Tap pirates!

Oh it's good to see guest taps coming back, as Dublin's beer-geek pub life settles into whatever the new normal will be. With UnderDog gone, the brewery-owned pubs are the best offer in the city centre, and both The Porterhouse and Galway Bay/BRÚ understandably have been pushing their own wares at the expense of guests. But, some international visitors have crept in lately, including today's pair from La Pirata of Barcelona.

Viakrucis is badged as an "American IPA". How retro. It's a mostly-clear orange colour so I guess we're on the west coast. The aroma is pithy, suggesting orange zest and peel, though hinting that juice may be on the cards too. A sip tells me it's not really, unless you count grapefruit juice. While the flavour is clean, it's also very bitter, in that old-school American way, minus the big malt that the Americans used to balance it with. They knew what they were doing, because I found this one rather unbalanced. The hop smack is fun for the first moment, delivering an explosion of lemon, jaffa and grapefruit citrus. But like most explosions, it stops being fun quite quickly, and there are consequences to deal with, in this case the harsh acidic burn and a savoury vegetal note that doesn't sit well with the fruit. On balance, it's OK. There are no problematic off-flavours and it's certainly not boring. The aftertaste brings an altogether sunnier sorbet buzz too. I think this can be filed under "not really my sort of thing". Give it a go if you crave the west-coast puch but don't really remember how west coast IPAs used to taste.

Their Barcelona Tropical, a collaboration with Les Trois Mousquetaires of Quebec, lays its cards on the table more clearly. It's no murk-fiend, though, pouring again a transparent orange-amber. You still get the juice, although it's not the sweet pineapple and passionfruit implied (to me) by the name. Instead I get a softer mandarin and Seville orange: sweet, but not exotic sweet. The juice is interrupted at the finish by a dry and savoury twang, suggesting misbehaving Mosaic. It doesn't ruin the beer but took the shine off it for me. Overall, this is disappointing. There are fun features but not enough of them, and badgered by the less nice bits. 33cl was no hardship but I'm in not in any rush back for more.

With no idea of when I'll next see Barcelona, it was nice to get a couple of tasters of its current beer scene. That'll do for now.