it's joined there by a very Belgian yeast spice. If I recall correctly, this uses the same yeast as Black Donkey's Sheep Stealer saison so possibly could count as the same style. Either way, it's a very fine hoppy sessioner.

Sticking with them peaches for a moment, Black's of Kinsale had a new Pils on tap: slightly hazy but still properly clean-tasting and with a subtle sprinkling of peach and mandarin flavours. It's done with US hops but really put me in mind of those mouthwatering Australian varieties they have now. Overall this is a decent, but not shocking, re-imagining of quaffing lager.

From lager to stout and a second beer from County Limerick's only brewery, JJ's. Abbey Stout is a roasty one, vaguely sweet but pouring on more of the dry notes. There's not much other complexity but then at 4.2% ABV I guess there's not supposed to be.

Jack Doyle's beer is rarely seen outside its native Wexford so I was delighted to find it at the festival. Jack Doyle's Premium Stout is another straightforward one: 4.2% ABV and served on nitro. Its special move is a lovely whack of chocolate and cocoa right in the heart of the soft, smooth texture. This is plainly designed to take the big boys on and I'd certainly pick it when faced with that choice. I'm a little less convinced by Proper Order, a pale ale at the same strength. Like the stout, it's simple and drinkable with no brewing flaws, but it's much more of an Irish red than a hop-forward pale ale. Sure, it's a pale amber colour rather than red, but the light body, the toffee, and the low-impact hops all say something other than pale ale to me. But again, in a pub with nothing better, I'd be content.

Local boys Killarney Brewing also malted up their Scarlet Pimpernel IPA. It's very nearly red and decidedly sweet, justified by a pleasant buzz of orange sherbet though let down in the finish by a harsher medicinal note. Some sort of phenolic invader, perhaps? Nothing like that in the stout though. Casey Brothers is yet another easy-going nitro job, though it does make good use of its extra strength at 5% ABV: there's a creamy richness plus a mild hint of blackcurrant right on the finish.

Neighbours Torc Brewing have been a little more adventurous with their newest offerings. Torc Wheat Beer doesn't sound that off-the-wall, especially at just 4.2% ABV, but they've used Cascade and Centennial hops to add a juicy citrus bang without losing the classic bubblegum sweetness. There's a decently full body for the lower strength too. Torc Amber Ale is a tiny bit stronger but less hoppy too. If Proper Order and Scarlet Pimpernel had Irish Red qualities, this tips over into that style fully. There's a dusting of red fruit, more than a hint of toffee, and a clean mineral quality that stops it from getting too sweet. But disappointingly little by way of hops.

Two pale ales to go out on. The first is The Dreamer, a summer seasonal from O Brother and based on their regular The Fixer, with the ABV dialled down a notch to 4.3%. It's pale and hazy, the Willamette hops imparting bright floral flavours but with a more punchy playful bitterness on the end. There is a bit of a bleachy bum note spoiling things a little: I guess something this light leaves no place for such off-flavours to hide, but at least the beer's merits aren't obscured by this flaw.

My beer of the weekend, however, was the new Eight Degrees summer seasonal Grand Stretch. Created with the needs of the brewery workers in mind, this is just (again!) 4.2% ABV but jam-packed with Vic Secret hops. A grassy, resinous spice bumps up against classic New World mango and nectarine leaving no doubt that this beer is all about the delicious, refreshing, fresh hops. Yet it's not overly bitter and nor is it thin: the body is full enough to carry everything that's happening. Complex hop-forward session beers of this quality are all too rare in Ireland. It's great to meet another one.

Killarney may not be the biggest or geekiest of beer festivals in Ireland but it's one of the most enjoyable I've ever attended (living on-site for the duration may have something to do with that) and the setting amid the majestic Kerry scenery really adds spectacle to it. Keep and eye out for the announcement of next year's dates.

A walk in the park

June Bank Holiday, as usual, brought the Bloom in the Park festival to Dublin. I hadn't been in several years but organisers Bord Bia very kindly sent me a couple of tickets so on the mostly-sunny Saturday morning I set off for Phoenix Park.

Bloom is first and foremost a garden festival, the centrepiece being artily constructed miniature gardens, vying for medals and a grand prize. Courtesy dictates that a token wander around this bit is mandatory before hitting the beer tent, but this year there was something specific I wanted to see: "Saison", a garden put together by Breffni McGeough with help from brewer Alex Lawes and incorporating a nanobrewery. And a couple of comfy deckchairs, obviously. Very cute, and it's great to see beer culture leaking out of the bubble occasionally.

To the Bloom Inn, then. The 2015 iteration wasn't quite as much fun as 2011's randomly deflating space domes, but leagues ahead of 2010's A Small Tent With Some Beer. It felt like a real festival, with a crowd still consisting of mainly the uninitiated, but with plenty of converted beer enthusiasts too. A dozen or so brewers and cider-makers pitched up, plus a handful of the new wave of Irish distilleries.

There were two beers I hadn't tasted before on offer. The first I noticed on entering was Wicklow Wolf's Arcadia, a straight-up Kölsch clone. Only the smoothness of cask serve is missing from the replication. It's a bright, rich gold and offers mouthfuls of crisp and crunchy grain backed by quite assertive waxy German hops. It may be top fermented but there is a spring-water cleanness to the profile as a reminder that Kölsch, done properly, really is a lager. Arcadia will do a number on more than a few thirsts this summer, I'd say.

Putting clean and understated to one side, we move to the Carlow Brewing stand. Last year we were promised a sequence of amber ales using different national hop varieties, under the "Amber Adventure" label. We're only now seeing a second outing, and a slight shifting of the goalposts. O'Hara's Hop Adventure Sorachi Ace is an IPA, for one thing, and a pale one at that. All you really need to know is that it tastes of Sorachi Ace in a big way, and it's up to you whether that's a recommendation or a warning. I enjoyed it, though. It's all oily coconut and lemon meringue pie, the pie effect accentuated by a light biscuity malt flavour. Other breweries who have made beer like this (Kiuchi's Nipponia springs to mind) have tended to pile on the alcohol to counter the hop pungency. I like that this one, at just 5% ABV, doesn't put anything in their way.

More summer festival fun to come next week.

Market rates

I mentioned The Beer Market in passing a few weeks ago. Dublin's first ticker-friendly beer-only pub has been open a while now, serving mostly pricey exotic imports from well-reputed breweries in the UK, Europe and the US. I've been in a couple of times to sample the wares and this post is intended to give a cross section of the kind of things on offer from the 20 fast-changing rotation taps.

It's weird being blasé about the presence of Thornbridge, but the Derbyshire brewer seems like the staid establishment option in this company. Not that's there's anything wrong with their beer, of course. Bamberg caused a bit of a fuss when it was on. As the name sort-of implies, this is a rauchbier, and not the half-hearted variety. Don't be deceived by the pale amber colour, this is a very hefty lager, chewy and sweet as befits a bock. They've used smoked malt as the base so it completely dominates the flavour, and the aroma too: sweet and tangy on the nose; rich and meaty in the taste. It's perhaps not quite as clean-finishing as the real thing and there's a tiny bit of a plasticky burr, but it certainly doesn't leave the smokeheads wanting.

Also from the Thornbridge not-so-subtle playbook is Cocoa Wonderland. The vital statistics are that this is a 6.8% ABV porter with added chocolate, but all you really need to know is that it tastes like they just melted Mars bars into the brew kettle and kegged the result. The beer element is somewhat lost and it becomes tough going once the novelty wears off, but this is to chocolate what Thornbridge Bamberg is to smoke: laid on thick with no apology offered.

Quality company: Oblivious & Tale of Ale

The Beer Market's position as a peripheral part of the Galway Bay chain means that it fortuitously has access to Beerd beers. Beerd's Irish distributor tends not to do business here in the east and Galway Bay brings them over the M6 for us. Colossus is Beerd's IPA, a big 'un at 7.4% ABV, brewed with Mosaic and Calypso hops. It arrived headless, a cheery hazy orange colour. There was surprisingly little aroma and the flavour isn't exactly complex, but there's a pleasant no-nonsense hit of citrus pith and orange barley sweets.

Next to it was Crowbar, only 8.5% ABV so a little light for an imperial stout, I thought. It's plenty heavy, however: thickly textured but also dry with strong burnt notes. This was matured in Islay casks and the peaty phenols are very present, all TCP and plasticine. As befits the name, this beer is not subtle.

We need a cleanser after that and Brew By Numbers 01|01 is just the ticket. This saison is an inviting hazy witbier yellow and was served beautifully cold. There's not much aroma, just slight citrus and yeasty esters and it tastes of fresh lemon with mild white pepper underlying it, plus some denser oily air-freshener for added seriousness. More than anything it tastes like summer, and seems ideal for al fresco refreshment. Definitely one of the best of the new wave saisons I've tasted.

The final two beers for the moment are Spanish. Edge in Barcelona brews Padrino porter. I found it rather thin and quite harshly dry. What should be a luxurious smooth chocolate flavour comes across as artificial and cheap. Padrino looks good on paper but the recipe doesn't quite gel together properly. Much more enjoyable was Napar Pale Ale by Naparbier from near Pamplona. Just 4.3% ABV but exploding with fresh hop resins and juicy mandarin, backed by a substantial sweet malt base. This manages to pull off all the moves that much bigger beers make, and without even calling itself a "session IPA". Well worth seeking out.

Doubtless you'll be seeing more of those stemmed glasses and numbered taps in the background of pictures on future posts.

One tin saison

There's something quite intriguing about a traditional Belgian brewer like St Feuillien putting its Saison in a can, and dry hopping it to boot. But so it is, and four for a tenner in Redmond's too. Not to be passed up.

Mind you, leaving it on its side in the fridge was a mistake. The "unfiltered" warning is there around the rim for all to see. The end result was a glass of beautiful sunshine-yellow beer, disfigured by huge yeasty flakes suspended through it. I'm not sure that any hop character has been lost, however: the aroma is still lightly melony and similar fruit salad chunks, while the flavour offers just a gentle citrus, akin to a witbier, but still very much crisp and saisony, and I don't think that's the fault of the floaters.

Overall, trendy packaging and anglophone hopping techniques notwithstanding, this is a classic understated Belgian saison, with all the thirst-punching power that goes with. And still perfectly quaffable even at 6.5% ABV. I'm impressed, I'll be buying more, but I'll still be storing the next ones standing.

Toøled up

Tobias from Danish gypsy brewing outfit To Øl was in Dublin recently, at an event organised by Four Corners and hosted in P. Mac's. He told us the To Øl story and introduced us to three of his beers. You can hear more on that in the interview he gave to the Irish Beer Snob podcast here.

Two pale ales and a stout were on the roster, starting with Friends With Benefits, a dense 5.1% ABV hazy orange pale ale. There's a heady aroma of aftershave and the flavour is mostly sweet, the Simcoe and Amarillo hops deferring to the Melanoidin and Munich malts. There's lots of toffee, a fair whack of honey and then just a tangy, pithy bitterness on the finish. Interesting, but it left me wanting more from those hops.

I wasn't sure what to expect from the second pale ale, Garden of Eden. This one's even cloudier, a lurid opaque orange colour. It smelled like runny Camembert at first which put me at some unease, but after a little time to warm up that gets replaced by lovely tropical fruit aromas. And it's the tropical fruit which dominates the flavour: loads of sweet mango and passionfruit to the expense of everything else except a mild peppery bite. I was impressed by the way they managed to get this intense juicy effect from hops until I learned that they simply added actual juice. As well as the two aforementioned, there's also apricot, guava and papaya in here, added right at the end of the brewing process. I feel a little cheated but can't deny I really enjoyed drinking it.

Finally By Udder Means, a big 7% ABV milk stout. It's a style which I'm fine with but have never been especially impressed by. This one was different. It's spectacularly bitter, with the intense green vegetal hop flavour more commonly found in first-rate black IPAs. There's a rich seam of dark chocolate and then the lactose sweetness just as an afterthought. A very grown-up beer overall, despite the slight candy flavours. Highly recommended.

Cheers to Tobias for dropping by, and to Paul and Amy from Four Corners for setting it up.

The resurrection men

The Session turns 100-months-old today. I've only written posts for 95 of them so can't claim my merit badge. And I've only hosted once: Reuben is on his third. The theme he has chosen is very much of the moment: Resurrecting Lost Beer Styles. And there's a lot of it about. Fuelled in part by new historical research, but I think mainly by brewers running out of innovative brewing ideas, dead and dying styles from around Europe and beyond seem to be back in vogue with contemporary brewers and drinkers. So it gose.

The beer I've chosen for this post probably doesn't strictly count as a resurrected historical beer, but it de facto is one. Before the Reinheitsgebot shut the apothecary shop doors in the German brewers' faces, hemp was one of the ways medieval beer-makers gave their beers extra bitterness, flavour, and doubtless psychoactive effect too. Hemp beers are still plentiful around the world, but they tend to be god-awful sugary concoctions designed more for the easily-impressed stoner market than the historical beer enthusiast. There are exceptions, however, and I'd single out Hanf by 7 Stern in Vienna and Hanf by Wädenswiler near Zurich as notable exceptions worth seeking out. A couple of weeks ago I was in The Bernard Shaw hoping to add Brewtonic Sim Simma to that list.

It's not the first Irish hemp beer: we have The Porterhouse to thank for the previous one, back in 2005. This time it's Rascal's Brewing Co. adding the pot to the kettle, via the good offices of The Hemp Company on Capel Street. The result is a hazy gold pale ale at 5% ABV. Unfortunately it doesn't really do the weedy business, lacking the beautiful herbal pepperiness of the aforementioned central European hemp beers. There is a slight resinousness to it, but that could just as easily be from the generous hopping as anything else -- the strongly bitter lip-smacking citrus punch makes up for any lack of novelty.

In short, Sim Simma is a solidly decent keg bitter and doesn't really get the value out of its hemp, other than as a talking point on the pumpclip, which I suppose is reason enough. I'd be interested in a do-over, however. Add more hemp.

And with that, I'm off to Killarney for the weekend. Drop by the INEC for a beer if you're passing.

Breakfast of champions

I understand Grand Cru Beers pulled off a bit of a coup, acquiring quite a lot of Founders's annual release of KBS ("Kentucky Breakfast Stout", though it doesn't say that on the label) for Ireland. At €8 for a little bottle I wasn't in much of a hurry to try it, but it was getting lots of good feedback and, since there didn't seem to be any shortage, I eventually succumbed.

It's 11.2% ABV and every bit as dense as that strength implies, pouring out black and silky, in no rush to form a head, though it eventually does. "Chocolate and coffee, aged in oak bourbon barrels" says the label, and the aroma repeats this verbatim: there's the oily and earthy roasted coffee bean; there's the chocolate bar with a large percentage number on the packaging; and there's the boozy vanilla wood of the whisky. No surprises here.

And it's the bourbon in the driving seat on tasting: there's lots of that signature sour-mash lime flavour and a kind of hazel nuttiness from the oak. The coffee is present but muted and the chocolate is all but gone. Disappointingly, it doesn't really taste of anything else. The mouthfeel is rather thin and the finish is short. I expected much more complexity, and some decent hop character (it's 70 IBUs!), but it all seems to have been drowned by the added goop.

Far be it from me to try and stifle anyone's creativity, but maybe less is more when it comes to double-digit ABV imperial stouts.

Born. This. Way

Hop Rocker, 77, Fake: BrewDog has had a number of goes at the pale lager category and none of them has impressed me much. The latest attempt is called This. Is. Lager. and was launched last summer. Understandably wary, I decided to give it a head start by drinking it on a sunny afternoon after mowing the lawn, when little is demanded of a lager other than refreshment.

And I think it exceeded the minimum requirements of the task. Yes it was wet, and cold and crisply fizzy but there's also enough malt body to avoid being hollow or watery. The hops, meanwhile, are in that East Kent Goldilocks zone of imparting a refreshing bitter bite -- grassy, slightly metallic -- lasting long on the palate but without being overpowering. While the body is dense enough to pass for higher than 4.7% ABV, it's not any way sweet or bready. Most of all, the classic lager cleanness infuses the whole making it an absolutely perfect patio quaffer. Put it in a grown-up serving size and you'd have a rival for Pilsner Urquell.

From there to a more recent release from the Scottish brewery: Born To Die, an 8.5% ABV double IPA. Colourwise, it's not that different from the lager, the clear bright yellow a refreshing change in a world where double IPAs tend to be heavy, soupy, orange beasts. The aroma is very, er, BrewDog: a punky blitz of ripe mango, pine resin and dank, with maybe just a whisper of heat, hinting at the high ABV. That strength gets hidden in the fruit-forward flavour. It sings an innocent carefree rhyme of apricots and mandarins with only a slight bitter pinch on the end followed by a dry savoury finish. No heat, no chewiness, just a pure clean surface for the hop fun. I sipped slowly to savour it, not because it was hard going.

I think I can see why the brewery is making a big fuss of this beer's fragility: when the hops die off there isn't going to be any character to replace them; it will not, like some double IPAs, grow up into a decent barley wine. Though that said I'm not about to spend another €11 to test that theory.

Top stuff all round from BrewDog. These plucky kids will do well.