Dancing to the beat

Remember brut IPA? The sub-style's brief moment in the sun a couple of years ago has left one survivor in the off licences of Dublin: Ska Brewing's Moral Panic. It has been around more or less since the craze began, and since it's still around and stocked freshly, I thought it was about time I gave it a go.

The pour gives us something pale yellow and hazy -- looking very summery in the sunshine -- and the flavour is a spritzy sea-breeze of salt and lemons. I was surprised to find it quite sweet: the lemons are candied, and a little syrupy. The brut-ishness comes in the texture, a watery hollowness that makes it very easy to drink but I think is preventing the taste from being as assertive as it could be. There's a certain tangy minerality in the background, though not as much as I was hoping for. This looks like a witbier, tastes a bit like a witbier, and can be put to similar sorts of duties, as an outdoor summer refresher, albeit slightly on the strong side for that, at 5.75% ABV. Still, don't expect any style-shaking peculiarities.

For something more up-to-the-minute and down-with-the-kids, here's a hazy IPA called The Hazy IPA. As always when a biggish American brewer puts one of these out in sufficient quantity for it to reach here, I have Sierra Nevada's Hazy Little Thing in mind. A tough contest.

This one is 6.5% ABV and is indeed hazy: a juicy-looking pale orange. The aroma is an enticing cross between orangeade and citrus sorbet. It tastes more serious, however. There's a little garlic or spring onion and a definite booze heat, sending double IPA vibes, punching well above its weight. The juicy citrus side -- satsuma, tangerine -- runs in parallel with this, a separate sweet counterpoint to the allium acidity. An earthy yeast bite finishes it off, adding nothing positive. They have managed to get the distinctive features of hazy IPA into this one. If the style is really your thing and not an affectation, then having a cheap and accessible mass market version should be a cause for celebration. Me, I'd take Sierra's answer over this any day. The rough edges that Ska has left here don't suit me.

A late addition to the set is The Aggrolite, a "lo-cal" session IPA, I guess for the benefit of those unconvinced by Ska's move into the hard seltzer realm. 4.2% ABV is comedically low for an American beer, and there's a thinness to the texture which over there they would likely expect from something this ridiculously compromised. For us, where it's perfectly normal, that's less acceptable. It smells like an old-school American IPA with a heavy dose of toffee-like crystal malt studded with jaffa-pith hops. That doesn't gel at all well with the mouthfeel; in fact it's completely out of keeping with the rest of the profile. It was quite a surprise to find it deliciously juicy and modern tasting, coming across like real mandarin flesh, the sensation just as you bite into a segment and the juice runs out. There's a faint aspirin or chalk twang in the finish but that juice comes back in the aftertaste. Once I learned to stop smelling it, I really enjoyed this. It's clear and clean too, another beer that shows murk is not required for juicy freshness. Lessons!