New country, who dis?

Slovenia isn't an easy place to get to from Ireland, which is why my quest to tick it off began in Croatia and finished in Italy. From the train coming in westwards to Ljubljana it looks like a beautiful country, its lush and dramatic scenery reminding me more of New Zealand than anywhere else. Ljubljana has the feel of a city on the up, shedding its Eastern Bloc past, prettifying and pedestrianising as it goes.

Its best-reputed beer bar, Lajbah, lies a short walk from the centre, along the banks of the Ljubljanica river. The list was a little thin on  local beers on my visits, however. My first was Summer Snow by Barut, a wild-yeast and barrel-ageing specialist from northern Slovenia. This was presented simply as a Berliner weisse, and a weak one at 3.2% ABV. There was nothing basic about the freshly funky stonefruit aroma: Brettanomyces is at work. Lightly carbonated, it's thick and juicy on the palate. I got lots of apricot flavour, plus a hint of barnyard, with the attenuated sourness bringing it back to a crisp apple finish. This is a great demonstration of how Brett can be used to add complexity without going overboard.

Estonians Põhjala featured large on the blackboard, and that's their Vahtra imperial stout on the left of the picture. This is a big boy at 10.8% ABV with a huge coffee syrup aroma and a sickly sweet flavour to match. I found an abundance of hazelnut, coconut and caramel from it, though the texture was weirdly thin and fizzy. While it wasn't advertised as a pastry job, that's very much what you get. Fans of bitter imperial stout steer clear.

Karneval, on the other hand, is advertised as a pastry stout, and is around the same strength. It gets busy with the dessert trolley early on, slinging raspberry and cherry jam, turning to Black Forest gateau when the rich chocolate notes kick in. And yet this one isn't a cloying sugarbomb. It's not very complex, for sure, but it is fun to drink. The name is well chosen.

Next to it, with rather less head, is the Anniversary Baltic Porter from enigmatically-named Swedish brewery O/O. I'm glad I wasn't invited to the party because this was terrible: thick like a milk stout and horribly sweet, with a plasticky bitter tang on the end. The overall effect is of bad instant coffee. Though 10% ABV there's no alcohol burn, but it's still far from easy drinking and really best avoided.

The other place for a large and varied beer list is Pop's: a burger restaurant rather than a bar, but they didn't mind us stopping for just a drink even though it was packed. My choice was SuperNova from Serbian brewery Kabinet. It's a dark orange IPA, 6.8% ABV and heavily textured. The aroma is an old-fashioned American-style mix of toffee and citrus. That's most of the value you get from the hops; the flavour being a strong honey-like sweetness more akin to a Belgian blonde than an IPA. A slight peppery bitterness adds seasoning. It's fine, just not very IPAish.

A Hungarian beer for herself: New York Mocacchino milk stout from Mad Scientist, also at 6.8% ABV. It arrived a deep brown colour and certainly smells like a mocacchino: sharp coffee roast and soft cocoa in equal measures. A candy sweetness builds as it goes and there's a floral perfume effect too. It is a bit thin and the cocoa turns powdery later on too. I was expecting something richer and smoother so was disappointed by what it turned out to be.

Handy for the hotel was a smart little English theme pub called The Sir William. Here I couldn't resist the opportunity to try a Slovenian cask beer, so Hopsbrew Pale Ale it was. It looked the part, settling to a clear copper colour with a generous head. There was a gorgeous fruit and spice aroma, an air of sandalwood reminding me of Harvey's Sussex Best Bitter. A sharp gastric acidity starts it off, suggesting Styrian Goldings hops to me, and it turns smoother later, the black tea and chocolate notes aided by an even, quaffable texture. This isn't just a tokenistic nod to English bitter; it's a spot-on imitation of a really good one.

We had a few beers from Reservoir Dogs, a brewery in Nova Gorica, hard by the Italian border. That's their Black Hole #50 rum barrel imperial stout beside the Hopsbrew. At 10.5% ABV it's very hot, the rum-soaked aroma singeing the eyebrows of unwary sniffers. The flavour blends a nutty cola dryness, dark chocolate and rum into a rum baba confection with added cork oak, while its heat scorches the throat like a spirit on swallowing. It definitely delivers what it promises but I found it just too sweet and rummy.

Their black IPA goes by the slightly disturbing name Starvation, and it's a very nutritious 8% ABV. A lemon-and-liquorice aroma leads on to a stronger lime-and-tar taste. While unarguably heavy, there's a lightness to it, from the spritzy citrus notes. The soft and smooth texture helps too. It mellows as it warms, bringing gentle lavender and chocolate. This is near perfection for black IPA in my book: beautifully balanced between the big and complex hops and the dark roasted grains. It's definitely not just a porter with a fistful of C-hops thrown in.

The pale beer is another Reservoir Dogs big-hitter: Mea Culpa imperial IPA. This was a crystal-clear orange colour with a hot and harsh boiled-sweet aroma. It tastes of marmalade and sugar so is another west coast throwback, when American IPA was all about big booze and big bitterness. As such, I found no real complexity here. The flavour is huge but one-dimensional, and frankly a little boring. Mea culpa indeed.

There's another Reservoir Dogs offering to come in a later post, but we'll finish up in the Sir William with a couple more from other breweries.

3rd Pill is an IPA by Pelicon. It's a clear yellow colour and has a wonderfully mellow texture. The flavour is packed with soft fruit, all mandarin and melon, making me suspect that Mosaic is the hop in use. Juice for days. The lightness beggars belief that it's all of 6% ABV -- there's even a slight watery note on the finish. Nevertheless it's a beautiful beer; and an insanely drinkable one too.

Finally for here, Povodni Mož ("The Water Man" - a famous Slovene poem) by Green Gold who we first met back in Zagreb. This is another IPA, 5.8% ABV this time and dark amber in colour. The aroma is all resins and toffee while the hop flavour is quite muted. Anyone expecting more hop whack from the advertised 75 IBUs will be disappointed, but should really have known better. It's quite plain overall, touching on caramel and soda water, with a pinch of aspirin for bitterness and quite a thin texture. Bit of a damp squib really.

The last beers of this leg were at an unassuming little café near the castle funicular, called Daktari. It wasn't on any list or guide but stocks an excellent selection of local beers, plus several interesting German imports. I picked Josip from Komunajzer, a client brewer operating out of the Vizir brewery. This is an American-style IPA of 6% ABV, served in a half-litre bottle, dark amber in colour and with a generous topping of foam. There's a lovely dry and resinous bitterness right from the off -- a classic C-hop move. Following this there's softer tropical and stonefruit. The finish is a bit sweaty, that dryness turning a little acrid and stale, but by then it's time to go back to the start. Enjoyable and stimulating stuff.

All this bar hopping and beer exploration is well and good, but there was no escaping the gravity of the local Big Multinational Brewery. I'll tell you what they were up to in the next post.