Secrets and mysteries

Hazy IPA and barrel-aged imperial stouts are very much the stock in trade at Lough Gill Brewing, and they're generally pretty good at both. Here are the latest examples.

The new New England-style IPA is called Mysterious Haze. It's the standard pale yellow, with custard-grade opacity. Your hops today are Galaxy and Cascade, and the former's orange-accented juiciness forms the aroma. The flavour is rather more savoury, suggesting red onion relish and salad leaves, the fruit showing up late, and briefly. After that swish of marmalade, there's little else to tell you about. While this looks like top tier haze, the flavour doesn't measure up. There's nothing off about it, but I think the hops don't suit it. These recipes tend to use more modern varieties, and that's not simply fashion. Lough Gill's beer don't normally want for boldness, so this plain affair is unusual.

It was only last summer that I encountered new stouts Emerald and Shamrock. The brewery wasn't long getting those into whiskey barrels and now the results are out.

Emerald Barrel Aged brings it across an imaginary style boundary, from an unaugmented 7% ABV export stout to a fully imperial 14.4% ABV. Wut? Did they check if the whiskey barrel was empty before putting the beer in? That's a hell of a jump. Oh wait. "Aged two years" says the can. Is this really based on the beer sold as Emerald? The barrel end of things could certainly disguise absolutely anything. It's very whiskey, with all the warm cereal notes, oodles of honey, and a kick of serious hard liquor on the end. The brewery knows what they're doing, however, so there's still plenty of space for the stout, giving melty dark chocolate pudding and frothy vanilla-laced latte. All of it is hella loud. While it's smooth not spiky, and appropriately rounded and mature-tasting, there's a lot of booze going on; a lot of heat and an almost cloying richness. I detect a little smoke too, the slightly salty iodine of fair Islay, but that's not mentioned on the label so I'm sure I imagined it. Regardless, this is a quality bee eh imp stou. If you like 'em spirit-forward, fill yer footwear.

Jumping from 7.5% ABV to 14.8%, Shamrock Barrel Aged is similarly supercharged with whiskey. I picked up a bit of smoke and little of the added coffee in the original, and that holds true for this version. The coffee is only really present in the aroma, and there it's sharing bandwidth with boozy dark sherry and a little too much soy-sauce umami. The flavour opens on calorific chocolate fudge sauce, though it isn't long before the umami arrives in. That's seasoned with dry oak smoke, overpowering the smooth sweetness and giving it a rasping rough finish. This is a more grown-up affair than the previous one; less like a dessert and more like a riffle through the humidor. It's still luxurious, with a beautifully full and soft mouthfeel, but after the aroma you have to work to find any chocolate, and I couldn't detect vanilla at all. There's a touch of honey from the Irish whiskey's input, but otherwise it's quite savoury. Whether that suits you is a matter of taste: it's still a first-rate imperial stout, one which takes full advantage of the barrel flavour palette. Don't expect much by way of pastry, however.

If anyone out there has first-hand experience of barrel-ageing stout, I would be interested in the technical details behind these massive ABV jumps, and I'll try and find out from the brewery next time I'm talking to someone from there (when's that taproom opening?). For now, they're just beers to enjoy, and don't worry too much about the dark secret of their creation.