The fifth column

Some new haze from Lough Gill today, beginning with Speckled Stone IPA. It's 5% ABV and quite a dark one: amber-orange rather than the de rigueur custard yellow. Still, it smells properly juicy, a mandarin segment replete with a juicy middle and pithy exterior. I get a strange side-aroma of chocolate too. Turns out the aroma is the most interesting part of it. The taste is good, but quite plain; no juicebombs or hop explosions, just a smooth and clean orangeiness. This also means there's no yeast bite, vanilla or garlic mess either, and for that I give thanks. The big and fluffy New England texture is there too, helping the whole package slip back with ease. This is unfussy and understated quality. I'll take that over more adventurous takes any day of the week.

And speaking of which, that was followed by Stranger's Leap, in that increasingly fashionable style "oat cream IPA", brewed with oats and lactose. This one looks more like your typical NEIPA: pale and yellow, with a thin combover of bubbles on top. The mandarin aroma is back, accompanied by a clean mineral sharpness. Nothing here suggests the milkshakey mess I feared. There's a certain creaminess in the texture, and a slight hint of the lactose vanilla in the finish, but the hops are bold enough to prevent that being the central feature. Instead, the Citra, Mosaic, Cashmere and Meridian bring a kick of citrus juice, an oily dankness and a little savoury garlic. The end result is a punchy, zesty and clean IPA, with only a cursory nod to New England custardy fluff. I liked how it goes about its business. There's probably enough to keep haze fashionistas happy, but it's secretly playing for the west coast.

An oatmeal stout is our dessert today. With chocolate flavours and a silky mouthfeel promised, the brewery is aiming for the fundamentals with Arethusa. In the age of brewing silliness, that's fair and welcome. It looks beautiful in a classic straight-sided glass: purest black, topped with thick tan-coloured foam. The chocolate character is dark and bitter and there's an edge of green veg from old-world hops. There's also a wheaty cereal character which I'm guessing is the oatmeal's doing. Are oatmeal stouts supposed to taste of actual oatmeal? The texture, meanwhile, is far from thin, but not exceptionally smooth, well within the bounds of what might be expected from any 5.4% ABV stout. It's decent stuff. Unexciting, but reliable and enjoyable. A perfect antidote to novelty beers.

An old-fashioned twist on modern beer might be one way of looking at this bunch: a valid market segment, and it's good to see somebody looking after it.