So I was delighted to see Marks & Spencer had seen some sense and graced the shelves of their
Irish stores with three bottled offerings. First up is an Italian lager called Birra D'Oro. It's a rather gassy and bland affair. Slightly dry, but otherwise unworthy of note. I presume they're going for something resembling Nastro Azzurro, not one of the world's great beers, but they've even failed at that. More vapid than vaporetto.Next is a Belgian witbier, innovatively titled Bière Blanche. It pours a very pale yellow and is not so much cloudy as slightly misty. Bizarrely there's no aroma. The orange zest listed in the ingredients does come through in the flavour in a sort of sherberty way. However, this is a cipher of a witbier. €3 I won't see again.
I figured I would do better with M&S Irish Stout, knowing that it is contract brewed by the Carlow Brewing Company, makers of the excellent O'Hara's. The first thing to confirm my prejudice was the superb head retention. This was followed by a rich, full bitter chocolate and roasted barley flavour. Excellent stuff, but not quite up to the standard of bottled O'Hara's and 20c dearer too. (O'Hara's on draught, incidentally, is nitrogenated: better than Guinness, obviously, but a touch flavourless.)
Of course, the feeling that M&S were looking after us didn't last long, with the announcement of their new range of bottle conditioned beers which have yet to arrive here. Whether they ever will remains to be seen. I'm pessimistic.
And that brings me to my second pet peeve. Birra D'Oro, says the label, is "Brewed in Italy", not "Italia"; Bière Blanche "Brewed in Belgium", not "België/Belgique". Yet for some bizarre reason, the stout is "Brewed in Eire", not Ireland. What's that about, apart from poor spelling?
