#378: Off Season

My son picked this beer out for me, otherwise I probably wouldn't have picked it up. No offence to Bullhouse Brew Co, I just don't get particularly animated about St Patrick's Day and beer tie-ins thereof. It was a good chance though to finally feature Bullhouse on the blog - I recently enjoyed their excellent Saisons In the Sun (no review, check out the Beer Nut's here). The artwork in particular is something I've long admired. Who would look at this and think some horrible AI slop would be better? 

Rolling Patrick pours totally opaque and flashes a promising whiff of sharp citrus and juicy tropicals, enticing and fruity. This reappears on the palate too but only for a flash; thereafter remains a beer that is all texture and very little flavour. To be fair there are shades of dank IPA stuff in here somewhere, but it's not particularly expressive, instead just delivering vanilla, grass and the empty promise of a pillowy body. It's sweeter and stickier than it ought to be at 4.2%, especially while doing not much else.

While we're talking about seasonals, this next one (still appropriately branded for St Patrick's Day) was one I thoroughly enjoyed over Christmas, and I've been unsuccessfully trying to replace it since then. 

The beer is Tara, from Lough Gill's dizzying lineup of archaeologically themed barrel aged series for the winter just past. While big barrel-aged stouts haven't been my bag as much lately as they would have been about five years ago, so I only picked up the one that looked most promising to me, this Pedro Ximinez-aged 13%-er. Expectations are high with that sort of pedigree, and they are immediately met; for as thick and slick and chocolatey as the stout of Tara is at its core, I am delighted by the amount of concentrated raisin and figgy wine. The dried fruit and almond is admittedly a secondary characteristic, the main event being dominated by a thumping great big stout that offers vanilla, dark bitter chocolate and sweet malted milk. It's heady at times, pleasantly and alluringly boozy, but never hot and always moreish. For a beer of  this strength and complexity, that's quite the feat. 

The other beers in the series have made a miraculous reappearance in my local off licence, hopefully the Tara will do the same.

#377: Crisp de Burghs

Illness has thwarted by grand designs to take part in the most recent Session, where hosts Boak and Bailey ask What is the best beer you can have at home right now? When able, I'd like to rehash my planned contribution into a sort of post about the house beer situation. Spoiler alert, its liable to be a German lager.

But for now, we settle for reflecttion on the previous week's German lager, the highly regarded Hopburgh Helles from the Alpine idyll of Smithfield, Dublin 7. It pours the colour of golden syrup and despite a fairly lively carbonation the head is loose with big wobbly bubbles that disappear all to quickly. That's about the last wobble of the evening though, because this beer is lovely; big stalky bitterness and, would you believe it, golden syrup on the nose. On the palate there's a suggestion of lemongrass and marshmallow, simultaneously bringing to mind not just native German helles but also Bohemian pils. In this way it's not unlike the Leikeim Pils from a couple of weeks ago, although I would take the Hopburgh over that beer any day. Beautiful, and when it costs more than an Augustiner, it ought to be. 

Not wasting any time we dive straight into the Hopburgh Schwarzbier. I fancy all types of dark lager but this is probably the one I have the loosest grasp on. Like the Helles it pours perfectly clear but in the colour a dark and particularly reddish cola. The foam is slightly more stable on this one too which is a nice bonus. There's a hint of smoke on the nose, rather surprisingly, but this doesn't follow up on the palate, rather unsurprisingly. Instead it's a delightful twirl of raisin and chocolate, with Café Noir biscuit underscoring the finish. Over time the bitterness - always there but rather subtle to begin with - intensifies and combines with the sweeter malts to give a sort of liquorice effect. Beautiful.

Both of these beers are triumphs, and worth the admittedly eyebrow-raising price attached to them.