An epic

This post began as a quick check in with what Whiplash have been up to this last few months. It probably would have gone out in mid-December but that's when The Big Drop happened and I suddenly had a lot more Whiplash beers to write about.

Going back, however, their first beer, Scaldy Porter, had its annual re-issue in November, but beforehand there was a brand new porter called The Sup. I was expecting classical and certainly got it from the visuals: dark brown with ruby edging. Chocolate on the aroma? Yep, that's there too. As tends to be the case with beer, things get really interesting on tasting. For one thing the texture is sticky; this is no easy-drinking session porter, it's 5% ABV and thicc. With that comes a quite busy bitterness, like dark chocolate at first turning more severe and metallic towards the end. Whiplash is very much bound by their fashion-forward presentation, but like Scaldy this is old school; the sort of thing that other haze specialists and their customers do not bother with. That alone makes it worthwhile but it's also a very good beer: a satisfying wintery warmer. I was prepared to resent the 33cl can but I can see why they chose it. Sip don't Sup.

And then we're back into the hazy IPAs again. First up is Love Tempo, hopped with Amarillo and Vic Secret. It looks a bit darker than Whiplash haze usually is, orange rather than yellow. The aroma is fantastically juicy, mixing tropical mango and pineapple with sharper satsuma and lemon. It's lovely and smooth, gently carbonated, but still light and not sticky. I expected something bigger at 6.8% ABV, but enjoyed how unobtrusive it is. The relative lightness helps the hops play their part, and it's fully as juicy as initially indicated -- mandarins and apricots -- with a balancing herbal edge provided by the Vic Secret. And, as usual with Whiplash, there's none of the nasty side of murk: no grit, no garlic, no diesel. I remark upon it because it's still a surprise when it comes to beers like this. Anyway, this is a beaut: clean and complex, subtle and flavoursome, drinkable yet satisfying. Top work.

That left me almost apprehensive about following it with a double IPA. This is Spectral Frequency, once more yellow and hazy. Amarillo is joined by Centennial so we can all pretend it's still 2009. This smells decidedly bitter, y'know like IPAs used to be, with the iconic American grapefruit character front and centre. Sure enough, pithy grapefruit is the first part of the flavour, followed by candied lemon peel and lime zest. It's dessertish, but not in the creamy vanilla way that these often are; more like a posset or a meringue pie, with an edge of fresh citric tartness. Only at the very end is there a hint of a garlic burn but it's mild enough that it doesn't interrupt the fruit. And although it's 8.2% ABV there's very little sign of the booze. Only the full, almost chewy, body indicates that it's a strong beer. I liked it, but not as much as I liked Love Tempo, and a lot of that is about my personal preference for single IPAs over double. Whiplash is very good at both, regardless of what I think.

And that would have been it until the following plethora all landed at once and were the subject of a direct order from the brewery.

The first one I opened was I Feel Space, a grisette. I make this the third one they've done and the ABV has been bumped up slightly to 4.4%. Hallertau Blanc hops are carried over from the last one, and there's a new Australian variety too: Astra. I got major witbier vibes from the appearance: opaque yellow haze and a soft frothy head. The mouthfeel too really shows off that wheat, almost creamy in texture. The aroma is a strange mix of soft fruit -- white grape and gooseberry -- with a peppery Belgian spice. I feared the flavour would be too busy but it proved to be quite plain, conversely. It's dry and grainy, featuring the earthy side of farmhouse flavour, rather than spices. I liked how the fruity aroma introduced every mouthful, without sticking around for the main performance. It took a bit of getting used to, and the dryness in particular is on the severe side, but I was enjoying it by the end. Grisette was far from the only unusual (for Ireland) style that they had in store...

I mean, Vienna lager isn't exactly coming out of the walls. The new Whiplash one is called Das Model and is 4.8% ABV. It's a bright copper colour though the head is a bit sad, fading to flatness almost instantly. Still it's not lacking in fizz and there's plenty of biscuity aroma propelled out of the glass. "Melanoidin" says the can in capital letters and melanoidin it delivers. Yet this sweet side is only half the picture. I was dubious about the use of Bruce blend hops from New Zealand rather than anything traditionally European but it absolutely does the job, bringing a balancing dryness rather than bitterness or flavour. The end result is a tasty but understated beer, flavoursome without turning loud, and as balanced and refreshing as a nice cup of tea. Rock 'n' roll!

Next in sequence is a dunkel, called Dry The Rain. Again, head retention was an issue. You can make your recipe and process as authentic as you like, but if it doesn't end up looking like the real thing, what's the point? The result looks like a glass of cola: dark red-brown with a desultory comb-over of bubbles on top. The aroma is back on style, having a sweet and heavy mix of grass and molasses. At 5.2% ABV I think it's a little light, but that adds to the drinkability. This is not the sort of dunkel you need to chew through, and I'll admit to having found stronger ones hard work when in Munich. It has no lack of flavour impact but is very approachable. A bittersweet dark treacle effect is at the centre of the taste, flanked by burnt toast and a zinc-like tang. It delivers exactly what one expects from dunkel, with the exception of a generous head and any unwelcome stickiness. Thoroughly acceptable.

The lagers keep coming and the next one is a Märzen, called The Mash & The Fury. I don't know which German original they're trying to emulate here but it's very dark for the style, beyond the deeper shades of autumnal chestnut and into darkest mahogany. Maybe the double decoction has something to do with that, and perhaps mouthfeel is the target, because this is very heavy: a rib-sticking weightiness more like you'd get from a doppelbock and far in excess of what you'd expect at only 5.8% ABV. Still, it's not one of those cloying American-stlye Oktoberfest beers: it's clean and quite bitter, a lot like the aforementioned doppelbock. I get lots of herbal liquorice, some woody roast chestnut and a crisp layer of burnt caramel. It all makes for very satisfying winter drinking. A Maß might be hard work -- two certainly would -- but 44cl left me replete and glowing with dark lager goodness. I can't speak to its authenticity under the Märzen rule book but it was very delicious.

Last in the lager sequence is a smoked doppelbock called Immolator. This is all of 8.6% ABV, though a nicely clear shade of dark amber, or pale brown if you will. In a reverse of the previous it's remarkably easy-going, smooth and sparsely carbonated. Onto that they've successfully grafted both the sweet caramel typical of doppelbock and a fully complementary, equally smooth, smoky quality. As I've come to expect, the head isn't up to much, but that's a minor quibble. One might have a right to expect some noble-hop bitterness too, though for me the smoke is adequate recompense. I couldn't ask for much more from this. It's not quite as multidimensional as Schlenkerla's Eiche, but has plenty in common with their superb Urbock. That should be praise enough for any brewer.

Time for an IPA break before we move on to the really strong stuff. First out is Elektrobank, a Mosaic IPA of 6.8% ABV, and hazy, of course. It's nice to have some decent head retention again. The aroma of this one is a little oniony, but not unpleasantly so, with at least some sharp citrus as well. The flavour is much more tropical, I'm pleased to report, with a soft texture offering up oodles of mango and passionfruit, just as one would hope for from an all-Mosaic beer. Except for maybe a little extra sweetness which I can't assign to the hops, there's little sign of the alcohol, either in the flavour or the texture, and it slipped back very casually as a result. A single hop tends to mean a lack of complexity, and so it goes here, but I can't really complain. There's a pleasant bite of old-world pith, but mostly it's tropical all the way: Mosaic is promised and Mosaic is delivered in the best way possible.

We double up next to, er, 8.2% ABV and Open Eye Signal double IPA, this one with Citra and Amarillo. Dense-looking and sweet-smelling, it's actually a little bit lacking in the flavour department. There's a dash of orange cordial with a squirt of fresh lemon, all in the middle, but no proper finish. It's very strange because the beer is indeed dense and slick with it -- the hop oils should be coating my palate, but they don't. The only other feature is a growing alcohol heat, given free rein with nothing else to keep it in check. Whiplash's DIPA game is usually much stronger than this. At least it's a relatively clean beer: no grit or earthiness, but for a double IPA to be boring is a fatal flaw.

Technically we're back on the lager next: a barrel-aged version of the Baltic porter Melody Noir. It's over a year since the original version appeared here, and I was very happy with it. Would barrel ageing be an improvement? It raises the ABV from 7.2% to 9%, so perhaps that's one enhancement. There's a lot of sweet oak in the flavour, making me think at first that it must be bourbon, but there's a vinous side as well, because it is in fact Cognac-barrel aged. The barrel is a big part of the flavour, which is a bit of a pity: the original beer's chocolate and liquorice gets a little lost, especially the latter. The light body of a lager remains, but this makes the Cognac effect even more pronounced: a severe and syrupy sort of sweetness, not the richness of a dark malt-forward beer. I sipped my way through it but didn't really enjoy it. I guess I'm a bit of a Baltic porter purist. If brandy-barrel beer is your thing, however, this one delivers generously.

The sequence reaches a crescendo with Quad of Paradise, a quadrupel, as you might guess, brewed with grains of paradise. It's 11.1% ABV and a sheer obsidian-black, topped with a tan-coloured head. The aroma is coffee and dark fruits -- prunes and figs -- with the Belgian yeast esters working harder than the add-on ingredient. In fact, other than a quick peppery flash in the foretaste, there's very little sign of the grains of paradise in the flavour, and instead it's all about the bitter dark chocolate with a bitterer herbal side. The esters are well-behaved and it's not overwhelmingly sweet or fruity, and it's also surprisingly not hot, staying calm and drinkable. This is an excellent winter's evening sipper and substitutes well for an imperial stout, should you be in need of switching things up.

But wait, there's more. The brewery has begun a series of draught-only beers and I let the first, a red ale, pass me by. When it was followed by a mild, however, that got me out of my seat and into Dudley's, a new pub on Thomas Street. Only Swerving was served nitrogenated and extremely cold, resulting in very little character to begin with. At €6.80 a pint it wasn't really priced for casual chugging either. What gradually unfolded was a sort of dark berry tartness against a dry and crumbly high-cocoa chocolate. I like milds to have a bit of a coffee character but alas this is not one of those. The hops are understated but present, and very old-world: a somewhat metallic English tang. It's inoffensive -- mild, I suppose -- but I couldn't help feeling there's something missing: a central flavour, be that hop or malt derived, something to make it more interesting. I'm sure it would pass muster somewhere where mild is part of the everyday drinking scene, but here where it's a novelty style made by microbreweries, I don't really get the point.

Whiplash is more than a serial releaser of new beers. They have developed a positive habit of bringing back previous runs, whether because they sold well or they just like making them. There are a few here I'd like to see another round of, and Immolator in particular.

Not so scaldy

There was a late rush of beers from Whiplash at the tail end of 2020. Of particular interest to me were the darker ones as this is an area where the brewery excels, even though most of its output is crowd-pleasing hazy pale ales. I am not the crowd, so let's see how much they pleased me.

We start light, at 7.1% ABV. Heart of Chambers is a "coffee and oatmeal double porter" created in collaboration with fancy-pants coffee merchants 3FE. I picked up an early growler at UnderDog. My jibe about the lightness is shredded by the texture: it's extremely thick and creamy in a beautifully silky-smooth way. A fair whack of warming booze comes with that. The coffee isn't subtle, beginning with a raw-grounds roastiness that lasts all the way from the aroma to the finish. It would have been better without that, but it doesn't ruin the party, because everything else is spectacular. I love when coffee contributes that cherry and rosewater quality and this has it in spades. A more orthodox latte flavour follows, combining with creamy vanilla to create a kind of coffee cake effect. It intensifies on the palate, passing Tia Maria and finishing back at the sharp burnt roast that started in the aroma. Malt? Hops? Nahhh, this is all coffee, and if you don't like coffee in beer stay well clear of it. I enjoyed its uncompromising boldness and the complexity. Half a litre was plenty, mind.

Second-weakest of the dark ones is a 7.2% ABV Baltic porter called Melody Noir. Other than a strength that's perhaps lower than the 8-9% norm, there's no messing with the style parameters here. It's a bit softer than a Baltic porter might typically be, lacking the dry lager crispness in favour of a velvety milk chocolate cream. It would be at risk of getting cloying were it not for quite a hard liquorice bitterness: if you're going to provide balance in a beer this weighty there's no point doing it by half. The mission is successful and the whole thing is very satisfying to drink. Despite its popularity, Whiplash is no novelty brewery. When they make beer I don't like, it was meant to be like that; when they get it right for me, however, it's just the way I want. Melody Noir is that, for Baltic porter.

Something more Whiplashy follows: Disco Mystic, a straight, hazy yellow double IPA, 8% ABV and using Strata and Citra. A properly punchy blend of heavy dank resins and lighter citrus zest forms the aroma, with a little hint of savoury garlic at the edge. Nothing too disturbing, however. It's mostly quite sweet, with the juice element balanced against bitterer pith. Though the texture matches the ABV -- full and rounded -- it's clean and not cloying or sticky. This is well-balanced and easy-going fare, for a big IPA. While not offering any unusual complexity, it does its thing well, demonstrating Whiplash's polished expertise at this kind of beer. Very much a fan-service piece, and there's nothing wrong with that.

A triple IPA of 10.5% ABV is next, and we're still not finished. Headlines is a three-way collaboration with Garage, Naparbier and Barrier. It's a very savoury guy, pouring thick and soupy into the glass: pale orange with a strong aroma of garlic and sesame paste. That oily, acidic garlic twang is where the flavour begins, and forms the bulk of it, to be honest. A generous sprinkling of white pepper is the only other complexity. It's far too rough and gritty for tropical sweetness, and I can't find any citrus pinch either. Ooof. You'll love it or hate it, I guess. As a true-to-style traditional hazy triple IPA, it's bang on style. The way you react to the description is likely what you'll think of the beer. 

Next up, taking a break from the big booze, is a mere 5% ABV pale ale called Hot Pursuit. This is hella hazy: pale yellow and full-on foggy in the glass. The aroma is fresh and fruity: OJ straight from the squeezy machine; a bit of apricot or nectarine, early in the morning at a continental market. You get a more intense acidity on tasting: your American style grapefruit job primarily, with an aftertaste of tangerine and satsuma first, then dry cotton and chalk dust. Yes, it's one of those hazy ones. On balance... yeah, I suppose my thirst did get quenched. It's an unexciting pale ale, the sort of thing haze enthusiasts keep in stock for everyday use. A can of the flagship Rollover session IPA shortly afterwards hit the same spots much more satisfactorily. Still, I'm sure Hot Pursuit will find an audience. 

A dark and double-figured beer to conclude: Fatal Deviation, Barrel Aged. The original version of this massive imperial stout tasted of "a decadent mix of espresso and gallic cigarettes" when I reviewed it in 2017. The new batch has had over a year in bourbon barrels, bringing the ABV up to 11%. The only remnant of the tobacco effect is a nicotine-coloured head. The aroma goes light on sweet American whiskey and big on sappy wood with just faint coffee and chocolate behind. The flavour, too, wears those oak resins at the front, and there wasn't much else at first, when I opened it cold. Given time to warm up, there's an affogato effect, of vanilla mixed with strong espresso. The bitterness level is low, but at the same time it's not a sugary, sticky mess. The alcohol is there to boost the flavours and succeeds without getting in the way. Overall, it is mellow and slow going: entirely appropriate for something costing €15 a can. You can bet I made the most of it.

A pretty decent showing here, on balance. I would really like if more strong porters like Heart of Chambers and Melody Noir were part of the brewery's regular throughput. Hold the French toast.