Well actually I started drinking beer before noon but I let the first one stretch into the afternoon and have been drinking slowly since.
Im going to start with what I am currently drinking. The Brewdog Paradox Speyside. It seems they do these in batches and the batch is hand written on the bottle along with the expiration date. I think mine is pretty new as it is not listed on the website yet. My batch number is 011 with a best before of 12/12/10.
The first thing i should mention about this beer is that it is expensive. I paid €5.99 for a 330ml bottle.
The second thing i should mention is the reason it is so expensive. This Imperial stout is Cask aged in a whiskey, or should I say Whisky (being Scotland of course) cask for about three months. The idea is that it will bring the aroma and flavour of the whisky into the beer.
I should point out that i am a Whiskey drinker and not so much a Whisky drinker, meaning that I love my Irish Whiskey and have limited experience with Scotch Whisky. My current scotch is a 15 year old Glenlivet and this as far as I know is a speyside Whisky. So if i compare this type of Whisky to the Paradox it actually does compare. I'm going to assume that Speyside whisky is not a strong peat smoked whisky like some others. I like the Glenlivet probably because it is closer to an Irish Whiskey than other ashtray tasting scotches so I like the taste of the Paradox because I can taste and smell the Whisky notes but it is not a very smoky beer. That is not to say I do not like a peated Whisky or Whiskey. In fact im a big fan of Connemara Peated Irish Whiskey.
Thirdly this stout is 10% making it the strongest beer I have tasted. This is wine territory. Wine is usually about the 14% mark but varies and can start out at 10% or sometimes less.
To be honest i need more than 1 bottle of this and I wish they provided it in 500ml bottles rather than 330ml bottles.
If i have any negative points about this beer then its the following.
There is no head on this beer, or at least the tiny head that formed was only a brief flicker of headiness before its spark expired from existence.
Treacle.... This is what this beer reminds me of. I am not comparing constancy, in fact the mouthfeel is light but heavier than some other stouts. I am just put in mind of a syrupy taste/feel in my mouth that my brain is telling me is like treacle.
I am not sure how many of these i could drink. At 10% im sure i would get pretty wasted in short order, however this Stout has the drinkability of a wine to me. One sip at a time as opposed to big mouthfuls.
Here is my conclusion of this beer. It is a conundrum. It tastes like a stout but is far more complex than your average stout. There are definite Whisky notes and it has a treacle sort of taste and feel. Like a whisky, I think this is a short drink so a little goes a long way.
I would prefer to have a glass of scotch for the whisky notes and a good roasted barley type stout like O' Haras but on certain occasions it might be nice to break out a brewdog.
It is an excellent stout, just not something i could drink a lot of myself.
Deuchars IPA is the second of the Caledonian Brewery beers I got. I honestly have trouble telling this apart from the Caledonian 80 i had last night. My first and only gripe about this beer is that as an IPA I would expect it to be a strong beer but this is only an average 4.4%. This means the beer is a bit like a light beer in the IPA market. It is not as strong as other IPA's. Having said that, I thoroughly enjoyed this beer. I love a hoppy brew and this did not disappoint me. I might not actively seek this out again but it is something i will certainly consider trying again. Next time I will try the Caledonian 80 & Deuchars IPA side by side.
Schöfferhofer Hefeweizen is the next beer beer. There is a website but it seems to be in German only and I can not read German. This bottle conditioned wheat beer is an excellent one in my oppinion. It is sharper, more citrusy and stronger tasting than the Franziskaner & Paulaner I recently had. In fact I had a Franziskaner just before the Schofferhofer.
This is well worth checking out. I have read that you can get it cheap at Aldi so I will have to take a look some time.
I've only had Paradox once, thanks to Mr BeerNut, and I thought it was beautiful. He'll have to tell me what edition it was, as i was a bit under the influence that evening, and it was well over a year ago. Would kill for another.
ReplyDeleteSchöfferhofer is a bit of a classic I reckon. A classic tasting Weissbier from near Frankfurt, rather than Bavaria, has to be admired! :D
It is Beautiful, that much is certain. A beer to savour, just like a good Whiskey I suppose.
ReplyDeleteSchöfferhofer is the wheat beer which changed my opinion on that particular style of beer. Thankfully it is not too tricky to get it in Prague, although the Primator Weizen is certainly a good substitute.
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