Face Palm

I missed Beer Club Belfast again. Judging by Twitter it seems to have been a good night, any one who was there want to share their beer of the night?

A wee trip to the Vineyard helped ease my jealousy and lead me to pick up another beer from the list:

201. Palm
Style: Belgian Ale. ABV: 5.4%. From: Vineyard.
Description: Golden/light amber with a white head. Fizzy looking. Not much going on aroma wise, something slightly metallic. Taste is lagery, some light metallic hops, and a vague bitterness. Light bodied and fairly fizzy. 
Thoughts: Not sure why this is on the list personally. Very lager like. Drinkable(ish) but I won't be buying again.
Score: 5

To make up for missing Beer Club I picked up the two of the beers on show that I hadn't already tried, both are from outside the list:

159. Founders Imperial Stout
Style: Imperial Stout. ABV 10.5%: From: Light House Wines.
Description: This is dark, may be the darkest beer I've had since Bourbon County Stout. Dark Brown head, it every looks gloopy just pouring it into the glass. Aroma of burnt malt, coffee, bitter dark chocolate, and rummy booze. Bitter coffee taste, dark chocolate, then some oak, smoke, and tobacco. A big boozy hit: this is viscous and sticky. 
Thoughts: Very tasty; dark, rich and complex. Though for me there was may be a little too much going on, and every thing is turned up to 11. Personally I though last week's Narwhal was a more balanced beer, and overall I still think founders porter is the best of their range.
Score: 8

160. Williams Brothers / Brooklyn A Wee Bit
Style: Scotch Ale. ABV: 4.5% From: Vineyard.
Description: Dark brown, translucent. White head. Aroma is all peat and smoke. Flavour starts sweet, some malt in the middle, finishing with the peat and smoke. Quite light.
Thoughts: Not bad, not bad at all. Personally I could have taken more smoke, and it needed a slightly stickier body for me.
Score: 6

Cheers!

Beer 200!

So it has taken a while to get here but finally we are up to Beer 200 of "1001 Beers to Try Before You Die" (link to amazon - other online retailers and physical bookshops are available!). Just over a year and I'm a fifth of the way through - it is getting harder and harder to get the beers locally now but a wee internet purchase or two might help from here on in - can anyone recommend a site they use to deliver to NI that's reliable, has a good range, and doesn't want your first born as a delivery charge to these shores?

Anyway, here's Beer 200 and it's a cracker:

200. Cantillon Rose De Gambrinus
Style: Lambic Fruit. ABV: 5%. From: Light House Wines
Description: Pink, clear, tiny head; not unlike pink champagne. Aroma of berries, lots of berries - raspberry mainly - and some funky yeastiness. Taste is tart and zesty - some lemon, but lots of sour raspberry. My wife commented that it reminded her of creamola foam - she had a point, a bit like eating creamola foam from the spoon. Light bodied, decent fizz, with a slightly bitter finish.
Thoughts: Gorgeous stuff. Not the sweetness of some framboise; more sourness and tartness here. But not too sour. Overall nicely balanced and very refreshing - will be having again!
Score: 8.5

I also tasted a few more beers from outside the list:

157. Sierra Nevada Narwhal
Style: Imperial Stout. ABV: 10.2%. From: Light House Wines
Description: Poured jet black with a light brown head. Lots of roasted malt in the smell, light coffee, and some dark fruit (think figs and plums). Taste is good bitter dark chocolate, again some coffee in there too. A little boozy, but not as much as you'd expect given the ABV. Full bodied with a slightly bitter finish.  
Thoughts: And there I thought I was going back to IPAs again... This is a beautifully balanced imperial stout, scarily drinkable for the style. That ABV could do some damage without care. Another great beer from Sierra Nevada.
Score: 8.5

158. Pokertree Red Earl
Style: Red Ale. ABV: 5.5%. From: Light House Wines
Description: Ruby red, clear, and an off-white head that dissipated very quickly. Caramel on the nose. Taste follows that, caramel, biscuity malt. Quite light for the style, I got an ashy finish as well.   
Thoughts: I was impressed with Pokertree's first effort - for me, this wasn't as good. I found it a little too thin for my taste, would have preferred something more syrupy; the ash finish wasn't really my bag either. Drinkable but not very exciting. I should point out that this followed the Narwhal so most beers may have struggled after that - may need to give it another tasting for fairness sake!
Score: 6

A gentle reminder that Beer Club Belfast meets this Thursday (27th March) in the Hudson. Theme is beers with a twist with lots of brews worth trying announced already (if you haven't had it the Sorachi Ace is worth the £10 admission price alone!). If your about come down for a night of beer geekiness (and some good craic too).

Cheers

St Patrick's weekend round up

After Birmingham and Cardiff, what I really needed was some sleep... But sure it was a weekend of sport, sport, and more sport, and all of it good (as an Ulster, Ireland and Liverpool fan anyway). So with all that I just supped a few beers over the weekend, none from the list so just a quick round up below:

153. Farmageddon India Export Porter
Style: Porter. ABV: 5.2%. From: Light House Wines.
Description: Poured dark, tan head, looked quite fizzy for the style. Whiff of coffee and toasted malt. Taste wise some chocolate, liquorice, and some definite light hoppy bitterness. Mid bodied, a slightly oily hop finish.
Conclusions: A beer that shows potential. Definitely a porter with some hop profile rather than a black IPA. Something was slightly off with my bottle that I couldn't quite put my finger on, but a solid effort. Belfast Beer Blog have covered the rest of the range here - along with some interesting thoughts on the local beer scene. This is a discussion I might add to in due course...
Score: 6

154. Ilkley Longhorn
Style: Aged Milk Stout. ABV: 8%. From: Light House Wines.
Description: More ruby red/dark brown in colour than the usual black. No head at all and transparent. Bit of an odd smell, I got candy sugar and something vinegary. Taste is again vinegary and sour - where's the milk, or the cranberry? Not much Barrel or wood flavour either. Oddly thin. 
Conclusions: Has anyone else had this? Is it supposed to taste like this? I'd guess my bottle was skunked, but I couldn't say for sure... If this is what they were aiming for then it's a mess. I'd say it was almost like a bad example of a Flemish red/brown rather than what it said on the label. Either way its one of the first beers I've poured down the sink in awhile. 
Score: (A generous) 1 

155. Beavertown Smog Rocket
Style: Smoked Porter. ABV: 5.4%. From: Light House Wines.
Description: Poured dark brown with an off white head. Aroma is chocolate, roasted malt, and smoke. Flavour is smoked peat, toasted malt, liquorice, chocolate. Mid to full bodied, smooth.
Conclusions: Here we go, following the Longhorn this was a beer to restore my faith. Nicely balanced, very drinkable, interesting without being over done. Good stuff.
Score: 7



156. Beavertown Black Betty
Style: Black IPA. ABV: 7.4%. From: Light House Wines.
Description: Black with a decent white head. Straight up zesty smell: citrus, hops and grapefruit. Taste starts off dark malt and chocolate, and then the hops come through with more citrus and grapefruit. Smooth, decent body but not overly heavy. Hides its strength scarily well.
Conclusions: This a great, one of the best balanced Black IPAs I've had. This beer actually started me craving good strong resiny IPA having been on a stout/porter run for the last while. I'd recommend this to anyone!
Score: 8

Assuming the longhorn stout wasn't off, it reminded me of this interesting post from Boak and Bailey. Basically they took what wasn't a great base beer, and barrel aged the shite out of it to make it "uber craft". I'm all for trying new thing and experimentation, but surely someone should of tried this and went "You know this shouldn't be put out there". Ah well, drink as many different types of beer this and you're going to kiss a frog every now and then! Saint Patrick's and not a Guinness in sight...

Cheers

Crafty Cardiff

Last weekend: Birmingham. This weekend: Cardiff. Next weekend: Bed...

A whole lot of not getting out much came to a sudden and juddering halt with a boys day night in Birmingham (that was supposed to involve going to a football match but failed) by a stag weekend in Cardiff. Have to say Cardiff is purpose built for that sort of thing... the hotel we stayed in seemed to be all drunken men in costumes and one very confused Spanish family. I think they survived it, I just squeaked though. To quote Indiana Jones "It's not the years, honey, it's the mileage".

Anyway normally this type of thing wouldn't be that suited to this blog but Cardiff was good for a bit of Craftwankerness as well - I even ticked another beer from the list:

199. 3 Founteinen Oude Gueuze
Style: Gueuze. ABV: 6%. From: Urban Tap House.
Description: It was a stag night, strangely I didn't have my note book with me so those won't be extensive notes! Was a pale cloudy yellow with a good white head. Big funky tart aroma - lemon and some sour fruits - a bit vinous. Taste starts a little sweet and light but then you get whacked over the head with a big lemony zesty sour hammer. Crisp and fizzy, tart and refreshing.
Conclusions: A bit of a wow beer for me. Even after the crap I had drunken beforehand it still kicked through as a little sour corker. Still puckering just thinking about it! 
Score: 9


Other things to mention:

• Zero Degrees was good for a crowd and beers. The pitchers made sense and give us the opportunity to try out a few things. The pale ale was a big american C-Hop affair with a good bitterness. The Red Ale was a nice malt and treacle affair, and the mango fruit beer was better than it sounds. Food smelt good too but didn't get to try it out.
• Urban Tap House is a little slice of beer geek heaven. Not cheap but great options and a good atmosphere. Enjoyed the Hadouken. 
• Brains - not so good. The pint of SA I had was definitely off. 
• The entire group managed (apart from a sex on the beach and a vodka) to order King Cobra rather than Cobra with our meal one night! It was actually better than I remember it but that might have been to do with the circumstances.

Overall great trip, very well organised (not by me a should hasten to add) with just the right amount of booze and carry-on. 

Right I'm off to detox till Friday. Well may be Thursday...

Cheers

Beers and Birmingham

This post was supposed to follow quickly behind the last one... then work and family life happened. Well plus a trip to Ulster Rugby and then off the Birmingham with the boy! So we'll start off the the beers I didn't get to last time round - no more ticks from "1001 Beers unfortunately.

140. Kernel London Sour 

Style: Berliner Weisse. ABV: 2.8%. From: The Vineyard.

Description: Pale, pale, straw colour, clear, no head. Smells vinegary with lots of yeasty esters. Tart, sour, lots of lemon rind. Very light.

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Thoughts: I've only had Berliner Weisse before with the syrup in... I think I prefer it that way. This was tart and refreshing but not a great sour for me.

Score: 6

141. Thornbride Tzara 

Style: Kolsch. ABV: 4.8%. From: Light House Wines

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Description: Bah, lost my notes for this one... Pale, sweet fruit aroma (a hint of strawberries), sweet start with a slightly bitter finish. Light bodied.

Thoughts:Not sure I really got Kolsch before this beer, this was light and refreshing. Tasty stuff perfect for a warm summers day. Apparently Kolsch's don't travel well - my need to get to Koln to find out!

Score: 6.5

142. Kinnegar Maddyroe 

Style: IPA (Burnt red!). ABV: 5.7%. From: The Vineyard.

Description: Burnt amber colour with an off white head. Great IPA aroma, citrus and grapefruit, something floral too - a little caramel and spice. Starts off all citrus hop, but again that sweet burnt caramel malt and spice comes through on the finish. Mid bodied.

Thoughts: This stuff was great, really nice mesh of smells and flavours that created a tasty, drinkable beer. I know this was supposed to be a one off... really hope they brew more.

Score: 7.5

143. Oakham Citra 

Style: APA. ABV: 4.6%. From: The Vineyard.

Description: A dark straw colour, clear, with a decent white head. Pure citrus hop aroma, fresh grass. A little tropical fruit, decent bitterness that doesn't linger too long. Light but a slightly oily mouthfeel.

Thoughts: Tasty enough without being mind blowing. 

Score: 7

That lot was followed by a trip to Birmingham! The Wellington looked good but I didn't actually get a pint there as they weren't serving food. Brewdog was but couldn't convince the boys to stay here too long - but the Magic Rock Cannonball was worth trying (the Tactical Nuclear Penguin less so...). To much craic to take notes but overall I enjoyed Birmingham as a city more than I though I would. Would go back - but wouldn't rush there.

Next up Cardiff for a stag doo - Tiny Rebel's Urban Tap House will hopefully get a visit... anything else I need to be checking  out?

Cheers