Siren call

There are more Siren beers coming into Dublin than I can keep up with, a phenomenon which delights me. The importer is also the management of The Beer Market so that's where I've encountered most of them, including...

Siren and Omnipollo Life's a Peach, a 6.4% ABV IPA which tastes like the union of a marijuana bud and a pineapple: heavy and resinous in texture and flavour, but with a breezy tropical fruit zing bursting out of the oils. It delivers a lovely fresh hop sensation which coats the palate without getting too sticky or cloying and without any trace of bitterness or harsh acidity. Added lactose and peaches? Who cares? This is just a pure quality IPA with no perceptible extra weirdness.

Sticking with the orangey IPAs, Dippy & The Equinox is a double IPA Siren produced with the help of Oregon brewery Boneyard. It presents dense and opaque, and innocently pale. However, it explodes violently on the palate, shedding a napalm bitterness that shocks at first and fades only gradually. The flavour it brings with it is a beautiful but deadly mix of gunpowder and mandarins. The fruit doesn't last quite as long as I'd like it to, getting replaced by a rather harsh waxyness after a short while. Overall, though, a beautifully constructed complex hop powerhouse.

With this sort of hit rate there just had to be a failure, and it came in the form of Liquid Monstrous, a beefed up version of Siren's rather tasty red IPA Liquid Mistress. Its appearance did it no favours at all: a very muddy red-brown. The aroma started well, with zingy orange sherbet, but it was no surprise to get a waft of mucky yeast sludge with that as well. It doesn't taste yeasty, mind, though there was a definite gritty quality in the texture. Instead it's hot and sharply bitter, big hops being part of that, but there's also a coffee-like bitterness from, I assume, the dark malts. Cherry fruit flavours lighten it only slightly, but it wasn't enjoyable drinking and lacked the usual bright and clear flavours I've come to expect from Siren beers, even the hazy ones.

We switch over to The Porterhouse next. Calypso showed up as their €4 bottled special a while back and that was enough to draw me in to try it. This is a 4% ABV Berliner weisse, dry-hopped with varieties that vary from batch to batch. Code G377 tells me I got one with Mosaic. It poured clearer than I expected, with just a slight haze through the gold. The head dissipates quickly, the millpond surface giving off enticing aromas of lemon sherbet, dank resins and the promise of a puckering sourness too. The sour leaps to the front of the queue on tasting, a big smack of tangy vinegar. But in proper Berliner weisse fashion it fades very quickly. First in behind it is a crisp and grainy, wheaty effect of the sort that predominates in Berliner Kindl's weisse. The hops don't do much here, adding little more than a whiff of urinal cake to the finish, but they don't get in the way. This hits exactly the refreshment points that a beer like this is supposed to and is, I would say, capable of resetting even the most jaded of mid-session palates.

And home again for the last one: Bones of a Sailor Part III. This is a 9.5% ABV imperial porter brewed with vanilla, raspberries and cacao and then aged in Pedro Ximinéz barrels. That's a lot to put on a label but the flavour does a great job of reminding you about all of it as soon as the dense black liquid goes in your mouth. The raspberries are first: an unmistakeable fruity tartness that shouldn't really be so obvious in a strong dark beer, but like that raspberry imperial stout Thornbridge did, it's very very present here. Pedro Ximinéz is so fashionable for beer ageing these days that I bought a bottle of the dark sherry when I was last in Spain to find out what it is. And as well as looking like it, this beer really tastes of it too, all sweetly tannic like plump boozy raisins. Vanilla and dark chocolate are present -- but only just -- underneath this, and I guess they're flavours you'd expect to find in an unadulterated oak-aged porter anyway. There's a smoky roast quality too, just in case you weren't sure that this busy concoction started life as a real beer. Though quite sticky, it's buoyed up by a busy prickle that helps with the drinkability. I was expecting a heavy and rich beer entirely unsuited to the sunny afternoon on which I drank it but the raspberry acid cuts through all that and gave me a powerhouse porter that's also really rather refreshing.

Liquid Monstrous notwithstanding, I'm in no rush to change my current high opinion of this brewery.

Arch rivals

You're not a proper London brewery if you don't have a railway arch, though what you do with it apart from brew beer is entirely up to you. I was in town for a weekend last month and visited three of the several dozen breweries now operating there.

Saturdays at the Kernel has been a regular fixture on the London beer calendar for a couple of years now and this was my first visit. Evin and his crew roll up the shutters, set out the tables and hook up the beer lines before inviting the punters in. You can buy bottles to take away at the entrance or go round the corner to sample from the selection on site.

My attention was first drawn to Kernel's Table Beer as I've heard much about it, all good. "Is this the same version that's listed on RateBeer?" asked the chap in front of me. I winced slightly. The cheery Kernelite at the taps informed him that this was version 14, and that he wasn't in a position to comment on what was listed on RateBeer. It's 2.9% ABV and is a dark and hazy orange amber. I confess I wasn't a fan: there's a dank hit at the top of the flavour, turning suddenly bitter for a quick finish. The low alcohol hasn't been compensated for very well and the texture was quite watery as a result. Maybe versions 1 through 13 had more going for them, but this didn't do it for me at all.

With the little hand only just hitting 10am, low alcohol was definitely the way to keep going, and so to London Sour, a 3% ABV Berliner weisse. This is much more my cup of whatever: a sweet-sour malt vinegar tang kicks it off with a bang and the aftermath is a smooth graininess without any of the musty wheat flavours I associate with Berliner Kindl's archetype of the style. Perfect refreshment and I'd love to have been quaffing buckets of it.

Wary of the weird stuff, Madame sent me to the bar to get her "something hoppy", adding "hops I like!" as I walked off. Obviously I ignored that and got her hops I like instead: Citra Galaxy Pale Ale. I've been a little let down by Kernel's pale ales in the past, I guess because I'm not much of a hop head as these things go, but this 5.1% ABV beer is a stunner. Bitter, yes, but tempered by that utterly fresh orange juice effect you get from Galaxy. There's a gorgeous sherbet sparkle to it as well, as if it wasn't charming enough already.

The follow-up was the Export Stout, and I never have any qualms about dark beer from Kernel. 6.1% ABV and I can say little more than it's the Platonic ideal of stout: a silky texture, dark chocolate balanced with fresh roasted coffee and a slight hint of metallic molasses to lend it an edge. A magnificent send-off as we headed, David-Banner-like, along the railway tracks of Bermondsey to the next archéd brewery.

Not too far, thankfully: Partizan is only a few minutes away and a rather more modest set-up, occupying a single arch and utilising Kernel's cast-off brewkit. It's all bottles here, and the hospitality does not yet run to things to sit on, or places to set your beer, but the welcome was warm and the beer wasn't.

Partizan Pale Ale is (was? they seem like the kind of people to change these things often) 5.5% ABV and single hopped with Dr. Rudi. There's an appropriately antipodean eucalyptus aroma though the flavour has more of a boiled sweets and and orange cordial thing going on. It's remarkably weighty for its strength too. Their IPA is a darker orange colour and at 6.8% ABV rather hotter. There's still a pleasant zest to it, however, keeping it perfectly refreshing on a warm summer's morning. Partizan Stout is thick and very roasty with lots of caramel and a healthy portion of bitter veg from the hops. I nearly missed this one but was glad I tried it.

What Partizan seem to be building a reputation for, however, is saisons and they had a few of these on offer. The Sage Grisette took my fancy in particular. It's not fully hopless, though there's not much sign of them in the taste of the 3.8%-er. Not a whole lot of sage either, if I'm honest, the flavour being quite simple and grainy. The sour lambicky aroma is another promise on which the beer doesn't quite deliver. There's much better fun to be had with the Citrus (not Citra!) Grisette, taking its name from the inclusion of oranges and lemons in the recipe. The aroma is a weird mix of barnyard funk and ripe fruit. Lots of fizz gave my palate a much-needed scrub before introducing a flavour which mixes the lurid orangeades of my childhood with the exotic yet mundane smells from the medicine cabinet. A fascinating combination.

Ramping the ABV up to 7.4% we have Mosaic, a saison which hides its strength expertly. It's much sweeter than I'd expect, knowing the voraciousness of saison yeast, with even more herbs-and-orange than the foregoing and a very powerful hop burn sitting right in the middle.

I was sad when I realised we'd got to the end of the menu. Partizan are definitely a brewery to watch out for, especially when you're close to the source.

The other arch we visited was quite a different experience. Camden Town Brewery is actually much closer to Kentish Town, and more or less physically attached to Kentish Town West Overground station. We called up on a balmy Friday evening, expecting the place to be jammed but there was plenty of space, inside at least. The set-up is pretty plush for an arch, especially compared to the other two: a glass entranceway rather than a roller shutter, white ceramic tiles instead of bare brick and a big-screen TV instead of malt sacks. The brewing equipment is presumably somewhere out the back but it wasn't on show: the place could have been just another trendy urban hangout.

The beer selection ran heavily to lager but I had no objections, given the weather. Unfiltered Camden Hells is remarkably clear, all things considered. As a helles it's absolutely bang-on: smooth and quaffable with just a mild hint of green apple in the finish which I'm content to regard as a fun quirk rather than a flaw. Its American-hopped sibling is USA Hells which achieves pretty much the same effect but with an added dusting of delicious grape and peach flavours. Perfect quenchers the both of them.

Our one for the road was Versus, a 7% ABV Baltic porter. Lots of roast in the aroma here and a true-to-style weighty texture, hiding its alcohol behind pipe smoke and liquorice. Deliciously old-fashioned, which I'm sure is not something the brewery was aiming for. From the fridge I took a bottle of Byron home with me, a session pale ale produced by Camden for the hamburger chain of the same name. It's not terribly interesting: medium gold with a mild hop aroma, sharply bitter and rather metallic with just some half-hearted toffee for balance. A long way from the quality of the other offerings.

London: go for the breweries and don't bother with the burgers.

From Prussia with love

It's all going to get a bit German on this blog for the next fortnight. Berlin had been on my must-visit list for far too long, and while beer wasn't top of my priorities as a first-time tourist, the city does have quite a number of brewpubs plus a unique local beer speciality. And our visit, earlier this month, just happened to coincide with the three-day Berlin Beer Festival, so beer did creep in here and there between the museums and palaces and historical sites. Funny how that keeps happening...

That local speciality is, of course, Berliner weisse, of which Berliner Kindl Weisse is the only surviving example from a mainstream Berlin brewery. It's a sour wheat beer almost always flavoured with woodruff or raspberry syrup to take the edge off. Having tried both of these previously I was determined to hunt out the naked original version. I found what I was looking for a couple of days into the trip, at Alkopole in Alexanderplatz station. It's one of a chain of beer specialists and they boast that they blend their own flavourings for Berliner weisse. I took this to imply that the unadulterated form was also available though it took a few rounds of "Öhne schuss." "Öhne schuss?" "Ja, öhne schuss" before the waitress finally threw her eyes heavenward and scuttled off to get me some.


It arrived in the customary goblet, though strangely headless: perhaps that's another function of the syrup. A pale gold colour and only slightly hazy, it exudes a grainy lagerish aroma. And on tasting it's surprisingly plain and dry more than full-on sour. Only a little vinegary tang on the finish hints at the lactic bacterial jamboree involved in the fermentation process.

All in all it was a bit of an anti-climax. But that's it done and I can rest easy knowing that if this beer goes the way of so many local German specialities at least I gave it a try. My recommendation is still to go for the green woodruff version if you see it.

Aside from the weisse, Berliner Kindl brews some more orthodox stuff. Their summer seasonal was a dark one called Märkischer Landmann Schwarzbier: a dark red affair with some lovely caramel on the nose and a touch of molasses, but also quite smooth and dry making it eminently sinkable. Of course there's a standard pils too which one sees all over Berlin, competing tightly against the rival Berliner Pilsner. This is a pure north-German style pils, gold with almost a greenish hue and a pungent waxy bitterness, finishing on heady grass notes. After a hot afternoon's schlep around the Museum Island it's a perfect refresher.

So much for the macros: we've got  brewpubs to hit. Starting at the everso touristy Georg-Bräu by the banks of the Spree in the city centre. I have a bit of a soft spot for this place, just because it was sunny when we visited, and it served us the first beer of the day.

Georg-Pils Hell was a hazy orange affair with madly low carbonation: little more than a gentle effervesence. There's a vague sort of herbiness in the flavour, but really it's a conversation beer meant for unfussy quaffing, which is what I did. Herself was on Georg-Pils Dunkel, a name to give the style purists white knuckles. This was bizarrely pale for something claiming to be dark, more of an orange-amber and only a few notches down the colour chart from the Hell. Low fizz again and this time a bit more depth to the flavour, showing some nice sweet fruit in the middle, and just a little waft of mown grass at the end.

We head back to the vicinity of bustling Alexanderplatz for the next one. Bräuhaus Mitte has a touch of '50s futurism about it, wedged into an upstairs corner of a rather unglamourous boxy shopping mall.

There were four beers on the go: Mitte Pils is a pale gold with a fast-disappearing head. It's very heavy work with lots of sugary golden syrup. Mitte Dunkel is more by-the-numbers: lots of milk chocolate in both the flavour and aroma. Only the paleness of its brown colour marking it out as any way unusual. These Berlin brewpubs seem a little afraid of the dark maltsacks. Mitte Weiss was pleasantly odd: a heady perfumed aroma and a flavour that spoke more of sweet pineapples than clove or banana. Finally the seasonal was a Zwickel. Relatively clear for this format and an attractive shade of dark gold. The flavour was very odd indeed: a sickly cakey cinnamon spice thing. Yeast playing silly buggers, I suppose.

For all that the beers at Mitte are a mixed bag it's a nice place to hang out if you get a seat on the terrace. Chatty staff and pork chops the size of housebricks make for ample compensation.

Lastly for this post we nip around the corner to Marcus Bräu, a poky little rustic tavern full of bric-à-brac. The old reliable pils and dunkel were all the menu offered. Marcus-Bräu Pils is an alarmingly wan watery yellow, looking for all the world like some class of weak lemon drink. Yet it's surprisingly heavily textured with lots of syrup and some bready, biscuity weight. A tiny citric hit on the finish is the only intimation of hopping it offers. The Dunkel, for once, is properly dark and red-brown. Aromas of coffee and caramel drift off the surface of the stickily textured beer while the flavour packs in brown sugar laced with old world spices: cloves and nutmeg. Definitely a cut above the dunkels we've seen so far.

On Wednesday we take a wander out of the city centre in search of yet more micros.

Take me up to Pinkus

Last Saturday I took a morning train out of Cologne northwards to the medieval university town of Münster which, for the last two years has been home to my former neighbour and fellow blogger Barry.

Yeah, Münster has, like, history and stuff, and Barry showed us some churches and a town hall famous for its signed peas or something, but then it was time for the main dish: Pinkus Müller. The last brewery making Münster's distinctive style of blonde altbier -- and indeed the last brewery in the city -- Pinkus Müller is conveniently situated near the centre of town on a large street-corner plot. The room we settled in was a very cosy and poky one, with wooden beams, delft tiles in the fireplace, lots of kitcheny nick-nacks and the watchful eye of our matronly hostess.

I started with the Jubilate, a light-bodied and only slightly sweet winter beer which manages to balance warmth and drinkability rather well. I followed this with the enigmatic Classic made, apparently, from "historical barley" -- what that means is anyone's guess. The beer is a very light and thin cloudy affair with a bit of orange flavour to it, but otherwise not terribly interesting. Last of the new ones was Müller's Lagerbier, which manages to break all the rules of what one might expect from such a label. It's cloudy, for one thing with a candy-apple nose and lots of fruity flavours, finishing with just a touch of honey. Very unusual and rather tasty. Naturally, I couldn't leave without a token Pinkus Original Münstersch Alt -- full of sour bitter spiky complexity yet super-quaffable. My full review is here, and I think half-litres are definitely the way to go with this, rather than messing about with 25cl glasses as we were.

Next stop was a couple of doors up to a fun little pub called Das Blaue Haus where there was Berliner Kindl Weisse on the menu. Having loved the green one, I went red this time. Berliner Kindl Weisse Rot is nowhere near as good: there's no space for the sourness to shine through and it just ends up tasting of raspberry syrup and nothing else. Lesson learned.

Dinner was out in the harbour area. Münster has taken an odd approach to its docklands redevelopment scheme, lining one side of the Dortmund-Ems canal with swish apartments and fancy bars, while presenting them with a view of unreconstructed industrialism on the other side, where a power station belches smoke and barges ply their trade. Strange. Anyway, we ate in Wolters where the food was good and hearty, and the beer was draught Duckstein. Plain old standard Duckstein is a lot more interesting than I'd expected, a dark beer with a delicate complex flavour including floral perfume, burnt caramel and a sweet rum-soaked raisin warmth.

And if that wasn't surprising enough, there's also a Duckstein Weizen: also on the browner end of the spectrum and with that caramel and rasins thing going on too. The banana flavours are relatively muted, and the finish is just a little too sudden. But it's definitely different and worth a go if you see it. To Barry's knowledge it's only sold at Wolter's.

Having found Münster's jolly English theme pub The James closed (sure who wants a drink on a Saturday night?) there was just time for a swift Frankenheim Alt before the train back south to Cologne. Thanks for a fun day out, Bar.

Dam'd if you do

We arrived in Amsterdam early yesterday evening and, having checked in at our lodgings, made a straight for In De Wildeman, a legendary beer pub and just a couple of streets away. We settled in the redundant non-smoking room (all Dutch pubs are entirely smoke free since last month) among the very mid-twentieth-century green painted wood.

A quick scan of the menu, the specials board, and the taps and my first order was a Yeti, the 9.2% ABV imperial stout from Colorado's Great Divide brewery. In typically Dutch style, 25cl was poured quickly into a glass leaving a huge expanse of dark brown head. The aroma sings of big American hops conspiring with dark smoky malts, all begging to be tasted. The flavour doesn't disappoint, with the hops sitting right at the front and then followed by a big long sweet dark crème caramel finish. The mouthfeel is incredibly thick with only the fainest hint of sparkle. The whole sensation is one of rapid see-sawing between big American hops and dark stouty malt, and one I enjoyed hugely.

Meanwhile, Mrs Beer Nut also started with an American: Left Hand's Juju Ginger Ale. It's an uninspiring and rather watery affair without much going on, either flavour- or aroma-wise.

So, what do I follow my powerhouse American imperial stout with? There was really only one thing for it...

Berliner Kindl Weisse Grün, is the version of Berlin's trademark wheat beer flavoured with a dash of woodruff syrup. I loved this beer from the start. It instantly hit the part of my brain that enjoys Faro and similar light sweet-sour Belgian fizz. It's sweet, light and (for me) inhalable. The sour/dry smack on top of the syrup makes it extremely moreish: I could lash through gallons of this 3%-er without even thinking about it. I'm only on my second beer and I think I've made the discovery of the trip.

Mrs Beer Nut decided to go Dutch and went for a Natte from local brewery 't IJ. Except I don't think that's what arrived. I was expecting a brown dubbel, but instead got a distinctly orange and cloudy beer with a gunpowder spice nose and a whole green-grocer's full of raw crunchy vegetal bitterness, moderated only slightly with a black pepper sharpness. I'm fairly sure they brought her the tripel Zatte instead. Either way, it was bloody good.

And with that we were off into the night to forage for some food after which we brought the day to a close. This morning we left bright and early for Alkmaar to see its legendary cheese market (jealous?) and the wonderfully quirky beer museum. Down the stairs and there's a pub at canal-level.

I continued the Dutch theme with another 't IJ beer: Columbus. This is a powerfully earthy opaque orange beer with more than a touch of Brettanomyces about it. The aroma is super-sour and the flavour includes the faintest wisp of orange pith under big heavy damp horse blankets. Meanwhile, Mrs Beer Nut wanted something light and refreshing, it being a warm sunny day (a what?!) and all. Randomly I suggested Wittekerke Rosé, and perhaps I shouldn't have. I rather liked it: it's 10% raspberry juice and tastes it, with just a bit of wheaty fluffiness underneath. Herself wasn't so keen, but them's the breaks when you let men choose your beer for you.

Second round, I stayed with 't IJ again and had a Struis -- another orangey-brown gunpowder-laden spicy ale. There's a touch of mango and passionfruit before the lees go in, and this is accentuated and added to with the gunk in: more gunpowder and a nice snappy hoppiness. A complex sipper that's end-to-end enjoyable.

Mrs Beer Nut indulged her bock habit, slumming it with Brand Imperator, a pale amber one from one of the Netherlands' nastier big industrial breweries. As expected it's quite an easy-going beer, light on the caramel and replacing it with a breezy fruitiness, making it a sunny afternoon sort of bock, which was just as well.

We spent the rest of the afternoon dawdling through Alkmaar, and got the train back to Amsterdam. 24 hours into the trip and already well ahead in the beer stakes.