Spinning on the spot

A deep breath before we get into the selection popped out by DOT Brew in recent months, or at least the ones that have come my way.

They have continued their range of Aldi exclusives, and that's where I'll start, with the Spin Off Series Non-A Fruit Ale, precisely calculated to be non-intoxicating at 0.38% ABV. It's a pale pinkish-orange in the glass, owing to the raspberry and strawberry in the recipe. The body is light but not watery, held together by concentrated soft-drink sugars. Oddly, the fruit aspect isn't part of this, providing a completely separate tang, minerally and almost tart. For all the sweetness, the finish is quick, and it makes a good palate-cleanser as a result. Not a bad option for the designated drivers this party season.

Next up in strength is the 4.2% ABV Spin Off Series Kveik Pale Ale. It's been dry-hopped with two favourites, Strata and Vic Secret, and that gives it a beautifully juicy aroma and flavour, full of bright and fresh mandarin and mango, with minimal bitterness. There's also a sherbet effervescence and a very slight herb or pepper spice. I've never really noticed kveik having any particular flavours, but I think it might be adding a faint saison-ish quality to this. It's an easy-drinker, and a highly enjoyable one too.

I wonder how many bemused Aldi customers a product called Spin Off Series Cryo Pop IPA has created. That's what's next, at 5.3% ABV. It's a bright gold and unfashionably clear, looking almost naked for a DOT IPA, with hardly a shred of haze. With the fine white foam on top staying put, it looks more like a good pilsner. The aroma is bright and perfumey, with strong wafts of the tropics which slightly threatens to become fabric softener but thankfully stops short. Its carbonation is light, giving it just enough of a sparkle to carry its coconut, apricot, grapefruit and lychee. These are all laid on subtly, flashing briefly before a harsh lime rind bittering settles in. The fizz also helps it finish cleanly, with nothing unwelcome hanging around on the palate. This is more subtle and interesting than any supermarket beer needs to be. Well played.

There was an American Stout at 5.8% ABV in the trio of beers DOT launched with in 2016. I didn't like it; too herbal. I'm expecting something similar from Spin Off Series American Stout, even though it's a tiny bit weaker at 5.6% ABV. It looks well: properly black with a lasting head. The aroma is certainly botanical, though I'd say more floral than herbal. All is not yet lost. There's a definite element of black IPA in the flavour -- a mix of red cabbage, black pepper and concentrated coffee -- but it's calm and civilised, not punchy. The body it's set on is light and a little fizzy: something softer would have worked better. It still just about passes as a stout and, more importantly, tastes great. One would expect "American Stout", correctly made, to be like this, so another point of education for the Aldi shopper.

This latest set tops out with Spin Off Series Oak Red Ale at 5.8% ABV. This is brown rather than red, pouring like a cola with a stout head. It smells of caramel with a little hint of peppery oak spice around the edges. The flavour is centred on chocolate, to an almost porter-like level: not a complaint but not what I was expecting. The oak chips add little more than a mild seasoning, of toasted coconut and black peppercorns. You definitely wouldn't mistake this for barrel-aged, so subtle is the effect. The overall flavour is quite unobtrusive, and doesn't take advantage of the creamy texture to give it legs. Red ale drinkers are poorly served in the independent beer market, and I think they'll appreciate this one, even if it's not strongly flavoured, or possibly because it's not. I thought it was a bit bland, however.

Leaving Aldi, the next sequence begins at 3.5% ABV, where there's D6 Session, brewed for Redmond's off licence in Ranelagh. It does look a bit wan, a sickly, opaque pale yellow with lots of head forming then crackling away. That's because of a high carbonation level which you feel long before you taste anything. A gentle tropical fruit aspect comes in behind it, tasting more like an "exotic" ice pop than an actual piece of fruit. There's pineapple, mango, guava and all the usuals, only muted. It fades out after a few seconds, leaving a raw and leafy bitter aftermath. It's a tough beer to like. Maybe the flavour would be bolder without all that fizz.

May as well throw a witbier into the mix, so here's Wit a Twist, the twist being that it's dry-hopped with Idaho 7, though it's also surprisingly weak at just 4.6% ABV. It's the requisite hazy yellow colour, while the savoury coriander is joined in the aroma by a lemongrass effect, which I assume is a combination of American hop citrus and Belgian yeast spice. That sounds like it might create a clash, but while both elements are right there in the flavour, they're complementary, blended like the delicious, yet non-specific, waft from a Thai restaurant. The texture lets it down a little, it coming across as thin and sharp rather than pillowy with wheat. Still it's a tasty beer and lives up to the pun: it really does provide something quite off kilter compared to mainstream witbier.

Up a little, at 4.8% ABV, is a sour ale with the questionable name of Absence Makes The Tart Grow Fonder. Pale and hazy is the game again, while the aroma is minerally with a pinch of citrus zest. I deliberately didn't look at what it's flavoured with before tasting it. The foretaste is at once perfumed and citric, like bergamot, with apothecary herbal notes. That turns a little jammy on the finish; much sweeter, like lychee and pear. The sourness is what gets left out in all this. Everything else melds into a kind of fruit squash, and there's only a faint mineral tang to say sour. Verjus and lime is how it's done. I liked it as a novelty fruit drink but hoped the tart would be tarter.

In addition to the Spin Off Oak Red above, there's also their own Oak Red at a slightly lower ABV of 5.2%. It's a very dark garnet shade, almost black unless held to the light. The aroma is subtle but has some pleasantly warm winter spices: clove and cinnamon. The flavour is quite dry, beginning on cola nut and coffee grinds. It took me a moment to realise that this slight harshness is down to the oak: there's a rough bark-like quality to it, though it's not oppressive. After a moment or two a gentler strawberry and cherry side emerges, turning to a full-on sweet toffee by the end. The texture is nicely weighty, moreso than the strength implies, and the whole thing is pleasantly sippable, suggesting the big flavours of dark barrel-aged beers, but in a scaled-back and accessible way. It's surprising that, of the two Oak Reds, the lower-ABV one is the more flavourful.

Exclusive to Bradley's of Cork is Bang On, a hazy IPA with Mosaic and Centennial at 6% ABV. It's suitably pale for the style, only a shade or two more orange than the serious hazebois produce it. The carbonation seems a little faint on pouring, with a loose rocky head clinging to the glass on the way down. It smells freshly of pineapple and lychee. The flavour makes that sweeter, the foretaste offering the same two tropical fruit, but this time tinned in syrup. Then there's a savoury edge to this, a mild peppery spicing, which doesn't clash but isn't exactly complementary either. It may be yeasty dregs causing the effect, and if so I'm glad they're muted. Mind you, the whole thing isn't exactly bursting with flavour of any kind, tasting quite subdued for this sort of beer at this sort of strength. I think there's just enough tropical character to stay in my good books, though.

Lastly, Way West looks to be an attempt at making a very straight-up west-coast IPA, although it's a little light for that, again at only 6% ABV. It's lacking the traditional and unfashionable crystal malt too, being a mostly-clear golden shade. Still, the hops are the right sort -- Centennial and Amarillo -- and in the right place: tangy and bitter primarily, with flavours of grapefruit, grass and a twist of lime peel. An almost rasping mineral dryness accentuates the effect. For all its paleness, there's a decent body, and enough malt weight to propel the hops. This is more Sculpin than Torpedo, for anyone sticking a pin in their west coast map, so despite the shortage of caramel it does meet the spec rather well. A reminder than clean and clear IPA should always have a place at the table.

Done already? Where are the monster barrel-aged beers? As it happens DOT did release a set of big barley wines for winter but at time of writing they're still sitting in their boxes atop the fridge. I'll get to them when we're a bit deeper into the season.