Bo Bristle, from Banagher, Co Offaly are a great little brewery, recently at the ICBCF i'd supped their American Amber Ale, and was hooked. Lovely citrus notes, due to the american hops, and a lovely malty character.
The problem was, up til now it was difficult to acquire the boar. Something which has recently changed, the lads in Bo Bristle informed me that they've got a deal where there will be in Marks and Spencer nationwide. Superb, this means that it should be much easier to get.
At a quaffable 4.5% has a lot of flavour, with a little bit of a dry finish. Get some now, for €2.99 per 500ml bottle, and currently M&S have a 6 for the price of 5 promotion on. Seems to shifting quite well as i've gone into Grafton St, and there is usually only a bottle or two left.
Get the boar, while you can!! Hopefully M&S will pick up the rest of the range, and the soon to be debuted Pilsner, and Red Ale.
Trim, home to King John's castle, the river Boyne, and Bru Brewery. Also home to The Malt House Pub, which has newly opened the "Sowing Room" in their fantastic attached Off License, The Winehouse.
On Friday the 18th of October, this was officially launched to the public, and Rodney Leonard was kind enough to invite yours truly to the launch night.
The event was showcasing the beers from Bru Brewery (www.brubrewery.ie / @brubrewery), but also we had entertainment, and a beer tasting session presented by Dean McGuinness (@beermessiah) of Premier Beers, you may know him from his regular slot on Movies n Booze with Sean Moncrieff on Newstalk. There was also a great abridged show by Susan Boyle (@miss_susanboyle / www.awinegoosechase.com), who has a fantastic one woman show called "A Wine Goose Chase"
The tasting by Dean brought us through the beers newly installed at the Malt House. From Kona we had long board lager, which i've talked about before, supped many a pint on my recent trip to Florida, Thwaites Wainwright, Red Hook Long Hammer IPA, and Columba. Dean talked to us a little about each brewery and the styles and marketing strategy. We weren't finished yet, there was a treat in store for us. There were cold glasses with Vanilla Haagen Daaz Ice Cream which then had Timmermans Strawberry Lambic poured over the top, an adult milk shake and it was delish. To cap it all off we'd a sup of the champagne style beer, Deus. Personally i didn't like the Deus, i've always preferred 3 monts.
All in all it was a great evening and the local Trim crowd were definitely piling in on the Bru beers, the lager was flying out. So much so that there was a resupply run done during the evening.
The next day Paddy from Bru had invited me along to a brewery tour he was doing with Rodney and some of the pub customers, who were going to the Kilbeggan Distillery for a tour. It was great to see the set up of Bru, and to hear where they are hoping to go.
Major Kudos to the lads who undoubtedly had a few the night before and still were there despite some sore heads.
Also the range of beers in The Winehouse is really spectacular. Definitely the best i've seen in Meath so far. Mrs Irishbeersnob summed it up best, when walking into the Sowing Room. It felt like a kid walking into a sweet shop. Well Done. Best of Luck with it, and from talking to Rodney yesterday, its quite clear that customers will support this venture, and are coming from all over, i'll be more than happy to pop over from Navan.
Meath, the Royal County as it is affectionately known the world over. Home of such historical sites such as The Hill of Tara, Newgrange, and The Battle of the Boyne site. But something is stirring. The craft beer revolution that is booming along in Dublin is slowly reaching out to its neighbouring county.
Like anything progress can seem initially slow, but once we have the spark i'd expect to see it lift off like a rocket. In Navan the main town in Meath the pub at the forefront at the moment is The Central. A multifloored, multiroomed bar located on Trimgate Street. They offer a wide food offering and have regular events such as a monthly comedy night and other events. However it was the craft beer tasting that piqued my interest. The team at the Central are loyal to local producers and use them as much as possible.
Having met Paddy and Daire of Bru Brewery recently at the ICBCF in the RDS Dublin and subsequently got to know the lads a bit better and thoroughly enjoying their beers, particularly the Rua. I was going down to see how they'd got on since their successful launch in the RDS, where up with Amber Ella the Rua was one of the most talked about Beers of the Festival. Also in attendance was John from Premier Beers, who was going through the tasting on a range of the bottled craft on offer in the Central.
€10 was the cost per head, but this included samples of the three Bru Brewery beers, and samples of the range from premier which included Thwaites, Donegal Blonde, and Moorhouses beers. More on those later.
But debuting on the night was the Bru Lager, which poured in my opinion a lovely amber colour very similar to Brooklyn lager, however from talking to Paddy the next batch will more than likely be lighter on the colour scale as customers were double checking they'd ordered a lager. The flavour was very nice, and very quaffable, ABV of 4.2%. We were sat with a few total novices, and I must say the feedback I could hear on the three beers was all very positive. I know Paddy & Daire have had a couple of teething issues, but this is to be expected. The quality of the product stands up to scrutiny well. If the lads continue on this vain i'm sure it won't be long before more local publicans will be looking to get on board.
John talked us through the offerings from Premier. Premier are renowned for importing all sorts from world wide, but they have started to do Donegal Blonde and I believer its flying out. Personally its a middle of the road for me, but I'd say it does well as its not too powerful one direction or the other. The stuff from Thwaites, from Yorkshire UK was good. The very successful Wainwright was very quaffable, but the IPA was a bit of a let down. Biggest surprise of the night for me was the Black Cat from Moorhouses, a sub 4% dark ruby ale, it comes in at 3.4% but was full of flavour, coffee notes.
There was a good crowd in sampling on the night and the little sausage sliders with charcuterie and cheese were lovely - hopefully the lads continue to push Bru as its only made down the road, literally, only 8 miles away. I'll introduce myself to the lads there formally when they are less busy. Also in my Beoir capacity i've to give them their "Irish Craft Beer on Sale Here" sticker.
This is part 1 of my review of the week gone by. I'll be putting up more later about what else i got up to
Well renowned American Brewers, Founders have finally hit our shores, being distributed by Grand Cru Beers. I actually stumbled on their All Day IPA Session Ale in my local O'Briens who have been steadily increasing their craft beer offering with many types and nationalities represented.
Recently there was a meet the brewer event in Against the Grain sadly it conflicted with other plans. But I believe a great night was had by all, and apparently the brewer is originally from Drogheda was back on holiday - working holidays eh.
Reasonably priced too in around the €3 mark. At 4.7% its very sessionable compared to the average IPA coming across the Atlantic. However carries a bit more punch than say Dead Pony Club.
It has a nice fresh aroma, pours a lovely amber colour with a nice rich head. The familiar citrus aromas of grapefruit and lemon were there and a nice feeling as it went down.
Its a very nice session IPA, and its a lot less severe than others i've tried, i'm looking forward to trying more of the range over the next while, as it appears we now have a steady supply coming to our shores.
