BrewDog Glasgow

Finally had a proper, adventurous and flavour-filled craft beer experience in Scotland - we visited the BrewDog pub in Glasgow.  BrewDog is brewed further North, but they now own a handful of their own pubs in both Scotland and England, so that you have a good setting (with very knowledgeable and passionate staff) in which to sample BrewDog's wares.

To this point I hadn't sampled much BrewDog beer, primarily because it's quite expensive in Vancouver, and there are thankfully plenty of good options in the lower mainland's well-stocked private stores.  I wasn't sure what I would think - were the punk theme and the extreme beers a gimmick, or would I encounter some great craft beer?  Definitely the latter.  On the surface, I'd call them a newer, smaller, Scottish Stone Brewing - the rhetoric and attitude are similar.

They had a nice tap list of their own beer to choose from, as well as a couple of guest taps and a huge bottle list featuring many well-known names in aggressive/exotic craft beer.  (But no Canadian bottles that I could see.)

Let the games begin!

We managed to sample everything on the chalkboard except the 5AM Saint, and only had a taste of the Chris from Stone Stout.

The pub is cozy and comfortable despite being utilitarian.  And it provides board games to play in addition to a nice library of classic beer/brewing books to browse.

We even got to hear some live hipster rock-a-billy music - which is apparently the correct soundtrack for chess.

The quick and dirty run-down:

• Barrel Aged 7.7 Lager: apparently aged in FRESH oak barrels.  I expected to be run over by sappy, green oak flavours, but this was spot-on - gentle woodsy/honey flavours instead.
• Punk IPA: delicious, big but not overweight.  I had two full pints as palette cleansers between other beers.
• Zeitgeist: a very nice schwarzbier, richer than usual
• Libertine Black Ale: a Cascadian Dark Ale made with 100% Simcoe hops. I've really missed Simcoe on this trip (it caused flashbacks featuring Red Racer IPA) so I enjoyed this beer, even though there was a surprising lack of roasty/chocolately malt flavours.  It was a hop showcase; ironically tasted much like a pale ale.
• Chris from Stone's Stout: a collaboration beer, a strong sweet & roasty stout.  Great stuff - until you taste the Paradox Jura.
• Hardcore IPA: a remarkably drinkable and not-overly-sweet Imperial IPA.  (Maybe a "Double IPA"?)
• Paradox Jura: the star of the evening, hands down.  This was a massive, very sweet but very roasty and well-balanced stout, aged in Jura scotch whisky barrels.  The barrels imparted a firm smokey, peaty character that married perfectly with the beer.  Simply sublime.  Like drinking a fine port... um... er... with a peat cigar?  (Terrible analogy and totally incorrect, my apologies.)  Why do so many North American brewers continue to wood-age stouts almost exclusively in bourbon barrels?  (Availability? Trend?)  All too often the bourbon barrel flavours do not marry well with the beer, and they go beyond adding some vanilla and caramel, creating sappy, woody flavours that are terribly out of place.  The soft, smokey, peaty scotch flavours in this beer were amazing.
• Tactical Nuclear Penguin: my vote for best beer name ever.  You'd be excused for thinking this was a gimmick beer, given that they ice distill a stout until it reaches 32% ABV.  But I thought it was a complex, interesting beverage when served in a snifter (1 oz) and slowly sipped. 
• Sink The Bismark: similar to the Penguin, but this one is made by ice distilling a double IPA until it reaches 42% ABV.  Still interesting, but a bit of a miss for me.  I think something this strong needs the complexity of concentrated malt and/or yeast flavours, but the distillation process makes this beer overwhelmingly bitter, which kind of stuns your palette.  If you're a fan of big, hoppy IPAs, it's worth trying an ounce since it's pretty much the furthest you can conceivably push an Imperial IPA.

First up: Libertine Black Ale and Barrel Aged 7.7 Lager

I heartily endorse this Jura barrel-aged stout

Extreme closeup of Tactical Nuclear Penguin.  Nice Legs.

Closeup of Sink The Bismark.  Seems innocent enough.

I would say you can't leave Scotland without a visit to a Brewdog venue.  Especially if, like me, your next stop is Turkey or some other equally-devoid-of-craft-beer destination.  (Must hold on... until... judging the... National Homebrewers Competition... in June... ack...)

Oban, Beer and Breweries

We decided last-minute to hit Scotland in our travels, and semi-randomly picked Oban as a destination since I knew there was a distillery there and it was the last stop on a branch of the scenic West Highland Railway.

I hadn't really thought much about beer in Scotland, other than the fact I could finally try a lighter Scottish ale on tap (which I did at the bar below our room: a McEwan's 70/-).

Then during one of my regular trips to Tesco, I discovered some interesting Scottish craft beer.  Who knew?  I suppose I should have.

Now what goes best with the neeps and tatties?

OK, the Caledonian might not be "craft", but it was good, a classic.  That is, until I tried the Black Isle Organic Red Kite Ale - slightly hoppier, but a definite step up in flavour and balance; it was the standout.  The Dark Island - from the Orkney Islands - was also a winner, with a nice smokiness from barrel aging.  The Island of Arran Sunset was the most local, being brewed on Arran Island a wee bit south of Oban - it was pecuiliarly sweet for a light pale ale, but it worked well & was refreshing.  (Arran Island is in Scotland - not to be confused with the Aran Islands in Ireland.)

And for those of you wishing more craft brewers in the Cascadia/Pacific Northwest region made lower-alcohol beers, this area would be right up your alley - most craft beers are well below 5%, and a Scottish Light (60/-) is one of the lowest-alcohol beers around.  If that still isn't good enough, Tesco can up the ante for you with something like this:

Yep, 2.8% alcohol.  No, I didn't purchase a Mighty Atom.  (Sounds like the name of a 1950s "better living through science" home nuclear reactor kit.)

On a day trip to Ellenbaich (tiny, TINY village near Oban), we ran across this sweet-looking little brewpub, which was unfortunately closed for the exact period of time we were in town.  Drat.

Some locals told us there was actually a brewpub in Oban, that was even bottling its beer and selling it locally.  Oban Bay Brewing is situated in the back room of the Cuan Mor restaurant and bar, which is right around the corner from the distillery in the middle of "downtown" Oban.  We grabbed dinner there on our last night in town & had a few samples.  All were low-alcohol thirst-quenchers, and passable if not mind-blowing.  I thought the 3.9% ABV Kilt Lifter was a zesty summer thirst quencher, though the light touch of hops and the almost complete absence of malt flavours, body and alcohol make calling it an "IPA Ale"[sic] questionable.

The next morning, the head waitress was nice enough to give us a tour as the brewmaster (one of the restaurant owners, self-taught since the last brewmaster left) wasn't in.  This is probably the smallest commercial-production brewery I've seen, apart from the (unbelievably good) Hess nanobrewery in San Diego.  Everything was in one room (except bottling equipment) - wood-covered vessels, malt storage, hop fridge, etc.

The whole brewery

The hot tub... whoops, I mean mash tun

We had aborted our plans for a day trip to the Isle of Mull, which we regretted when we later discovered it is home to Isle of Mull beer.  But it turns out that Oban Bay and Isle of Mull are owned by the same company (Argyll Brewing or some such thing), so we didn't feel too disappointed.

We ran out of time to see another craft brewer in the area, whose bottles appeared in several pubs - Fyne Ales.  They are situated roughly 30 minutes from Oban on a working farm and produce shop that is open to the public, and tours are available.  Apparently they feed their spent grain to their cattle, whose beef you can purchase on-site!

If there's any lesson here, it's that some advanced planning/research is pretty essential if you want to find and gain access to non-mainstream beers/breweries when travelling.  I'm sure I'll return to Scotland (because it's fun and the people are wonderful), and I will have a better knowledge of my craft beer travel options before the next trip.

If you're visiting Oban, I would target Fyne Ales and Arran Island Brewing for local tour/sampling destinations, based on what I've heard/tasted.

In the Land of Real Ale

Well, not quite - but my extended trip has taken me into Northern Ireland, and being part of the UK there's a bit more of a presence of real ale (i.e. on cask) and even, thankfully, craft beer (from smaller, more independent brewers).

I've become a big fan of Marks and Spencer and Tesco since trying to keep costs down on my trip.  Good grocery prices, and lots of food with - wonder of wonders - no added flavourings or preservatives.  But I digress.  Look at what else you can pick up at Tesco!

Whitewater is a new-ish Northern Ireland brewey, and you can often find their beers on tap and in stores.  The Belfast Black was a nice little stout, and the Belfast Ale on cask was a very tasty, fruity bitter.  The McEwans was wonderful - a good Scotch Ale is my favourite solo dessert beer.  And I was fortunate enough to have a wedge of mild stilton handy to have with the Old Peculier old ale, which was pure heaven.

CAMRA's effects are felt all over the UK, including Northern Ireland, and most pubs have at least one cask going at all times.  (Even the cheapo Wetherspoons chain has casks - though when I commented on how nice it was to get a cask beer there, to the woman pouring it for me, she looked confused and said, "It's just a different type of tap handle" - as she pulled the manual cask pump repeatedly and served me beer out of a gooseneck, before moving on to serve Heinekens to other people via a regular tap.  Clearly knowledge of what you're serving is not a prerequisite for working behind the bar there!)

The results of cask beer are mixed, however, and while I respect the tradition, I'm not so certain it's the ultimate in beer delivery.  Many times you hit a cask beer that just isn't that good; the people serving it aren't experts, and frankly I don't know if the breweries do/can do enough to ensure the cask product is tasty by the time it's served.  I find you have to go through a lot of bad-to-mediocre-to-average beer in casks before hitting one that's extra-special.  And I just don't want to drink that much so-so beer.  Fortunately, most places allow you to sample before purchasing a full glass.

Let's face it, casks are old technology.  Modern kegging systems allow you to provide a more predictable, stable product.

Case in point, we got a pint of Hilden Ale (craft brewer near Belfast) and a pint of College Green's Molly's Chocolate Stout (another Hilden brand), both on cask, at The John Hewitt in Belfast.  The Hilden Ale was, well, terrible.  Watery, yeast-stressed, and just not enjoyable - a waste of money.  In contrast, the Molly's stout was sublime - really a wonderful cask-based chocolate stout.  Same brewer, same pub, wildly different results.  Fortunately, craft brewers in BC don't seem to leave quite as much to chance with casks, and while many might not be as authentically produced as a UK cask beer (i.e. already-finished beers with a few extra ingredients and/or yeast added), the results are generally better.

At The John Hewitt, a fellow patron was nice enough to give me her CAMRA Northern Ireland newsletter pamphlet.  It was a nice little booklet, with a couple of articles and some ads.  But I find CAMRA Vancouver's weekly email newsletter is more informative and timely.  And it turns out that CAMRA Northern Ireland only has about 300 members - half as many was CAMRA Vancouver (which is presently around 600+, if I recall correctly).  CAMRA Vancouver might not be as accepted as CAMRA England yet, but they have surpassed CAMRA Northern Ireland in some respects.

We grabbed a meal (upstairs) and a couple of cask beers (downstairs) at The Crown in Belfast.  It's a beautifully decorated Victorian pub, a heritage building with mosaics, doored booths and gaslight - really worth a visit just for the ambience.

Mrs. Hoplog enjoys a cask Whitewater Belfast Ale in our booth

Stained glass, and Lion & Griffin booth guardians

Giving the Crown Ale a shot

Now that's a bar

Back in the day you could ring the bell for booth service, and you could strike you matches on the roughened sign

Real gaslight is still used

Diageo - El Diablo

In case you hadn't heard, award-winning Scottish craft brewer BrewDog just became the victim of seriously shady corporate pressure by a multinational that owns many, many famous alcoholic beverage companies - Diageo.  It appears Diageo outright blackmailed a charity into denying BrewDog an award it had won.

Haven't heard of Diageo?  Well, you've definitely drunk their product.  Here's a list of their strategic brands, which include such beverages as Johnny Walker, Crown Royal, J&B, Bushmills, Smirnoff, Ketel One, Baileys, Captain Morgan,  Jose Cuervo, Tanqueray and Guinness, among many others they own (such as a whole raft of well-known scotches).

I strongly encourage you to read the following two articles, outlining what happened:

http://www.brewdog.com/blog-article/diageo-v-BrewDog
http://www.brewdog.com/blog-article/diageo-screw-brewdog-part-ii

This reflects poorly on Diageo no matter how much damage control, spin or messaging they apply to it.

It should also give one pause, and perhaps the opportunity to consider, "why would I purchase products from this company - especially when equal or better products are available from small, honest, independent producers?"

Personally, I prefer to buy beverages from companies that make products, not those that "manage brands." Take a look around Diageo's website.  I think it reads like a press release from AB InBev.  Or MolsonCoors. Practically no mention of the physical products they create or the ingredients they use - just the "brands" they own, the "experience" and "connections" felt by their customers, and how the brands are "performing."

I think this is an old, tired business model, and people are finally wising up to it.  It's starting to be reflected in the sales and profit figures of the large beverage makers.  They're understandably scared, and instead of changing for the better, they're grasping at straws - straws that can, apparently, for certain beverage makers, include blackmail.

So learning of this kind of inexcusable behaviour is simply the last straw on the camel's back for me.

I'm considering a boycott.  Maybe you will too.

Irish Beer Options

It's a bit alarming and unfortunate how many people (tourists slightly more than locals) drink non-Irish mass-market beer in Ireland.  And if you're a more adventurous tourist, you're probably sticking to Guinness, maybe Harp.

However, while I don't exactly have great intelligence on Irish craft breweries, I still managed to find a couple of nice alternatives to the usual, almost by chance.

Porterhouse

Right on the edge of Temple Bar in Dublin is the main location of the Porterhouse, which serves its own beers, plus a few guest taps.  They even do North American-style samplers!  We tried their Porter, Oyster Stout (spicy), XX Stout, Irish Red Ale, and Pilsener, all of which were very tasty.  They do several seasonals, and listed a few North American styles as well (which they had run out of).  Definitely worth a visit if you're in town.

Galway Hooker

Galway, on the West coast, also has its own craft brewery, which brews a locally-reknown and lovely pale ale called "Galway Hooker."   Much better fresh on tap than out of a bottle (where you lose the fruity hop character).  They brew other styles for some local pubs in Galway, including what appears to be a kind of dunkelweizen.

Mrs. Hoplog enjoying a fresh Galway Hooker (juvenile humour omitted)

Other Stouts

In my opinion, the top three most popular stouts in Ireland are, in descending order, Guinness (Dublin), Murphy's (Cork, owned by Heineken) and Beamish (Cork).  When I was last in Ireland, my favourite was Beamish (I visited the brewery, poured myself several late morning pints at their tasting room, then went out for a fun lunch with a bunch of Germans I met during the visit).  Beamish is decidedly more hoppy (and, I think, flavourful) than Guinness, which isn't hoppy at all.  Murphy's is between Guinness and Beamish on the hoppiness scale.

You can find Guinness anywhere.  Murphy's and Beamish are common in the South, and much less common in the North.  And you basically can't find Beamish outside of Ireland (though at one point they were trying to push their Red Ale on the European continent).  So for 7 years I have been searching for, and dreaming of, having a Beamish stout, without success.

Yay!

That is, until yesterday!  Hello, lover.  Sweet, refreshing bringer of stouty pleasure.  I grabbed a Beamish stout at a pub in Galway.  And you know, it's still pretty damned good.

Crazy, whipped cream-like head on the Beamish

I'm not convinced I'll randomly run into many more craft beer options in Ireland, but that's OK - the standard fare is pretty good.  I'll sample a couple of Irish Whiskeys if I get bored.  Unfortunately, beer and spirits are more expensive here than in Germany and Belgium (high taxes), which discourages wide-ranging tasting sessions.

Guinness - You Will Be Assimilated

We're in Dublin, and though I managed to avoid it on my previous visit, this time I went to the Guinness Storehouse ("GS") tourist thingy they have at Guinness' factory at St. James' Gate.

(Note: this is the main, original Guinness factory.  Guinness is a big deal here - they practically own Dublin, despite the intense efforts of Budweiser, Coors and Heineken (and to a lesser extent Miller and others) to advertise their way into peoples' drinking glasses - efforts which have met with some success.)

I'm of two minds about the GS.  If you know anything at all about beer and brewing, you're not going to learn a ton from the experience.  In fact, you'll be reminded at every turn of how you just spent a fairly substantial chunk of change to participate in a huge, virtual reality infomercial for Guinness that really amounts to a "marketing re-education/brainwashing" centre; it's designed to make you feel like Guinness is the best thing ever made and that you should spend, spend, spend more money on Guinness.  (Some of it is pretty subtle/artful: for example, they mention how every Guinness stout in the world contains some "special essence" produced by the Dublin factory, which is a pretty way of saying that they produce a wort extract that they ship around the world to other brewers who reconstitute it & brew the Guinness themselves under contract. Guinness says that all North American Guinness stout is brewed at St. James' Gate, Dublin - though they don't say if this means they ship actual tanks/kegs of ready-to-drink Guinness from Ireland to North America, or if uncompleted beer is somehow finished/reconstituted by a local brewer after it leaves Ireland.)

However, if you don't know much about beer and brewing, the GS is a very big, slick operation that gives you a very basic view of the brewing process, with lots of visual candy and some neat architecture.  For example, it's designed around a 7-story-tall atrium shaped like a Guinness pint glass.

To be clear, this isn't a tour of the brewery/factory.  Guinness is a highly secretive operation, like a Molson brewery.  GS is simply a tourist attraction.

Walking to the factory. My those are big, Molson-sized tanks!

Here's Arthur Guinness' original 9000-year lease he signed for the brewery.  They make a huge deal about this - almost as much as the Germans make about the Reinheitsgebot. But to be fair, that's a pretty sweet deal.

Example of the slick presentation - after a field of barley, you get to the water section, which features this nifty waterfall.  They explain how the water comes from the nearby Wicklow moutains to the south, and not from the (not-very-attractive-looking) river Liffey that flows through Dublin.  Then they explain that again.  And again.  Yes, you use potable water, we know!  :-)

The most interesting part of the display to me was the section on Guinness' marketing efforts over the years, which are unique and truly genius.  Like most people, I have a couple of "My Goodness, My Guinness"-labeled items at home.  Above is a vintage Canadian stubby from the display; it was co-produced by Labatts.

 And my favourite - all of the health endorsements published by Guinness over the years.  They also published proper poster-style glossy advertisements featuring quotations by doctors about the benefits of drinking Guinness.  Truly a bygone era.

Part of the Guinness factory, as seen from the top-floor lounge

For your entry charge, you do get a pint and a chance to chill out at the end of the tour.  You can pour your own pint on a lower level (meh), or you can get someone else to pour it at the 360-degree-view top floor lounge, which is what we did.  It does provide the best possible view of the city, short of flying.

Many brewers, distillers and others have similar marketing-based "experiences" like the Guinness Storehouse (e.g. Old Jameson Distillery in Dublin, Heineken Experience in Amsterdam).  If you're new to brewing and beer and/or are willing to pay a few bucks for a nice view and a pint, the GS is for you.  Otherwise, I would skip it & use the money to buy several pints at a cozy pub with some live Irish session music, then take a real (and free) brewery tour at a smaller craft brewery where you're likely to learn & see much more and get to speak with the actual brewers, all without the marketing veneer that comes with big glitzy tours like this.

Brussels and Lambic

We only had a single day in Brussels on our travels, but I had been avoiding lambic and related sour beers up until this point of our trip, knowing that we'd be in the heart of lambic country in Brussels at least long enough for some fresh samples.

The plan was to hit the Cantillon brewery in downtown Brussels for a tour & tasting.  Unfortunately, we didn't account for the fact it was May 1 (May Day) - which is a public holiday in Belgium, unlike in Canada.  It's always May 1, even if it falls on a Tuesday.  So cafes were open, street festivals were on, but everything else was closed.  Including Cantillon!  The horror...

Putting a brave face on our tragic timing

Fortunately, it wasn't that far of a walk to a great Belgian beer bar featuring many (fresh) Cantillon beers: Moeder Lambic (Fontinas location).  Most Belgian beer bars seem to feature a few taps plus a long list of bottles - many of which we get in Vancouver (thanks RainCity Brands!).  Moeder Lambic Fontinas has gone the other direction and focused on taps - 46 in all, including about 6 cask engines.  That's right - fresh lambic/gueuze/etc. from a cask.  Drool.

Um, yes, I think this will do nicely

For those beer nerds who want to break out the magnifying glass, here's the tap list:

Nice bar inside, and all tap lines are limited to about 4m in length (kegs are directly underneath the bar):

One of the advantages of drinking with Mrs. Hoplog is that we get to share beers.  We had:

• Cantillon Mamouche (lambic made with Elderflowers)
• Cantillon Lambic on Cask (unblended, young lambic)
• Cuvee St. Gilloise (dry hopped lambic)
• Cantillon Rose De Gambrinus on Cask (lambic made with raspberries)
• Dupont "Monk's Stout" (stout made with decidedly wild/non-standard yeasts)
• Cuvee De Rank on Cask

Oh, that was worth the wait.

Unblended young lambic on cask, and Mamouche (w/Elderflowers), both by Cantillon

I have to admit, the first smell/taste of the young, unblended Cantillon lambic brought me right back to many beers I've judged in competitions: cheesy old hops and the weedy/vegetable taste of a beer infected with wild bacteria.  These are usually bad things, but I had to set previous notions aside as the whole point of lambics and related styles is that they're produced using only wild yeasts/bacteria.  So that "infected" aroma/flavour is expected, it's not a flaw.  With time and care (and possibly blending) the bacteria will produce a wonderfully complex drink - the vegetable taste will fade, and the bacteria will eat up the cheesy flavours of the aged hops, and woodsy, sour and earthy barnyard flavours will appear.  Really interesting to taste the early stages of that process, and this is one of the few places you can do it.

Elderflowers made for a fine beverage

Mrs. Hoplog's Rose De Gambrinus (cask) was an attention-getter - unbelievable raspberry aroma and flavour.  The freshness was a real advantage for such an aromatic beer.

Cuvee St. Gilloise (dry-hopped sour beer) and Rose De Gambrinus on cask

The standout for me was the Cuvee De Rank on cask.  I had tasted it from bottles, but this was a totally different experience.  Less sour, much more fruity.  White grape juice to begin, then quickly flavours of - no kidding - a nice Reposado margarita appear; and finally a finish of toasty wheat.  Wow.

For dessert later on in the evening, we had a bottle of Lindeman's Grand Cuvee Kriek to finish before the next day's flight, with spoonfuls of cheap Belgian chocolate fondant we picked up at the grocery store. Drool.

Thank you Belgium.  Tomorrow we're off to Dublin, and an entirely different beer culture.