From salon to saloon

Each year, the city of Nancy hosts a brewing trade show called Le Salon du Brasseur. Every machine, ingredient and packaging format available to the industry is showcased here, with suppliers from far and wide. It's not something that interests me much, but the meeting I was at happened next door and there was a bit of time afterwards to walk the floors.

A couple of the hop suppliers had brought beers along so that potential customers could taste what to expect, and at the Barth-Haas stand, a fridge full of cans was getting thinned out by the punters. I was pleased to see Slovenian brewery Reservoir Dogs represented in there so asked to try a couple of theirs.

One was Little Sister, which the brewery describes as a "low ABV New England IPA", so a hazy session IPA then. It's 5% ABV, and a warm orange colour in the glass. I didn't get much juice or vanilla sweetness from it, only a broad new-world peach effect. The taste is dominated by a Germanic grassy bitterness, which I liked, but was unexpected. I guess it's the use of Slovenian hops that makes it different, and earned it a place in that particular fridge. It works, but it doesn't really hit the hoppy points of the style spec.

The brewery also does a wet hop ale with local varieties Styrian Wolf and Styrian Kolibri, the latter being a recently developed aroma hop which I hadn't seen before. The beer has been given the unfortunate name of Wet Dreams. It's another orange-coloured one, but clear this time. The flavour's centrepiece is a big Sorachi-like hit of coconut and citrus pith, leading on to a slightly sweeter note of peach skin. Both aspects run long into the aftertaste, helped along by a nicely dense body and 6% ABV. The off-kilter nature of the hops works much better here than in the previous one, and it's a good illustration of what Slovenian ones can do, which I guess is the reason it was there.

Elsewhere, the agency tasked with promoting French hops had a stand with three beers on tap. I began my taking advantage of the hospitality with La Parisienne Libérée, a 4.7% ABV lager from La Parisienne brewery in [checks notes] Paris. It was a good place to start as this is a rather boring affair, doing the clean pale lager thing but failing to go anywhere interesting with it. It was meant to demonstrate the benefits of Aramis hops, and if the benefit is that they don't intrude on the taste, then well done. There's a minimal kick of bitterness if you look closely but not a whole lot else going on.

Brique House, as featured on yesterday's pub tour, was also here. Their beer seems to have been made especially for the occasion: an 8% ABV hazy double IPA called Triple Hoppy, because it uses Magnum, Elixir and another new one for me: Barbe Rouge. It looks murky but tastes clean, though there's a significant heat. And the hops? Very convincingly American, with lots of fresh and bright pineapple and a funkier ripe guava side. It's a sipper for sure, but very enjoyable as it goes. Whoever commissioned it chose well.

Finally for this stall, a hazy pale ale called Nova, from Hardi. Mistral and Triskel are the hops here. Although it's only 4.5% ABV there's plenty of body, and a proper New England softness. The bitter foretaste is odd, starting on grapefruit peel but introducing a weird plasticky tang. My fellow drinkers were keen, but I wasn't a fan, perhaps from drinking the DIPA ahead of it. Thanks to the hops it's certainly different to most beers of this sort, but still not brilliant.

Takedown began as I was finishing that, and a neighbouring exhibition hall took up the mantle for the evening, hosting La Fête des Bières, an (almost) all-French beer festival, open to the public. It's a slightly boutique affair but there was plenty of choice. Plus my favourite feature of any beer festival: loads of breweries I had never heard of or drank before.

First thing to catch my eye as I entered the hall was a cask beer engine at the stand of Bon Poison -- a brewery name that's a little too on the nose. It was pouring Midsummer, a 5.3% ABV wheat ale, and that seemed like a good place to start. The low carbonation and soft texture was beautiful, and the flavour a bucolic mix of floral honey and candied lemon. Despite the strength it's very quaffable and I liked the classy simplicity of it: not the sort of thing I expected from a brewery with a skull as its logo.

Staying drinking beers by the entrance would never do so I made a point of heading to a distant corner next. There I found another skull-fan, La Bourlingueuse, with a range of mostly bottled stuff and a couple of draft lines. One of these was pouring a porter called Mr Hyde. This is a straight-down-the-line example of the style, 5.5% ABV but tasting like 4. A silky smooth texture complements medium-sweet milk chocolate. There are no fancy complexities but no off flavours either. It's a beer to have a case or two of on hand when you just want quality without having to think too much about it.

Because there were many more beers yet to try that evening, and the stand was selling bottles, I took away a La Catrina, their chipotle brown ale, after only a rudimentary quality check. It's really red rather than brown, and an ugly murky colour. I've known chipotle to produce a stale plasticky note, and that's here in the aroma, though offset by a caramel and honey sweetness. It's neither the malt nor the chilli which dominates the flavour, but the smoke. It's quite an acrid, dusty, paprika-powder effect, followed by a subtle hint of spice which tingles at the back of the tongue long after swallowing. It's not as good as it was at the festival -- funny how that happens -- but I'm OK with it. Don't expect any clean complexity though.

One of my tablemates had picked up a can of La Déesse des Chutes by Belgh Brasse of Quebec, one of the rare imports available. This is a 6.5% ABV white IPA, but one which takes a very different direction from the usual in its flavour. A candy base leads on to a massively spicy main act, with clove being the dominant taste. It took a bit of getting used to but it's highly enjoyable. I don't know what white IPA enthusiasts would make of it, but I'm not one of them so it doesn't matter.

I do like a beer with basil, so when I noticed Basilic from Ferme Brasserie Simone in passing, I jumped on it. It's a sour ale too, and 5.1% ABV. Though an unattractive dirty blonde colour, it's crisply tart to begin, and then massively lays on the oily green basil taste. One dimensional? Absolutely. But it delivers what's promised and I could drink a lot of it. One of those occasions when it seems a brewery has made a beer for me and nobody else.

There was an interesting looking grape ale on offer from the La Vaugermaine brewery, based on their Au Moût de Raisins blonde ale, with Pinot Noir. It turned out to be quite plain, however, with nice dry tannins but not much to show beyond that. The base offers a different sort of dryness with a bread crust note, and that's as complex as it gets. Fine as a beer, but below par for a grape ale, I'm sorry to say.

Time was running on, so it was time for a quadrupel IPA. This was supplied by Piggy Brewing and called Tangerine Dream. I'm not sure I've ever had one as strong as this, 12% ABV, and that doesn't bode well. Sure it's hot, but almost to the point where it becomes a feature not a bug. There's a bit of onion at first, then a tang of orange peel, before finishing on thick vanilla custard. It wouldn't be my sort of thing, but seemed well made in general for what it was.

French brewing has taken somewhat to the pumpkin beer, and one brewery was making a big thing of theirs: Brasserie de l'île de Noirmoutier, with Pump'king. It turned out to be a very poor example, tasting like a basic blonde ale into which someone has sprinkled a flavouring powder. It actually tastes powdery -- dry and acrid -- but without any real spice. Pointless. I liked the label, though.

A Schwarzbier to finish, from Parcel. The brewery's branding is quite farmy but there was nothing rough or rustic about this one. It's absolutely on the money for the style; only 5.2% ABV but still with a treacle unctuousness. The flavour is centred on dark chocolate but includes lighter cocoa powder as well. Roasted grains and cola nut also feature. Above all it's dry, supremely clean, and with nothing that shouldn't be in there.

That was quite enough for one day. We wrap up the trip, and pop into a country next door, tomorrow.