This was my first time at the beer festival as I missed out last year for some reason. Last year I heard great reports but they did not do it justice as this year was jam packed with breweries with the exception of a few, most notably Whitewater which was a pity.
I arrived just before 2pm so there were a few people around but no beer being served as yet, though I am sure I would have been served if I had asked. I waited around till a few more people showed up and I saw some beer moving and I went to our hosts stand to try their new beer called Golden Otter.
Golden Otter came on cask which was perfect as this is an English style bitter. I got some grassy hops and a little caramel on the nose. The taste was interesting as there was a citrus bite and it was quite bitter which was nice as many bitters are not in fact very bitter at all. There was a nice malty sweetness in the background but it was certainly more in the bitter end of the scale rather than sweet or balanced. I enjoyed it a lot as it was not trying to be complicated and was simply a cracking pint of bitter.
Now I will have to apologise here because I forgot my camera. I only had my iphone to take pictures and notes on. I ended up only taking two pictures during the whole festival as I got so caught up in the beer. Thebeernut took a few more so go look at his.
The next beer of note was the White Gypsy blonde which was a very lager like and over carbonated blonde ale. One for lager drinkers for sure. My wife had this and she enjoyed it but preferred her Belfast Blonde.
I then went over to the Galway hooker stand to try their new pilsner. Aidan said it was not ready yet but said when I come back it was on the house. Well out of the corner of my eye was their DunkelWeisse but what was this? A hand pump? Surely the dark wheat is not on cask? Well it was and it was absolutely lovely I thought. The aroma was dried fruit and wheat and the taste was a lovely sour, roasted grains beer packed full of flavour. A little watery perhaps but that would be more down to the cask serving as many cask ales do not have the same body as their kegged counterparts. Anyway I will be on the lookout for more cask dunkel and suggested Aidan send some to The Bull & Castle.
Next it was time to try one of the new breweries. Two newbies were present and both of them started life in our little Irish Craft Brewer community so we were quite proud.
Dungarvan brewing company had a fantastic beer called Helvick Gold. It was very drinkable, generously malty and one I seriously need to try again.
Not as impressive was copper Coast which was a red ale. It was pretty standard and perfectly fine but was just not as interesting as Helvick. Their Blackrock stout never made it though. I was told it will be at the Galway festival in May but I will be in France so will have to keep an eye out for it another time. The good news is that they will be bottling more than kegging so I should be able to pick up more of their beers.
Trouble Brewing were also present but only with one beer. Ór is a pale fruity, lightly hopped ale that is very drinkable. It is easier to drink than Helvick but it is not as flavoursome or interesting. This is a good session or BBQ beer. I look forward to more beer from Thom and co once they get in to the swing of things in the new brewery.
I returned for my free pint of Galway hooker Pilsner. Actually I only wanted and expected a half but Aidan seemed keen to give me a full pint so I accepted. Now I will point out that Aidan himself is not too impressed with his own beer. To him it is "just a lager" and as such "not very interesting". Well on the contrary that was a brilliant biscuity, bitter, refreshing pilsner and reminded me very much of proper Czech pilsners. I gave my wife a taste as she lived in Prague for a year and she gave it the thumbs up. It was somewhat citrus like and I am thinking lemon here. This was one of my favourites not only because it was free (always a bonus) but because it was better than I expected. It was also not as fizzy as some pilsners can be so that was good.
Shortly after we went back to Aidan to present him a first runner up in the beer of 2009 awards as selected by the Irish Craft Brewer community. The award was for their original Galway Hooker Irish Pale Ale which is still one of my favourite beers. It lost first place this year to Carlow's Goods store IPA which is dry hopped and Cask conditioned. We suggested Aidan tries dry hopping Galway hooker. Oh and we got free Galway hooker T-Shirts which I proudly wore the next day.
White Gypsy has an IPA but I found this a little watery and not producing a lot of flavour so I was disappointed but White gypsy is still a pretty new brewery so I am sure it will improve with time.
At the other end of the scale, Cuilan from White Gypsy has brewed a magnificent oak aged imperial stout. It is called Raven and is a blend of two (I think) versions of the oak aged stout. One is a no oak and the other is from a French barrel. For me this was the beer of the festival. It was packed fool of wood and vanilla notes and I savoured this for a while. I loved the sourness in this beer. Cuilan also produced some bottles containing the different barrel aged versions. There was one from the Bushmills barrel, one from the American Oak and the other was French Oak. I think I got to try two of them as I had lost track of time and forgot about the double secret tasting but one of the guys gave me at least two versions to try. Both were fantastic but since they were not officially part of the festival, my favourite was the blend on tap and Raven came out on top for me.
Other beers worth mentioning are from the UCC brewery called Hansel and Gretel. Hansel was a decent fruity lager style beer but Gretel was a lovely German style Weisse that was brewed to perfection and would be at home at Octoberfest. These beers are not commercially available though and as far as I know you can only get them at the Franciscan Well Easterfest.
Barrelhead were there and they had a fantastic Pale ale but I never got a chance to taste it properly as it was the last beer I had before I decided I was finished with beer before I actually became drunk as opposed to nicely buzzed. I will have to look out for it again.
A very pleasant surprise was to see Cúl Dorcha there from Beoir Corca Dhuibhne Kerry. I was pleasantly surprised by this beer at Septemberfest so I was doubly surprised to see he had a second beer this time. Now it was a hand pump as they only use cask to serve but it was a simply hand written label on a white background that said "Easterfest Special" and I was immediately intrigued. This turned out to be like ordinary Cúl Dorcha but was a more pronounced chocolate flavour as well as a sourness that worked very well. They ran out of beer on the first day of Septemberfest last year so for Easterfest they made sure they had enough beer with him.
I was only there for the Saturday but I think that was enough. It would have been nice to go back Sunday and try what I had missed out and get some pictures but I spent Sunday with my friends in Bandon.
I look forward to next year and seeing how it comes along. If Irish craft breweries continue sprouting up there will be no room at The Well soon.
I arrived just before 2pm so there were a few people around but no beer being served as yet, though I am sure I would have been served if I had asked. I waited around till a few more people showed up and I saw some beer moving and I went to our hosts stand to try their new beer called Golden Otter.
Golden Otter came on cask which was perfect as this is an English style bitter. I got some grassy hops and a little caramel on the nose. The taste was interesting as there was a citrus bite and it was quite bitter which was nice as many bitters are not in fact very bitter at all. There was a nice malty sweetness in the background but it was certainly more in the bitter end of the scale rather than sweet or balanced. I enjoyed it a lot as it was not trying to be complicated and was simply a cracking pint of bitter.
Now I will have to apologise here because I forgot my camera. I only had my iphone to take pictures and notes on. I ended up only taking two pictures during the whole festival as I got so caught up in the beer. Thebeernut took a few more so go look at his.
The next beer of note was the White Gypsy blonde which was a very lager like and over carbonated blonde ale. One for lager drinkers for sure. My wife had this and she enjoyed it but preferred her Belfast Blonde.
I then went over to the Galway hooker stand to try their new pilsner. Aidan said it was not ready yet but said when I come back it was on the house. Well out of the corner of my eye was their DunkelWeisse but what was this? A hand pump? Surely the dark wheat is not on cask? Well it was and it was absolutely lovely I thought. The aroma was dried fruit and wheat and the taste was a lovely sour, roasted grains beer packed full of flavour. A little watery perhaps but that would be more down to the cask serving as many cask ales do not have the same body as their kegged counterparts. Anyway I will be on the lookout for more cask dunkel and suggested Aidan send some to The Bull & Castle.
Next it was time to try one of the new breweries. Two newbies were present and both of them started life in our little Irish Craft Brewer community so we were quite proud.
Dungarvan brewing company had a fantastic beer called Helvick Gold. It was very drinkable, generously malty and one I seriously need to try again.
Not as impressive was copper Coast which was a red ale. It was pretty standard and perfectly fine but was just not as interesting as Helvick. Their Blackrock stout never made it though. I was told it will be at the Galway festival in May but I will be in France so will have to keep an eye out for it another time. The good news is that they will be bottling more than kegging so I should be able to pick up more of their beers.
Trouble Brewing were also present but only with one beer. Ór is a pale fruity, lightly hopped ale that is very drinkable. It is easier to drink than Helvick but it is not as flavoursome or interesting. This is a good session or BBQ beer. I look forward to more beer from Thom and co once they get in to the swing of things in the new brewery.
I returned for my free pint of Galway hooker Pilsner. Actually I only wanted and expected a half but Aidan seemed keen to give me a full pint so I accepted. Now I will point out that Aidan himself is not too impressed with his own beer. To him it is "just a lager" and as such "not very interesting". Well on the contrary that was a brilliant biscuity, bitter, refreshing pilsner and reminded me very much of proper Czech pilsners. I gave my wife a taste as she lived in Prague for a year and she gave it the thumbs up. It was somewhat citrus like and I am thinking lemon here. This was one of my favourites not only because it was free (always a bonus) but because it was better than I expected. It was also not as fizzy as some pilsners can be so that was good.
Shortly after we went back to Aidan to present him a first runner up in the beer of 2009 awards as selected by the Irish Craft Brewer community. The award was for their original Galway Hooker Irish Pale Ale which is still one of my favourite beers. It lost first place this year to Carlow's Goods store IPA which is dry hopped and Cask conditioned. We suggested Aidan tries dry hopping Galway hooker. Oh and we got free Galway hooker T-Shirts which I proudly wore the next day.
White Gypsy has an IPA but I found this a little watery and not producing a lot of flavour so I was disappointed but White gypsy is still a pretty new brewery so I am sure it will improve with time.
At the other end of the scale, Cuilan from White Gypsy has brewed a magnificent oak aged imperial stout. It is called Raven and is a blend of two (I think) versions of the oak aged stout. One is a no oak and the other is from a French barrel. For me this was the beer of the festival. It was packed fool of wood and vanilla notes and I savoured this for a while. I loved the sourness in this beer. Cuilan also produced some bottles containing the different barrel aged versions. There was one from the Bushmills barrel, one from the American Oak and the other was French Oak. I think I got to try two of them as I had lost track of time and forgot about the double secret tasting but one of the guys gave me at least two versions to try. Both were fantastic but since they were not officially part of the festival, my favourite was the blend on tap and Raven came out on top for me.
Other beers worth mentioning are from the UCC brewery called Hansel and Gretel. Hansel was a decent fruity lager style beer but Gretel was a lovely German style Weisse that was brewed to perfection and would be at home at Octoberfest. These beers are not commercially available though and as far as I know you can only get them at the Franciscan Well Easterfest.
Barrelhead were there and they had a fantastic Pale ale but I never got a chance to taste it properly as it was the last beer I had before I decided I was finished with beer before I actually became drunk as opposed to nicely buzzed. I will have to look out for it again.
A very pleasant surprise was to see Cúl Dorcha there from Beoir Corca Dhuibhne Kerry. I was pleasantly surprised by this beer at Septemberfest so I was doubly surprised to see he had a second beer this time. Now it was a hand pump as they only use cask to serve but it was a simply hand written label on a white background that said "Easterfest Special" and I was immediately intrigued. This turned out to be like ordinary Cúl Dorcha but was a more pronounced chocolate flavour as well as a sourness that worked very well. They ran out of beer on the first day of Septemberfest last year so for Easterfest they made sure they had enough beer with him.
I was only there for the Saturday but I think that was enough. It would have been nice to go back Sunday and try what I had missed out and get some pictures but I spent Sunday with my friends in Bandon.
I look forward to next year and seeing how it comes along. If Irish craft breweries continue sprouting up there will be no room at The Well soon.
Sounds like a great festival, will make sure to go next year. Any dates for when Dungarvan will be starting to bottle?
ReplyDeleteHi Mark,
ReplyDeleteBottling is under way at the moment. They should be hitting Dublin in early May.
Cormac.
Thanks for the update Cormac.
ReplyDeleteThanks Cormac, look forward to trying them.
ReplyDelete