One out of three ain't good

It's not Nutty Black, it's Very Nutty Black: this is Thwaite's super-charged mild with the ABV savagely ramped up to 3.9% ABV from the usual 3.3 -- handle with care.

Once you're safely strapped in and have popped the cap with your asbestos bottle opener you'll find a beer that pours promisingly black with a nice tan head. The texture is velvety smooth and the flavour is... really quite boring, actually. I'm looking for the roasted coffee notes that one would expect from a mild but there's no sign of them. I've always liked Thwaites beers in the past and I know they're the sort of brewer that can pack all sorts of interesting stuff into a low-ABV package, but this isn't one of those. Yes it's slightly dry and if you concentrate really hard you might get a whisper of plums, but there's little else. There's certainly nothing that I would count as even remotely nutty. But it is black: I'll grant them that.

The owl ones

Cheers to Special Agent Richard for the intelligence that Dublin's landmark Japanese restaurant Yamamori is now selling beers from the Kiuchi brewery. It took a few months to get round to it, but on Monday last I met up with Dave and Laura for an evening of sushi, sake and Japanese ales.

I'll leave the food aside, only to mention that the four course set menu is great value and the sake tasting tray is well worth it. There's also soju, and a few other, more sedate, Asian beers. But the main reason we were there was for Kiuchi's Hitachino Nest range, with their dinky 33cl bottles and impossibly cute owls on the label.

First up the White Ale. It's surprisingly spicy for a witbier. A look at the ingredients shows that, along with the coriander and orange peel, they've added nutmeg and it really adds an extra dimension. A bit more typically there's a lemony perfume to it which balances the spices without being overpowering or artificial. Witbier with a twist, this, and a great match for my tiger prawns.

The Weizen is a long way from its purported style. Bavarian heritage and banana flavours are promised, but I couldn't find them. Laura got lemons from this one, and I think she's closer than the label copy is. It's piquant to an unusual degree, while also pumping out earthy, funky vibes. Add this to a brown body, lighter and fizzier than your typical weizen, and the word that springs to my mind is saison. And who wouldn't prefer a saison to a plain old weizen anyway?

The funk jam continues with the Japanese Classic Ale, though it's no louder for the beer being 7.5% ABV. The chilled glassware in Yamamori did a lot to take the edge of the flavour (as, in fairness, did the banoffi pie). After a few minutes' warming and a palate-cleansing sake, however, the complexities were more apparent. More saison-like spice, but it's deeper and edgier with strong elements of incense and aftershave. Had I read the label, the reason would have been obvious: it's aged on cedar. I don't think I've knowlingly had a cedar-aged beer before (Baladin Nora, maybe?) but I approve.

I'm very pleasantly surprised with this lot. Given what generally passes for Asian beer around here Yamamori's imports are a welcome addition. It would be great to see them in off licences and more restaurants.

Strange provenance

I don't get sent much free beer (yeah yeah, boo-hoo etc) but was rather intrigued to be offered some lager by a US PR company a few weeks back. "Sure," I said, "send it on over". And then waited for the "Oh wait, you live very far away, sorry about that" mail. It didn't arrive. Instead I got a box containing a bottle and a can of Minott's Black Star plus some accompanying press materials. I supposed I'd better read the stuff now that I've committed to writing about the beer.

A slightly odd tale unfolds between the lines of the press release. The beer boasts of origins in Whitefish, Montana though is brewed in Milwaukee and is being marketed specifically at Northern California. It looks like desperate attempt at preserving a beer's credentials of origin while having it contract brewed elsewhere and being upfront about it. Convoluted, but at least it's honest: lots of other beer companies are nowhere near as forthcoming about where their product is made.

Sweeping the geography puzzles aside, the beer is an attractive dark gold lager, a colour that immediately had me thinking Budvar thoughts. Saaz and Mittelfrüh are the hops, says the marketing, so that's definitely the right direction. And the body is similarly big and rich with that golden syrup sweetness. But that's where it ends: those hops are nowhere to be found and it all tails off rather sadly.

It's not a bad beer, but with just a bit more hopping it could have been a very good Czech-style lager. I suppose it's wrong of me to criticise it for not being the beer I'd like it to be. With that heavy texture I think it'll stand up well to a curry, so that's where the can will be going.

And if you're reading in Northern California: hey look, here's a beer you can buy.

Mothers of the revolution

Tom and Jeff at the Lug Wrench Brewing Company blog are in charge of The Session this month and have asked us to write about "craft beers inspired by homebrewing". It's a growing issue here in Ireland, with most of the recent spate of start-up breweries having grown from homebrew operations -- the guys behind Clanconnel, Trouble and Dungarvan all came to the business via hacked picnic coolers, plastic buckets, cornies and the like, and they won't be the last. Increasingly, as the Lug Wrench guys say of themselves, drinkers are discovering beer connoisseurdom through making their own beer and experimenting with the myriad flavours and textures that can come from manipulating different varieties and combinations of malt, hops, yeast, and whatever else you fancy throwing in to see what happens.

I always find it strange that someone would turn their nose up at a homemade beer -- made for drinking pleasure alone, untainted by economic concerns -- while regarding anything else homemade to be of superior quality to the pre-packaged factory-made alternative. Homemade beer, like homemade food, is only bad when the maker gets something wrong. Tales of hotpresses (airing cupboards; linen closets) and kilos of table sugar are beer's answer to lumpy gravy and rubbery steak.

Ireland's new breweries are merely reflecting a global trend which started in the US where the craft beer revolution went hand-in-hand with the growth of home brewing -- backyard breweries turning out compromiseless beers which in turn were either aped by the commercial micros or themselves became commercial beers when the home brewer turned pro.

Over in Europe, something similar happened, especially in places where the beers were blandest. You'll find an ex-home brewer at the helm of Italy's Del Borgo, for instance. And of course, in Scandinavia you can't move for former amateurs working full or part time at getting their beers onto the market, and the resulting quality and diversity speaks for itself.

I'm marking this Session with one from Norway's Nøgne Ø, again a brewery with domestic roots. Specifically, it's Nøgne Ø Imperial Stout Highland Edition, a gift from Knut Albert. It pours thick and treacly, leaving a dark mocha head. The aroma had me immediately questioning the wiseness of putting it in a post next to Tokyo*, as it's very similar -- vanilla, chocolate and cherry liqueur richness. In fact, BrewDog get name-checked on the label as having assisted with barrel procurement (though a shame the Nøgne Ø guys didn't do them the courtesy of dropping the e from "whiskey" on the label copy). It's different from Tokyo* on tasting, however, as one might expect given that it's under half the strength. You get lots of big rich roasted flavours and more soothing silky chocolate, finishing quite bitter -- a touch metallic -- from some very generous hopping. Being ex-homebrewers they of course tell us exactly what hops they chose: big old American Columbus, and a fine job they're doing.

It's a gorgeous beer: satisfying and tasty yet completely drinkable. Any brewer would be proud, whether they'd crafted it for themselves and their friends, or merely lashed it up for the money.

This Session is quite timely, too, as yesterday marked the day Ireland's online home brewing community officially transformed itself into a full-on craft beer campaign group (website coming soon; when Barry gets the finger out), tasked with carving out a sustainable niche for native microbreweries, delivering choice and quality for the drinkers. It goes without saying that providing a forum -- virtual and real -- for home brewers will remain a cornerstone of what the group does. It's hard to imagine a beer revolution taking place without the people who brew their own to drive it.

So here's to the home brewers, their compromise-free beer, their commercial ambitions and their game-changing effect.

Three controversies ago

It's hard to believe that the whole furore over Tokyo* was less than a year ago. Since then two more, even stronger, beers have come out of Fraserburgh knocking the so-strong-it'll-cure-binge-drinking barrel-aged imperial stout into a proverbial cocked hat. If I'd known how quickly its notoriety was going to wane, maybe I wouldn't have spent so much on it in Utobeer last December. And if I'd known that it was going to be sold in Dublin off licences for a fair bit less come summer I'd have made a point of drinking it sooner.

As is, it was only last weekend that I rescued the blighter from my sweltering beer store (currently, refugee bottles are crammed into every hidey hole in the house, all but wearing babushkas and playing mournful violin music). With all the fuss a distant memory, how's the beer?

After the unpalateable mess that is Tactical Nuclear Penguin I was on full alert for boozy harshness, but boozy harshness came there none. The nose is heady and alluring, like a tasty liqueur, with hints of wood and cigars. Texturewise it's incredibly smooth. The 18.2% ABV gives a warming sensation, but doesn't burn or cloy: think Drambuie or similar. The taste reminds me a little of Samuel Adams Triple Bock but it's much mellower and more balanced, calmly soothing with chocolate and cherries, not leaping up to show you flavour after flavour from its toybox. It's very easy to forget this is a stout. To the point, perhaps, where stout fans and Paradox fundamentalists might be disappointed. This stuff is playing a different game altogether.

Overall, a beautiful beer for taking time out with, its softly-spoken dignity ill-deserving of being dragged through the gutter press.

Hefe nice day

I've been using the recent spell of warm weather to work gradually through my stash of hefeweizens. It's a style I've gone off a bit of late, reverting only to the odd Flensburger Weizen to go with a curry (and to add the swingtop bottle to my hoard of reusables). So, what's been happening with weissbier in my absence?

O'Brien's made a bit of a song and dance about the arrival of Erdinger Urweisse a few months back. Despite the brewery's reputation for blandness, they are capable of the odd gem (Pikantus, for instance) so I reckoned this was worth a go. It certainly has a lot more happening than your standard Erdinger: lots of big banana flavours and a distinct alcoholic heat, despite being just 5.2% ABV. In the finish up, however, there's just not enough here to keep me entertained and I won't be rushing off for another.

Unertl Weissbier Bock looked much more promising: a full 6.7% ABV and pouring a gorgeous shade of chestnut. The first signal that things were not going according to plan came with the aroma. Beyond the fruity esters coming from the yeast which was floating on the head, there was no smell; no caramel sweetness, no roastiness, no crisp dryness: nothing. The texture was the next let-down: thin and exceptionally gassy where mellow smoothness might be a reasonable expectation. And finally the flavour. The yeast is doing its utmost to give a bit of banana character, but beneath this veneer there's a rough and woody vibe -- bark, mulch and rubber -- not enough to spoil or unbalance the beer, but hard to escape when there's not much else going on inside. Mrs Beer Nut claims that there's a vanilla element too, but adds that while it might make a decent sorbet, this is not a beer for drinking.

Last up a weiss that has been getting very mixed reviews since MolsonCoors began shipping it over earlier in the year: Grolsch Weizen. Pouring it into my Grolsch glass was a mistake as the headkeeper made it go mental. On a warm evening after a long day at work I do not want to spend ten thirsty minutes trying to get my beer under control. When I finally got to it, my first thought was "watery". But then the pineapples kicked in: big, fresh and juicy and marvellously thirst-quenching. It's not watery, it's light. Perfect for charging through cold and won't leave you feeling like you've just had half a litre of 5.3% ABV beer. Which you have. I would return to this for future al fresco refreshment, certainly long before MolsonCoors's other wheat beer Blue Moon.

On this showing I doubt I'll be converting to all-weissbier diet this summer, but it definitely has its place, with curry and without.

On the up

A quick Google tells me Black Diamond's Peak XV has only been with us a couple of weeks at this stage. The 8% ABV imperial porter is made with fresh vanilla and California cocoa nibs. And, perhaps because it's so young, is incredibly fizzy at first. Mountains of head piled up as I poured, though subsided relatively quickly leaving a layer of tan foam on the surface.

From this there comes an oddly sharp aroma with a strangely green and herbal character: I get the distinct impression that, a journey of 5,000 miles notwithstanding, this stuff isn't quite ready for drinking yet. Chocolate is the main flavour: dry and dusty like cocoa powder. The vanilla is present too, adding a depth and richness otherwise lacking in this busily youthful but quite two-dimensional beer. The only other beer badged as "imperial porter" that I can think of is Flying Dog's Gonzo, and this has none of the big hop complexities present there.

The texture is relatively heavy, and once the head has settled it's as smooth and ungassy as this sort of beer should be -- a bit of a prickle livening up the mild alcohol burn as it slips down.

At the moment, Peak XV is a big, cacophonous powerhouse of sharp, unsubtle, unblended flavours. While I enjoyed it, I recommend a year or two's cellaring before approaching the thick moulded plastic seal over the cap.