Brewdog

The UK is experiencing a true brewing revolution. The age of the cheap lager is over and the craft beer is taking its deserved place at the top of the pile. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Scotland. Beers ranging from a 4000 year old recipe for heather ale through to a 55% head melter called 'The End of History' make the Scottish craft beer scene one of the most diverse in the world. Breweries such as Williams Brothers, Innis and Gunn and the Orkney Brewery are showing what Scotland is capable of. However, one brewery in particular stands out as a true pioneer. Brewdog. 

The wee brewery up in Fraserburgh has made a huge impact on the craft beer scene since it was opened for business in 2007. It has shocked the brewing world on more than one occasion, brewing progressively stronger beers, culminating in the astonishing 55%abv 'End of History'. The brand's provocative marketing strategies and 'punk' image almost clash with the amount of care and attention that has clearly been put into the making of their beers. Their flagship brand, 'Punk IPA' is a brilliantly hoppy pale ale. Drinking it could be described as being like biting into a ripe grapefruit.

    Despite the rough image and extreme beers, the market for Brewdog beers isn't exactly niche. Brewdog is now Scotland's largest independent brewery, and bottles of Punk, along with more of their brands, can be seen on supermarket shelves right across the UK. This is a further sign that the general drinking public are now looking past the cheap lagers and generic mainstream beers and are looking for something different and new, which is something Brewdog can definitely offer.

Outside of the brands seen in supermarkets, there is a huge array of speciality beers. As mentioned, the brewery were involved in a 'beer war' with a German brewery, resulting in the two breweries competing for the title of the World's strongest beer. The beers which were produced were a freeze distilled stout, 'Tactical Nuclear Penguin' (32%), a quadrupel IPA named 'Sink the Bismark' (41%) and 'End of History', which also broke the record for the world's most expensive beer, retailing at £500/£700 depending on which bottle you wanted (the choices being a stoat or a grey squirrel). The beer which kicked it off, an 18.2% imperial stout called Tokyo* is probably more within the price range of an everyday drinker. Also notable is the brewery's experimental 'Abstrakt' series, as well as a number of collaborations with other breweries. 

James Watt, one of the two founders, clearly has a great business head on his shoulders, and knows that any publicity is good publicity, and their attention grabbing stunts, such as the arrival of a tank at the opening of the new Brewdog bar in Camden, goes to prove that they'll do anything to get a headline. Brewdogs image may be seen as a bit of a marketing gimmick, designed to catch the attention of a new generation of drinkers, but nonetheless, the brewery produces some damn good beer. I look forward to seeing what Bracken and the boys are going to bring us in 2012!

P.S- A Brewdog Bar on the Emerald Isle wouldn't go amiss ;-)

Cheers

American Wheat Beers

  Over the past week or so I've been thinking long and hard about what my 'favourite style' of beer is. I love big hitting American IPA's, you just can't go wrong with a biscuity, wholesome English Ale, and, of course, I'm always in the mood for a Guinness, but I've decided that, whilst I don't have a 'favourite style' as such, I do have a genuine love for wheat beers. Nothing is better on a cold afternoon than a stein of HefeweiBe and a bratwurst at the beer tent of a Christmas continental market. In saying that, a wheat beer goes down equally well on a lazy summer evening, served in a tall glass, with some cheeses and olives to nibble on. But when I think of wheat beers, I nearly always think of German or Belgian beers, like Unertl, Schneider WeiBe, Franziskaner or Hoegaarden. It's only very recently that I've begun to explore the variety of wheat beers and weizens from across the globe, and most notably, America.
    The first beer I tried was Goose Island's effort, 312 'Urban Wheat Ale'. 312 comes in at a pretty normal 4.2%abv, so no real surprises there. The first thing which struck me as I poured the beer was the appearance. Although this is an unfiltered beer, I still found that it was just a little transparent. I expected a swirling, opaque, yeasty foggyness and instead I found it was almost like a cloudy lager. The carbonation was very visible and the colour was a sort of golden straw colour rather than pale . This wasn't necessarily a negative point, it was just different from what I was initially expecting. The smell was infinitely more pleasing. It had notes of lemony zest and spices, along with heaps of wheaty aromas. This carried on into the taste, which was, again, quite lemony. It had a fair amount of aromatic hop flavours, with just a little sourness. It had flavour, but for some reason I found it to be just a little bland and lacking in kick. The liberty and cascade hops which were used just seemed to have been suppressed by the wheatyness. I wasn't expecting a pale-ale style bitterness, but just some sort of bite would have helped it.
  I found Sierra Nevada's Kellerweis was much closer to its European counterparts. It poured a hazier amber colour, and had a thicker, longer lasting head. The nose had banana with a hint of coriander, and plenty of spice. The brewers spent a long time looking for the perfect recipe before this beer was released in 2009, and the yeast strain which they eventually settled on gives this beer it's more German feel, with notes of bubblegum and clove coming through in the aroma. The taste is definitely more American however. It has the feel of a real craft beer, expertly made with real thought. The spices come to the fore and the flavour changes hugely in the mouth, going from coriander, to lemon, to bubblegum. The only downside to this great beer is the mouthfeel. I think there is just a little bit too much carbonation, which takes away from the smoothness I would expect from the style, this however is just a minor point and it doesn't take away from what is a very good effort at a wheat beer.
   Finally, I had a Blue Moon. Blue Moon is brewed by Molson Coors, so, whilst technically a 'craft beer' it isn't exactly micro brewed, nevertheless, I really enjoyed it. It pours a more orangey colour than the other two, with a really good, bubbly head. On the nose it has huge orange and coriander aromas, which are amplified when the beer enters the mouth. The citrus and orange flavours work really well with the tartness provided by the wheat, to give a really good all round taste. The mouthfeel is smooth and the overall style of the beer is more akin to a Belgian weizen. So much so, in fact, that in 1999 the Confederation des Brasseries de Belgique filed a lawsuit against the company, accusing it of 'misleading the public' with regards to the beer's origin.
   So, out of the three I think Blue Moon was the personal favourite, although I still think a tall glass of Aventinus is very hard to beat! I look forward to trying more wheat beers from the U.S and further afield, but for my next one I'm coming a little closer to home, for a Curim Gold Irish Wheat Beer. I'm looking forward to it!

Westmalle Dubbel Review

 The Westmalle brewery, based in Westmalle, Belgium, is one of the last remaining truly Trappist breweries. The abbey has held the Trappist label since 1836, and their first beer was brewed in the same year. The Trappist code requires that the abbeys survive on enterprise rather than charity, so many of them chose to brew. As with most of the Trappist abbeys, Westmalle also produce their own range of cheeses, which I am sure would go excellently with their beers. Today, although still officially a Trappist brewery, most of the work is done by workers in a secular setting, separate from the abbey, however 22 Trappist monks still supervise the brewery's activity.
  Anyway, on to the beer. Faced with the choice of a Tripel or Dubbel, I was quite stumped, so was eventually reduced to a game of eeny-miny-mo, and came up with the Dubbel. It poured a wonderful cloudy dark colour, with some hints of redness when held up to a light. At 7% it had a surprisingly thick head which laced the glass almost perfectly as I drank the beer. The nose was rich and fruity, but managed to keep a hoppy dryness which I have come to expect from darker Belgian ales. In the mouth I was hit by the aromatic flavours and soft mouth-feel. The flavour wasn't as robust as I had imagined it would be, but this didn't take away from the fact that this was a truly exquisite beer. Easily quaffable and remarkably smooth, this one would go perfectly with some soft cheese, or even possibly a lighter meat dish. I'm now really looking forward to the Tripel!

Scores
Presentation(Packaging)   8
Pour/Colour                     9
Nose                               8
Taste                               8
Mouthfeel                        9

Overall                           8.5/10

THE NEW BLOG!

Well, finally I got round to my new years resolution for 2012 and got my beer blog back up and running again. Those of you who followed my old blog will know the basic drill. I'll try my hardest to post at least one weekly review, plus any other little bits of interesting thoughts that go through my head during the week. I'll do reviews of beers, breweries, pubs and off-licences, as well as beer related news, recipes and lots more, so its definitely worth clicking the 'follow by e-mail' button!
   So, with no further ado, I pronounce the all new BeerBlokeBlog...Open!