The rough with the smooth

Ballykilcavan is one of the few Irish breweries with a brown ale in regular production. In 2023 they had a go at barrel-ageing one, using bourbon casks. Late last year, they did it again, this time with two different barrel types, previously used for whiskey at Lough Ree Distillery. Despite the spirituous influence, they're both quite weak affairs, at just 5.5% ABV. 

First up is Barrel-Aged Brown Ale: Recioto de Valpollicella. I noticed that the bourbon one tasted quite vinous so I was expecting lots of that from this. It's not in the aroma anyway, which has luscious warming hot chocolate notes and a hint of lightly oaked whiskey. That oak is stronger on tasting, becoming quite dry and splintery, with rub of damp cork across it. There's a different sort of dryness in the crunch of roasted grain, and only after that does the wine emerge, quite faintly, showing as concentrated damson and plum. All that took a bit of getting used to, but by the half way point I was finding the chocolate again, and enjoying the full and smooth texture: no qualms here about the ABV being too low. Unfortunately, that dry wooden rasp lingers long in the finish, becoming the beer's defining feature for me. I tried hard to like it, but ultimately found it a little too harsh to enjoy fully.

I had high hopes for more of a wow factor from Barrel-Aged Brown Ale: Islay Whisky, as in "wow that's smoky". The chlorophenols get straight to work in the aroma, imparting your classic Islay TCP twang. Sure enough, that occupies almost the entirety of the flavour, leaving no room for chocolate or coffee nuances. Throwing any beer into this barrel would likely have yielded similar-tasting results. In the flavour, the phenols ally with more of that splintery wood, and the effect is interesting, but I can't say it's very tasty. There's two kinds of harshness at play, and while I can tolerate the peat, the oak is too much. This has the same smooth texture as the other one but it doesn't carry any of the brown ale character. Getting through the half litre was hard work.

I'm going to lay the blame for these two at the gravity: I feel they both should have been big big beers in the first place, so the dark malt would hold its own against the barrel onslaught. As was, there didn't seem to be enough character in the base beer to deal with that, and the result was badly unbalanced. I've said it before, but there's a reason breweries tend to start with imperial stouts and barley wines when doing the barrel thing.

We'll finish on something completely different: the latest in the brewery's limited edition sequence, Clancy's Cans #15: Lemondrop Saison. Sounds delightful. It looks good too: a proper spun gold with haze of the friendly Belgian sort, not aggressively American. The aroma is certainly citric, and though I wouldn't say lemon candy, it definitely has wafts of scented candles and zesty baking ingredients. In the flavour, that gets combined beautifully with iconic saison earth and spice, giving it very classic Belgian vibes, with a little streak of modern hop colour running through it. That's a wonderful combination, spicing up the traditional saison profile while retaining all its fundamental traits. 6% ABV makes it a little on the strong side, but it doesn't try to kid you into thinking it's a light beer: this is hefty stuff, filling without being difficult. Very nicely done, overall.

I'm not convinced by Ballykilcavan's barrel-based exertions, but they hop a good saison.