Bring in the new

As in previous years, twenty Irish breweries took stands at the Killarney Beer Festival. This year, unfortunately for my ticking predilection, the line-up veered a little away from the local breweries -- no West Kerry, no Eight Degrees, no Black's of Kinsale -- and in favour of breweries I meet all the time in Dublin: Wicklow Wolf, Boyne Brewhouse and The Porterhouse were among the first-timers for 2017.

Anyway, there was still enough to keep me occupied for the weekend. Of particular interest was a slew of new specials from Manor Brewing but before that, a bit of pre-festival research revealed that I'd never written about their flagship lager Mont, even though I've always enjoyed it. It's not a beer of bells and whistles, just a superbly produced pilsner, well balanced between the light (yet not thin) malt body and a waxy kick of classic noble hops. The carbonation is low enough for easy quaffing too. An all-round class act, basically. So what about the newbies?

There was the Belgian-style dark ale which I wrote about a couple of weeks ago, and also a dark lager, infused with oranges, plus extra Seville orange soakage at the point of dispense. The name: Black Is The New Orange. I'll confess it took a while for the orange side of it to open up for me. To begin with it was just sweet and roasty black molasses and treacle, tasting a little heavier than 5% ABV would suggest. Then the fruit kicked in, giving a pleasant, but mild, zesty punch in the finish, and a sweet aroma of chocolate and marmalade that's disturbingly close to a freshly opened pack of jaffa cakes. It's a fun beer overall, and I like how it didn't lay on the novelty too heavily.

Two new IPAs from Manor were on tap as well. Triumph & Disaster is the regular one at 5.7% ABV. I was surprised, though charmed, by the highly malt-forward aroma, full of rich and calorific cake and biscuit. The flavour serves up the hops old-school: earthy Cascade dominating, but balanced nicely by the crystal malt behind. It's not a complete '90s throwback, however, there's a spark of modern complexity in the pear and white peach juiciness that runs through it. Not a world-shaker, but nicely put together.

Its companion imperial IPA is called Bigger Than Ben Hur and at 9.2% ABV has clearly been designed to shake something. (Excuse the terrible picture: it was understandably late by the time I got to this.) The hops this time are Amarillo and Wai-iti but to me it bore a strong resemblance to its little brother. There's that cake thing again, as well as the peach and pear. It's perhaps not as hoppily punchy as the best DIPAs but it does lack any cloying sickly heat or sharpness, which is definitely in its favour. Fans of the style may find it lacks impact for them, despite going all-out with the ABV.

Also working the multiple-new-beer angle for me was Boyne Brewhouse. I had missed their Oatmeal Stout at the Alltech festival back in February but it made a reappearance on the bar here. This one certainly gets its money's worth out of the porridge bag: it's massively thick and gloopy, despite a quite reasonable 6.2% ABV. It uses that extra heft to add complexity to the flavour, and as well as the standard roast coffee and chocolate I got sweet ripe strawberries and a heady spicy aftershave note. Very much a beer for sipping, this, for reasons both of texture and flavour.

And brand new on the Boyne roster was an Imperial Saison. I keep saying how strong saison isn't my thing but I've now met three badged as "imperial" (including Stone's last week) which I've found highly enjoyable. This one is 7.8% ABV, a pale milky colour and arrived without much by way of a head. It smells of pear, which put me on high alert for acetone solvent flavours, but there aren't any. Instead it's amazingly crisp and clean, refreshing even, without an ounce of heat or excess fruit. It is, in short, everything a saison is supposed to be except for the percentage number on the tap badge.

Finally for today to local boys Torc and a couple of new offerings. They actually had three but I only spotted their new red as I left to get my train on the last day. Neither of the other two really floated my boat, however. There was a Barrel-Aged Porter at just 4.6% ABV which I suspect just didn't have enough beer substance to balance the barrel. The end result tasted of butter, vanilla and sawdust.

5% ABV Kingdom IPA was also new to me, and also lacked the desired cleanness. It's a strange purple-ish colour and is extremely sweet, showing the synthetic fruit characteristics of red lemonade. I'm afraid I can't help you with this analogy if you've never tasted red lemonade, but suffice it to say that lemons do not feature. There's a certain red fruit purée element as well and a slick, almost sticky, body. Perhaps this has been constructed to suit local tastes but it wasn't my sort of IPA at all.

More from the festival later this week, with some more rapid flitting between the bars. It's good to get a bit of exercise.