Still rolling

The middle post from Alltech Brews & Food concerns the more familiar brewers, the ones I drink a lot, and now just happen to be drinking them here.

On the first evening there was a tasting for media types where a selection of brewers (and distillers) brought samples to talk about. Aidan from Galway Hooker opened the proceedings with the new Galway Hooker Honey Beer, brewed with locally sourced honey. Though presented as a brown ale it didn't look very brown to me, more a medium amber colour. The aroma was similar to that of a quality pilsner, grassy and floral, making me wonder if that's attributable to the special ingredient. It turns into more of a brown ale on tasting: thickly textured and leading with toffee, followed by wheaty cereal and a crisp roast finish. There are no way-out bells and whistles, and the honey is easily missed, but it's still solid, and doubtless deserving of a bigger sample than I had.

Not to be outdone, Wicklow Wolf also had a honey beer at the gig, this one with added elderflower and brewed with international brewing celebrity Anders Kissmeyer. Wolf Kiss is the name: 6% ABV and a clear darkish gold colour. The aroma was a little off-putting, being funky, with an edge of ammonia or even urine about it. The texture is thin and the flavour intensely sweet, adding up to something that reminded me of plain, straight, white lemonade. A mild peppercorn spice offers some contrast, but overall it just didn't work for me, on any level.

That didn't stop me from heading straight to the Wicklow Wolf bar first thing on the Saturday afternoon. They were also pouring a new-release coffee porter called Black Gold, the fourth beer of that name to feature on this blog, fact fans. This is a bit of a stonker at 7.8% ABV. I'm usually fairly well-disposed to coffee as an ingredient in dark beers, but this takes the complementary flavours to a whole new level. There's a beautiful melding of the two kinds of roast, plus the chocolate from the beer meeting the sweet and oily coffee beans. That leaves a long finish, aided by a gorgeous creamy texture, as well as providing an invigorating pure coffee aroma. Great stuff.

Black's of Kinsale had an impressively long bar, featuring two new sour beers. Both were 4% ABV and, tasting side-by-side, I couldn't pick much difference between them. Solero Passion Fruit should have had a sweet fruit character, but didn't, turning out quite savoury with lots of chalky minerals. Wild Thing, then, tasted like a very basic Berliner weisse, dry and plain, and while perfectly thirst-quenching it has little character beyond that.

That must have left me in the mood for something else sour because my notes go straight to Lough Gill next, and their Sligose oyster and seaweed beer. Top marks, first of all, for a "gose" pun that actually works. It's as pale yellow as one might expect, 5.6% ABV and tasting very witbier-like at first, going big on bittersweet herbs and crunchy wheat. I waited for the sourness to kick in but it never happened, the herbs intensifying to a kind of minty humbug flavour. It's a lovely beer, complex, engaging and tremendous fun. I missed the gose element of the taste, however.

Something more down to earth from the same bar next: Lost Armada, a pale ale. I don't know what hops they used in this but it must have been a lot. It has that raw and leafy quality of pure hops, beyond citrus fruit and into crunchy green veg; al dente sprouts and broccoli. And yet it's not harsh or acidic, showing a balanced bitterness and no more. You can forget about malt though: what's there is purely structural.

I saved the 9.5% ABV barrel-aged barley wine until the end of this visit. Old Coot served its time in a Speyside whisky barrel but to me it tasted of wine: dark and fruity, like black cherries in particular. The aroma is tart and the flavour dry, so no malt-driven sugar-bomb here. The texture, however, is appropriately heavy without turning cloying. A proper Bigfoot-like hop bitterness forms the finish. It's a beer of contrasts, immensely complex and rewarding of considered sipping. Not that that was likely to happen in the midst of a festival like this.

Moving on, I noticed Carrig had a poster up for its Cael & Crede red ale which it bottles for the US market. It's a blousy 6.5% ABV but that's probably the most interesting thing about it. Beyond that it's a fairly simple sweet and sticky, toffee-laden Irish red. I wouldn't be too offended if that's what its demographic thinks Irish people drink.

From the hoppier side of the brewery's whiteboard comes Alexanderplatz, a mid-strength IPA (5.5% ABV) showcasing Mandarina Bavaria hops. It arrived lovely and clear, though the aroma was a little sweaty, giving off the expected oranges but a bit of a funk as well. Unlike most recent Carrig offerings it tastes quite sweet, with a fair whack of gummy vanilla and a lacing of coconut. Thankfully there's just enough bitterness to cover it and the end result is decent and modern, if a little lacking in old-fashioned punch.

A year after their first appearance in Dublin, Bridewell of Cliden were back with a third beer: Festus. The slightly odd formula here is a dark lager recipe brewed with an ale yeast and carrying elements from both. It has the crisp and clean roast of a schwarzbier, and some funky hop resins: Mandarina at work again. The ale side of the equation is in the texture, a certain greasy fullness as you'd find in some English dark ales. It's pleasant and would certainly do in a pinch if one is stuck in Connemara craving mid-European black beer.

The other western brewery with a new beer with a short name was Reel Deel, bringing Recon. This is a brown ale (fashionably unfashionable!), all of 6.5% ABV, due in some part at least to time spent in Connemara Whiskey barrels. It really blends the two sides beautifully: all the sumptuous chocolate of a smooth and chewy brown ale overlaid with the bright meadow honey of good Irish whiskey. The texture is suitably thick and the finish long and warming. A gorgeous celebration of malt, all-in-all.

I think Boyne Raspberry Sour is my first sour beer from the Drogheda brewery. It's 4.9% ABV, bright pink and going all out for the fruit, very much at the expense of the sourness. "Hot jam" say my notes, meaning it has all the taste of the sugar and the raspberry seeds. I'm reminded of the fruit-heavy sour beers Open Gate has been brewing. Maybe there's a market for this sort of thing -- all those Belgian brewers can't be wrong -- but I can't help feeling nobody wants to actually brew beer like this.

Between Black Gold and Recon I thought I had picked my top beers of the gig, but on one of my last circuits I noticed the Chardonnay Sparkling Ale, tucked away at a right angle on the Rascals bar. Wow. I found it hard to believe this started out as Happy Days session IPA: the barrel really did a number on it, beginning at the striking champagne aroma, all light toast and dry white grapes. The flavour is a bit more lary, bringing floral bathroom-cabinet lavender, chamomile and jasmine, though there's also more subtle and classy wine tannin too. Despite the big flavours it's very refined, reminding me in particular of DOT Brew's magnificent Champagne Beer from 2016. And like that one, it seems like a beer that won't be around long. Grab it while you can -- this Saturday at UnderDog would be a start.

One more spin around the Convention Centre to come on Friday.

A fresh look

Alltech's beer extravaganza rolled into town in early March for its sixth annual outing. The untimely death of company founder Pearse Lyons on the day the gig opened failed to put a damper on things, and the show rolled on as a tribute to his memory. Exhibitor numbers were down, affording extra elbow room in the Convention Centre's main hall. And I still didn't get to try every beer on offer, so no complaints about the scope of the selection from me.

New breweries are always a major draw, so I made an early appearance at the Brewmaster beer stall. This range is produced by Dundalk Bay Brewery, itself a subsidiary of metal fabricator Spectac. I had assumed that the intention was to present the brewery as a showpiece for potential customers, and it may still be, but its primary purpose is as a white-label facility for contract brewing.

The three beers on offer weren't the most distinctive of styles: a lager, a red and an IPA. Brewmaster Lager is 4.2% ABV and surprisingly sweet, to the point of being almost syrupy. Brewmaster Red piles on the caramel, lacing it with chocolate in a complementary way. It's sweet again, but more manageable with it, tasting like it should be thick while staying light and drinkable. Lastly, Brewmaster IPA is simple and dry, easy-going with just an edge of grapefruit but nothing more intense than that. I expected a bigger kick from its 5.5% ABV.

Clearly there has been no attempt to blow socks off with this lot, but I can see how a publican, looking for something unchallenging for the regulars, might consider re-badging one or more of these.

It was my first time meeting the owner of Ballykilcavan Brewing, currently under construction in Laois, with beers brewed using their own malt at Kildare Brewing, for the moment. Brickyard Red is where I started, copper coloured and a light 4% ABV. It's fairly plain fare, leaning heavily on the dry and toasty-roasty side. New for the festival was Long Meadow IPA, with a candyfloss malt base and a certain lime sharpness -- balanced and easy-going. Pick of the lot was their Irish Hopped Pale Ale, brewed with a variety of varieties, also grown on their own farm. I got a feel of really good pale-and-hoppy English bitter from this: a clean and crisp grain crunch, lemon zest and a dry mineral finish. It's one I could drink a lot of so it's a shame it's so seasonal.

Finally for this opening post, The first set of core beers from Larkin's. I've been following this Wicklow brewery with interest since they first appeared at the RDS festival last autumn. Lager is a speciality and that's why there are four of them in the main six.

My journey started with Larkin's Märzen, which is quite a dark version of the style: a deep orange-amber, resembling an American Oktoberfestbier. It certainly gets its money's worth out of the extra malt, with a huge and sweet biscuit melanoidin foretaste. There's enough noble-hop spinach bitterness to counter it, resulting in a big and bruising, but highly enjoyable, chewer of a lager.

As a palate cleanser afterwards I went for Larkin's Helles. This didn't impress so much. Sure, it looks the part: as clear and gold as you like. The texture is decent, but lacks the soothing ultra-smoothness of really good helles; while the flavour lacks any kind of hop character, or cakey malt, giving just a mild crisp grain crunch. It's serviceable but rather plain: a lager for lager's sake.

I saved Larkin's Baltic Porter until quite late into the festival, even though it is a little weak for the style at 7% ABV.  It's still bang on where flavour is concerned, however: a big liquorice bitterness greets the palate, followed by strong dark chocolate notes. The cool fermentation gives it a superb cleanness and makes it a Baltic porter that's definitely drinkable by the pint, as they should be.

The strongest lager was Larkin's Doppelbock at 7.6% ABV, and this one I found a little too hot and heavy. The deep chestnut red colour is its best feature. The flavour begins on pleasant caramel and hazelnut but they're joined too quickly by hot and cloying esters, making for some tough drinking.

I left the ales to last, starting on Larkin's Pale Ale, which represents a major climbdown in strength at just 4.5% ABV. It's a pale and hazy bright orange colour and exudes a massive jaffa orange aroma. The bitterness is very low, its flavour going instead for a sherbet-like spritz and zest. It's very modern-tasting, though without resorting to sickly vanilla or leaving any nasty yeast residue in the taste. Perhaps most amazingly, it's all done with Cascade hops, I'm told.

Larkin's IPA brings us home. This has a pure haze-craze appearance: smoothie to the point of soupy. The aroma follows up this suggestion of New Englandism with a mix of juicy peach and acidic spinach. On tasting that becomes soft honeydew melon followed by a buzz of garlic or spring onion, set on a smooth body. Where one might expect the claggy sweetness to kick in there's just a long and satisfying proper hop bitterness, lasting late into the finish. These two are quite a switch from the super-traditional lagers, but also a very pleasant one.

More new beers from Alltech next, though this time from more familiar producers.

Spring flowers

There was a sudden abundance of new Irish beers in March. Presumably the run-up to the national holiday had something to do with that, as well as a couple of festivals to which I'll dedicate later posts. This one is about the random new beers I found in the pubs and off licences.

And also in breweries. I paid my first visit to Rye River in Celbridge at the invitation of the company. On the roster was the first in a limited edition series of high-end beers, going for that super-premium 440ml can segment. First out is a Belgian Imperial Stout. Brewer Bill described the style as a sort of hybrid, somewhere between a normal imperial stout and a quadrupel. I got that 100% from the flavour: smooth warming banana meeting bitter and roasty espresso, though the two never fully meld. I like the way it maintains elements of both, letting you enjoy two beers at once. With a relatively modest 8.2% ABV it doesn't overdo things either. In a world where pastry stouts are ever more commonplace, it's perhaps lacking a little in wow, but I suspect that may come with a bit of ageing. I certainly put one of my complimentary cans into the stash. Thanks to the team at Rye River for the evening out.

An afternoon excursion to Alfie Byrne's yielded no fewer than three new beers from Hope. Two were from their own Limited Edition series, now up to 9 and 10 respectively.

9 is Hope Vienna Oatmeal IPA. I expected something quite dark but it's definitely yellow, and a little hazy with it. There's a decent head, of course, from which emerges a pleasingly weedy fresh hop aroma. The texture is a little watery and I think that has affected the flavour detrimentally. You get a bitter kick at the front, and then an acidic afterburn tailing off, but no middle where the hop fruit, or resins, or whatever, ought to be. It's fine but forgettable, tasting like an average session IPA rather than its full 5% ABV with proper malt credentials.

Its fraternal twin is Flat White Stout, this one at 6% ABV, a collaboration with Upside Coffee of Fairview. There's lots of roast in the flavour but specific coffee notes are scarce, at least at first. The sense of coffee is really only engendered by the creamy texture, and maybe a touch of brown sugar sweetness. It takes a minute or two for the coffee bean oils to make their presence felt, and they're at no point excessive, adding an extra layer to the mouthfeel, as well as a warming rich coffee flavour. I liked how, despite the added ingredient and gimmicky name, it never loses sight of being a basically good stout, just one that happens to have some coffee in it.

Last of this trilogy is a contract brew: Brethren Brown from the Midlands Beer Collective. It seems, from nowhere, that everyone's making brown ales these days. Expect more in subsequent posts. This one is a monster 6.7% ABV and a clear red-amber colour, rather than brown. It's surprisingly dry for a big, dark beast, opening with light plum and raisin before turning floral and then full-on bitter. The finish is quite acrid, mixing punchy hops with the sharp bitterness of roasted grains. It's all a bit severe for my liking; brown ale, even with an American twist like this, should be softer with more of a sweet malt character. And browner too.

Moving across town to The Black Sheep next, a pub I've been making much more use of since they introduced live tap listing. It was the first place I noticed Galway Bay's latest: Hearts & Feints, a Citra-forward double IPA which acts as a companion to Weights + Measures session IPA, as reviewed last month. It looks similar: pale yellow and very murky. The aroma is a beautiful medley of funk and citrus: limes and weed. The body is appropriately full given the 8.5% ABV, and there's an eye-popping juiciness right from the first sip. I was reminded of the first time I drank Of Foam & Fury, in the same pub over four years ago. So much so I ordered a taster for comparison. The elder statesman of Irish DIPA is paler and drier than it used to be, much bitterer than this fruity and dank young pretender. Even at identical strengths in the same style they make for a fun contrast. I definitely prefer the hop fireworks of Hearts & Feints, however.

Over on the cask array, one could be treated to the rare spectacle of a cask Berliner weisse in a dimple mug. O Brother's The Whippersnapper  is the beer in question, just 4% ABV and dry-hopped with Amarillo. The cask had been on a few days, and I never got to try it kegged, so I'm not sure if what follows is a description of what it was supposed to be. I liked it, though. The sourness was very mild, almost unnoticeable, and there was a beautiful soft and zingy lemon sherbet quality. The light melt-in-your-mouth candy effect was definitely aided by the effervescent texture and I'd imagine wouldn't stand up to full carbonation. My overall impression was of a pale 'n' hoppy modern English bitter, a sunny beer garden refresher. It's something I'm very much on board for. Berlin can wait.

Back over to the keg taps next for a YellowBelly. Diamond Heist is 5.3% ABV and described by the brewery as a "Belgian style pale ale". I wasn't sure what I was going to get. My pint arrived a deep orange colour with very little head. On tasting... woah, that's Belgian! It has all the fruit and spice of Duvel: banana, orange, clove and nutmeg. This is set on a wholesome rye-bread base and finishing tannic, like sweet black tea. Maybe its the acrobatic complexity, but this tastes much stronger than it is, which is fun: you can pretend you're in Belgium being decadent, even when you're only necking a quick pint.

The White Hag launched their collaboration beer with Norway's Haandbryggeriet last month. Hag & Haand is a barrel-aged apricot pale ale with Brettanomyces and I caught up with it at P. Mac's. It's just as well that 75cl is the main format for this one because I don't think it's quite finished. It's extremely fruit forward, to the point of tasting like a jam or jelly. There's a thick texture to match, giving an impression of real ripe apricot. Just an edge of the oak shows through, sappy and bitter, not mixing well with the sweet side. That flashes only briefly before we're back to the stonefruit again. The Brett funk is more apparent in the aroma than the flavour, and the only other complexity is a slight twist of white pepper. It's one-dimensional; one-and-a-half, tops. But there is lots of sugar for the Brett to chomp through. I think it'll be a year or five before we really find out what this can be.

Where next? UnderDog, of course, and a pint of M-Alt, an Altbier by Third Barrel. This was designed by the brewery's visiting German intern Alex (you can read his recipe here), and was based on Schumacher Alt. It was sweeter than I thought typical of the style, full and fuzzy with lots of warm-fermentation character. Wheat, milk chocolate and melanoidins all feature in my notes, as does strawberry, secondarily. There's a nice and peppery noble hop bite but it lacks the matured lagered cleanness of the real thing. This is serviceable, but sailed too close to an Irish red ale for my comfort.

The pub round-up finishes in 57 The Headline with a glass of the new Trouble Brewing double IPA Space Juice. "DDH", of course. As perhaps implied by the name, it's a weird creature, where the first sip brought a bizarre clash of tropical fruit, vanilla, yeast twang and a metallic bitterness. All very unsettling and impossible to relax with. At its centre there's boozy over-ripe peach, reflecting the 8.2% ABV. The smoothness and the sweetness hint that something like an imperial version of Ambush was the intent here, but it's too hot, too harsh and not clean enough. It could be it's just a sub-style I don't get, but it's not my kind of beer either way.

New bottled Porterhouse beers are a rarity, though I'm hoping they'll be more commonplace now that the new brewery is up and running. Bounty Hunter is the latest, a chocolate and coconut porter with added lactose. As one might expect, there's lots of coconut. The aroma is husky and toasted; the flavour bringing the chocolate into play as well. For all that, it's surprisingly dry, with a powdery desiccated coconut character. The texture is light as well, and the carbonation low, making for easy drinking, although at 5.2% ABV it should really have a little more heft. You don't get much from the base beer, no hop or grain character to speak of, but then it is meant to be all about the coconut. I wasn't wowed by it the way I was by Independent Coconut Porter last year -- it lacks the sumptuous coconut oils that one displays. It's fine, though. No complaints.

I collected that in DrinkStore, alongside their long-awaited collaboration with Whiplash. It's called Embrace the Daylight and is a Cascadian dark ale of 6.3% ABV, made with four different malts and four American C-hops. It poured out like a milkshake, forming a thick beige-coloured head over a pure black body, while smelling enticingly of lemon, bergamot and bitter herbs. I was poised for something serious but it's actually light and fruity; delightfully so. There's a tangerine juice element, and then some darker stout-like roast, some liquorice, before finishing on a grassy bite from the rye. The finish is quick and it leaves little aftertaste. It's all very well balanced, drawing on both sides of its nature and putting them to good use.

Also from DrinkStore, this one which isn't new but of which I was unaware; in fact I caught it in the last months of its shelf-life. Sour Smack purports to be the first in a limited series from Clonakilty Brewing. The label is otherwise short on information, other than it's 5% ABV and bottle conditioned. I poured carefully but couldn't avoid getting a few gritty bits into my glass, turning the bright orange liquid yellower. There's an enticing aroma of melon, peach and apricot: sweet and juicy with a tart mineral edge. The flavour is very Belgian, with the candied orange and old-world spices found in that nation's best blonde and pale ales. De La Senne's excellent Zinnebir leaps immediately to mind. The sourness is almost missable behind the fresh zest and is no more than what a squeeze of Jif lemon would give you. Rather than puckering your cheeks, the tartness serves merely to accentuate the juice, and it's a noble calling. Lightly textured, softly carbonated and beautifully balanced, this is a thirst-quenching triumph and very worthy of a repeat brew.

Bringing up the rear, New Ireland Beers is a new label by Dean Clarke of distributor Premier International. First out is Savage a pale ale designed by Rossa O'Neill and brewed in Dublin at Hope. It's a bright orange colour with a slight haze. There's a fresh orange candy aroma: enticing chew sweets, bubblegum and Fanta. The flavour is more nuanced, with tangerine rather than jaffa, plus added mango and passionfruit. It has a sufficient bitter greenness and a yeast spicing that almost tips over into an off-flavour but thankfully the hopping is bold enough to hold it back. The texture is very light, even for just 4.8% ABV, and that does make it a little thin. I can see how it would work as a sessionable quaffer however, by the six-pack or pint. Overall a great first effort and I look forward to where New Ireland takes us next.

All these and I still haven't reported on this year's Alltech festival yet. Stand by...

Zo surprising

I don't think I've mentioned this here before, but the fridges at Urban Brewing have some remarkable beers in them, ones you won't see elsewhere in Ireland. It's worth tippy-toeing over the bar for a gander. I asked Seamus O'Hara about this recently and he told me they use their import facilities to bring in small mixed batches of this and that, just for the sake of variety. I mean, why not?

I had noticed cans from Austro-Slovenian brewer Bevog previously (my opinions on a couple of theirs are here) and then a few months ago one showed up on the guest tap. It was Zo, a session IPA. At €6.50 for a half pint that's very much a hypothetical sort of session. It's a clear gold colour and as light-bodied as might be expected. The hops bring funky resins to begin with, settling out after a while to more floral bathsalts and an oily rosemary-like winter greenness. There's a sense of thickness without the beer being at all thick. Some gentler apricot wafts in when all of that settles down, fading quickly to a disappointingly watery finish.

It's OK. There's enough going on there to hold the drinker's attention for a while and I can imagine getting through a few pints of it. After I make my fortune, of course.

Reservoir reservations

It seems to me a long time since Quentin Tarantino was considered cool. Lately his association with Hollywood sex pest Harvey Weinstein has tarnished further a reputation already on the skids. So I was a little surprised when fashion-conscious Danish contract brewer To Øl continued to evoke the director's work in a sequence of beers.

The Mister Series has been around a couple of years, each of the six beers named after a pseudonym used by the central characters in Reservoir Dogs. In 2018 the recipes got revised and they arrived in Ireland for the first time, landing at a special event in The UnderDog in February. By the time I stopped by it was a bit too loud and crowded for trying them all, but here's the four I did get to on the night.

Mr White was my first choice. I was intrigued by the daftness of the description: a "New England style grisette". Whut? At 5% ABV it's a bit strong for grisette and weak for a New England IPA. The flavour isn't very complex: orangeade fruits and slightly soapy herbal bathsalts. It's... fine. That it's not the wacky and way-out offering it purports to be is most likely a good thing.

Next to it is Mr Brown, a coffee imperial stout matured on oak and cedar wood. This was the best of the lot, all heavy and warming with tasty hazelnut flavours while also decently bitter, as imperial stout should be. I didn't get much of the wood from it, though that's probably in its favour: oak works best when it's no more than a seasoning. A little more cedar might have spiced it up nicely but I can't really complain.

Just a taste of Mr Blue for me, a multi-berry-infused Berliner weisse. It's certainly blue; a deep dense shade of purple and completely opaque. The texture is palate-cloggingly thick in a way that's totally inappropriate for a Berliner weisse, or anything other than a fruit smoothie, really. There's a certain tartness but a lot more sweet claggy fruit pulp getting in its way. This is one of those beers that's all about the concept and the daring recipe, leaving no consideration for whether it's nice to drink. Which it isn't, really.

Before hitting the road, a swift Mr Orange. This is a double IPA at 9% and includes a raft of tropical and citrus fruits as well. It's another heavy one, and the texture accentuates its cordial sweetness. That ought to have been the death of it but a big hop bitterness comes to the rescue, offsetting the cloying sugariness and giving it a clean snap in the finish. It didn't convert me to the cause of fruit DIPA but it did show that they can have merit, sometimes.

Sad old Mr Blonde was still on tap a week later and Paddy offered me a taster. This is a fruited gose with added vanilla and, contrary to the name, is the bright pink colour of red grapefruit juice. I shouldn't have been surprised to find it tastes like a yoghurt, but it does: that mix of lactic tartness, creamy vanilla and sweet berries. It's fine, but not terribly exciting, verging even on dull. I doubt that a bigger measure would have improved it.

In the best gangster tradition, I thought I was done but they pulled me back in. All six showed up bottled in Fresh so I was able to complete the set with Mr Pink in the comfort of my own home. This beetroot IPA looks very dramatic: an opaque blood red topped with electric pink foam. I caught a little of the beetroot's signature earthiness as it poured, but a proper sniff turned up a purely hoppy citrus aroma, mostly of fresh zesty lemon. The flavour is similarly, simplistically, hop-dominated, the citrus spritz joined by a heavier wilted-spinach acidic greenness. You have to concentrate to find the beetroot amongst it, but I think it's there in the finish: a sweet tuberous edge, more like parsnip than beet, and really not making much positive contribution to what's otherwise a solid, if simple, American-style IPA.

While some were certainly better than others, there was very little wow factor to any of these beyond their descriptions. I'm sure every sensible drinker knows that way-out recipes do not necessarily make for better beer, and it's not like we're starved for this sort of "creativity" in beer these days. But the people in the pub were happy and maybe that's their most important achievement.

Mes we can

It's over a year since I last reviewed a beer from that little bit of Belgium in Mayo, Mescan Brewery, so I'm devoting this post to a couple of theirs.

Westport Saison is first, coming on the personal recommendation of Jimmy Redmond, who also sold me the bottle. As always with saison I'm obsessing over the strength, and 6.2% ABV seems excessive. I had to pour carefully to keep the foam under control and a clear pale golden glassful was my reward. So far so good. It smells sweet and mineral-like: lemon sherbet, parma violets and bathsalts. It took a while to get a handle on the flavour as the massive carbonation kept getting in the way, punching my palate and distracting it from tasting. It's quite a simple beer behind that, with sweet lemon candy again and then dry straw and rye grass in the finish. All very pleasant in an understated way that few saison brewers seem to bother with these days.

I followed No. 72 with No. 73: Special Reserve. I'm told this is broadly a winter ale, and the dark colour and 8.4% ABV certainly back that up. It smells of coffee mixed with figs and plums, and in marked contrast with the Saison has a beautifully smooth texture. Those dark fruits are at the centre of the flavour and this time the roast is at the edge, joined by a certain dark chocolate bitterness and a gentler waft of exotic rosewater. It doesn't taste its strength, slipping back with a slick and gooey mix of Turkish delight and spiced latte, sweeter than a dubbel or quadrupel but lighter on the headachey esters and much more enjoyable for that. An excellent winter night's drinking, and a recipe I hope they continue.

Quite a contrast between these two, but they demonstrate what a great end-to-end brewer Mescan is. Their beers are easily missed in Dublin but worth seeking out if you've not had the pleasure.

Wild in the beer aisle

It's one of those situations where I hear lots of people talking about a beer I see every week in the supermarket and haven't tried yet. Admittedly it doesn't happen too often, but it happened with Straffe Hendrik Wild. The concept is simple: standard Staffe Hendrik tripel innoculated with Brettanomyces, the intention being that it will transform and develop with age the way Orval famously does. My 2017 vintage had a best-before of 2022.

When I pulled the cap it didn't gush, but I could tell it was thinking about it. The foam ambled up the neck and the glass was two thirds filled with it when I stopped pouring. There's a seriously funky Brett aroma, mostly farmyard but with hints of that sticky peach and pineapple juice it also offers. The flavour lets more of the tripel come through: honey and spices first, set on a candy sugar base. Very warming, at 9% ABV, and very Belgian. The Brett follows, providing a different sort of Belgian character. The funk doesn't cover up the rest, at least not in the first year, though the elements it brings don't exactly integrate with the tripel, merely accompanying it.

I liked this. It's a fun twist on a very decent tripel. I would, however, be a little apprehensive about ageing it. I'm not sure that letting the voracious wild yeast dry it out over time will improve it any. Though obviously there's a part of me that really wants to try it anyway.