Belhaven Scottish Ale

As stated before, I'm working behind the bar currently at one of my old favorite haunts, Acadia Cafe at Cedar and Riverside in the West Bank neighborhood here in Minneapolis. As of this moment, there are a mere eight beers on tap that haven't appeared here. (there are 28 lines, with one devoted to a root beer, Lift Bridge currently, one a cider (Four Daughters' Loon Juice) and also a mead (B.Nektar))
I haven't been especially diligent, and some have escaped me since starting. Take for instance Unibroue Noir de Chambly. It was on tap when on my first day, and only ran out last week. I first took notes on a bottle back in 2006. I could have easily had one after a shift one day, snapped a photo and posted those old notes, as I've done again and again. Same thing with Lagunitas Pils, that one slipped past me. There are a few others, also, including a few that I'd need to take new notes for. Well, no more! I'm catching up, starting with Belhaven, which seems to be a constant on the nitro line.

Back in July, 2005, I wrote these notes on the nitro can version of Belhaven Scottish Ale, then commented on my previous feelings on a bottle. Today, I'm having it off a nitro-tap, sharing those 10 year old notes with you:


Some people just adore the cascading effect of the rolling foam in a nitro "draught" pour, tap or can. Doesn't do much for me...I just want to see the damn beer, and get to drinkin' it...buuurp...

this one, when the flashy effect dissolves, is a crimson/amber hue, capped with a thick, creamy head that lasts quite a while...very nice, indeed.

Aroma: coppery, metallic, odd..some hops, a bit of fruity sweetness, malty, but not much too it, beyond the initial impression.

Taste: kind of limp...tastes like fish, no kidding...was is smoked? Very unusual, and not too kind, nothing I enjoy. Smooth on the tongue, but this smoked fish feel never leaves! Weird!
Easy drinking, but to a fault, very minimal character, insipid mouthfeel, lean body...I'm gonna have to keep passing this one by (though I couldn't resist one last chance...)

Halfway, through (it's a 15 ounce can we got here) it's almost passable, but still disappointing.
...
crazy how much I liked the bottle, when I reviewed it over 2 1/2 years ago, but was far from taken by this version!

Nowadays, I realize that, essentially, it is beer, and you can drink it. Nothing wrong with that. 

Belhaven Twisted Thistle India Pale Ale

More re-visitations of Scottish beers, and this one posed a problem. At some point in time, the Belhaven brewery went with clear glass bottles. This one had a skunky nose when I opened it and the lightstruck flaws severely diminished the taste. If this were my first stab at this one, you would not be reading the final sentence of this review from September, 2005:

Clear, pale copper/ gold color. Huge head, defiantly rocky, puffy, thick 1/2 that lasts long.

Brilliantly alert and lively aroma, spanking fresh piney, fruity aroma, not too bitter. Pineapple, apricot, ...a more West Coast-U.S. style aroma than I'd expect from a Scottish brewery. Cascade and Challenger hops. I like it!

Fresh and zesty in the mouth, a nice blast of hops on the palate. Falls back with ease, bitterness wanes, dries as it leaves, urging you to toss back another gulp. 

Medium bodied, with a vibrant, fruity, bitter/dry finish. 

A very tasty IPA, an ingenious mix of U.S. and U.K. takes on the style. For a brew with a tongue-twister of a name, this is amazing easy to love, for a hophead like me, and will easily leap into my must-buy list.

Traquair Jacobite Ale

We're still re-visiting long-ago discovered ales, and we're still looking at Scotland. Here's one brewed in honor of the Jacobite rebellion of 1745 by Traquair House Brewery, which dates back to 1107. Heavy on the coriander, this one. Notes are from June of 2003:


Appearance: dark, eggplant brown color, ruby red 'round the edges, with a head thick and creamy, tan and voluminous.

Aroma:  exquisite! Alert, lively, swimming in spiciness. To drink it in is divine. Deep and complex, and so rewarding in so many ways. Though containing precious little "subtlety", it's like being smacked upside the head with a spice rack.

Tasty. Bitter hops at first, then dark, turbulent malt, and a very complex flavor: what is going on here? It's like drinking spices.

A certain fruitiness arrives around the middle, but I perceive it's only suggested by the spices. In light of full reasoning, it's all about the spices, in Jacobite.
My very first encounter with Jacobite, but I'll be going back for more. A remarkable ale.

I had to delete a lot of exclamation points, once again. Man, I was addicted to those things!

Kelpie Seaweed Ale

I'm going way back in time, April 1, 2003, for a review of another Scottish ale that screams curiosity. I wasn't as thrilled with it this time around. So, check out my old review, and turn it down a notch.


As it is April Fool's Day, I present my review of a beer some would assume to be a practical joke, Heather Ale's Kelpie Seaweed Ale, presented in a handsome and generous 16.9 oz dark bottle.

Aroma spills out of the bottle on cracking the cap, but I hold off from studying it until other aspects are examined. Pours a deep, dark brown, almost black, with a lush, creamy, proud cocoa-colored head that doesn't want to quit.

And that smell? Surprisingly sly snd soft, when lifted to the nose, but virtually indescribable, and utterly unique, but I'll give it a whirl...mossy, briney, vegetal, dark, cocoa, and nuts.

On the palate, very soft and pleasantly smooth. Some slight hops appear, but the thick and flavorful malt is fully in power. More flavors show themselves, more cocoa and nuts, more and more it feels like a very good brown ale. The seaweedy aspect bobs up again and again, but is inoffensive, unobtrusive. Oiliness in the texture, but terrifically smooth, with a nice, tasty finish.

This is their recreation of a historic style, from a time when seaweed brine washed over the barley fields, and infiltrated the flavors of Scottish ales. The label calls it "a rich chocolate ale which has an aroma of fresh seabreeze and a distinctive malty texture." That's about right. Anyone looking for an ale that's all about seaweed (and who are you, again, and why aren't you locked up?) will be disappointed.
I had this with an Ethiopian dish called Raafu, consisting of kale, carrots, potatoes, peppers, herbs, and spices. Went tog

ether well.

Grozet Gooseberry & Wheat Ale

Grozet Gooseberry & Wheat Ale, Ale brewed with Natural Flavors. Brewed and bottled by Heather Ale, Ltd., Williams Bros Brewing Co., Alloa, FK10 1NT Scotland, UK. Best before End: Jan. 2014….oops. Well, let's try it anyway!

a few months isn't much of a difference. Tastes fine. And exactly when I first wrote about it nearly 11 years ago…here come those notes (from July, 2003):

Appearance: hazy, dull yellow color, short, and soon demised white head.

Aroma: sparkling, sprityzy, slightly fruity, a little sour.

Very easy-going, smooth ride over the lips and down the throat, with a decent helping of good wheaten gritty texture. This ale trips very lightly along, and maintains a delicate fruity taste that just seems to float on the tongue.

Light in body, moderately spiced and very mild in flavor. An interesting experiment/recreation, and a nice little beer. Nothing that will blow you away, no, sir, but a nice, mellow brew, more than adequate as a simple dessert or a mellow nightcap.

Orkney Skullsplitter

It's still drizzling. I'm having one more before getting out of here. Going back to bottles, and heading to Scotland for one I know I haven't had in a long time. The Skullsplitter , from the Orkney Brewery, apparently "5000 years in the making.""The Authentic Orcadian Ale."

notes from a bottle, June, 2004:


Clear, bright garnet hue,nearing auburn, with huge carbonation, bubbles all over the place, with a flush head of beige foam that goes down in a flurry of vanishing bubbles.

Aroma, deeply, darkly malty, woody, some spices float about in the nose, caramel, some fruitiness, dark ones, grapes and cherries, a wealth of complexities...

nice taste, caramel leads the flavor, just nearly definable as "rich", but not quite..nay, not quite as full in the mouth as we'd hope, and then the booze kicks in, and it tastes something like a blend of dark rum and cherry brandy. I swear I wasn't drinking officer, well, one teensy little beer, maybe...

Body's a bit medium, finish is, too, doesn't quite maintain a presence on the palate. Overall, a tasty, boozy blend of malt and fruit.
For the sake of my skull, though, I plan to visit this brew at well-spaced intervals.

BrewDog Storm

BrewDog Storm, malt beverage aged in an Islay Scotch Whiskey barrel.
"At BrewDog we are selfish; we only make beers that we want to drink.
This is not an unerring, despondent, half-hearted compromise. This bottle contains our IPA which has been aged in Scottish islet whisky casks.
The combination of Islay whisky casks and New Zealand hops is one of polar opposites on so many levels.
Drinking this beer is like being caught in the eye of a force 12 North Atlantic storm. Heavily peated demonic smoked Islay whisky and the fruity hop flavors of our IPA should not go well together. Nor should mild pretentiousness and exponential cool. However at BrewDog we are pretty sure we can rock it out and make both admirable combinations work reasonably well.
Zeitgeist in a bottle.
Brewed and Bottled by BrewDog Ltd, Fraserburgh, Scotland."

So, I'm giving BrewDog yet another try, and I'm greeted by more gobbledygook. Look at that second sentence, and try to make sense out of it. When do those three things happen at once? "An unerring compromise?" Huh? Whatever.

Let's pop 'er and see.

Pale golden coloration, smallish cloud-white head. Unassuming, yet inviting.

Aroma: Boom! There's that heavy peated malt right off the bat, Flinty, malty, nothing but whisky, nothing found below.

Taste: whisky is still in charge, with no flavors of the IPA tasted yet. Frankly, I don't see the point in drowning out a beer of real character with so much of the islay malt. Perhaps a lighter ale would be best served in this cause. Nonetheless, the smoky peat of Islay dominates everything.

Medium bodied, but a bit of a challenge, if you aren't up for all the smoke and peat. I'm fine with it, but I wish more of the IPA would actually, as promised, rise up to match the whisky. If it's a Storm, it's one that carries away any other flavors than those in the barrel they mixed the IPA with. This is a beer for whisky fanatics only, and as that, it's not bad, maybe even good. I'm on the fence and on the verge of jumping off, based on that promise of a marriage that never came through. It's a beer awash in whisky. Some may like that. Not I.

Stone/ BrewDog Booshwah, I mean, Bashah

Full disclosure: I love the blending of styles, and the breaking of rules, and admire the "punks" of the beer scene. But, if you propose to be doing that, and ending up sending us something rather tried and done, and cover it up with a verbose smokescreen of incomprehensible bullshit, I will call that out. And here is what I wrote when I had a bottle of BrewDog/Stone Bashah, the Scotland/San Diego collaboration, tonight:

Brew Dog Bashah, The Black Belgian Style Double India Pale Ale by BrewDog and Stone Brewing, Product of Scotland.

bashah, what does it mean…oh, god this is wordy, oh, for the love of….a lot of blah, blah, blah, talk of substance, but little of it…is this the work of Stone, or BrewDog? I know the Stone labels to be willfully wordy, flagrantly florid, exaggerated extraneousness….perhaps they influenced the Scots, in this?

Whatever, it's too much for me to copy, and we'll take the bare bones and see what this Black Belgian Double IPA is all about.

It is black, fully ebon in coloration, with a 1/4" slim, but lasting head. Looking good.

Aroma: booze hits first, not surprising, from one of the contenders in the strongest beer olympics, some hit of bourbon, maybe..grassy hops show up, right next to dark fruit. Char and molasses, and I'm wondering why this isn't an Imperial Stout. There's still some bright hoppy character, if you look for it, but more Black than Belgian, and barely IPA…so far…

Taste: anise, at first, then black malt, a bit of chocolate, some rich, roastiness, then the grassy hop flavor reveals itself, a bracing blast of bitterness. No. it's not that big, and it's butting heads against the chocolate malt factor.

Disclaimer: I'm against the Black IPA/ Cascadian Ale, blah, blah, blah, whatever, style, it's an interesting hybrid, a notable experiment, but as a full-blown style, I find it unworthy. Most attempts have been clumsy, with a clash of the primary flavors, hops vs. roasted dark malts. Only a few I've had have been enjoyable, and the rest have been suffered through.

This one, pretty balanced, but doesn't escape that clash, it's still happening, and I find little enjoyment in it. I don't feel this high level of grassy, piney hops matches at all well with dark, roasty malts, and it's …gobbledygook!

Okay, now I want to quote the damn label copy, Check this nonsense out:

"BASHAH: what does it mean? Yes, what indeed does it all mean. Meaning, of course, is elusive and illusive. It can't, or shouldn't be found on this bottle. Should it? Yet, what if it was? Would you look for pearls of wisdom or life direction on a beer label? Perhaps it's been there all along. Since meaning is a mere illusion, perhaps we shouldn't let it have any influence on our destiny. This particular beer has refused to succumb to the illusion of meaning or allow capricious parameters to have any influence on it's own fermented fate. Are we even asking the right questions? Are you feeling frustrated in the emptiness? If so, that could be because someone got to this beer before you, and thus there's a reason for this emptiness. It's empty. And if so, perhaps indeed there is not any meaning for you here after all.

Style over substance, or substance over the scriptures of style? The latter, thank you very much. Twice."

Good God, what hogwash! Not a single word about what the beer tastes like or how it was made, just a load of words, words, words! (And too many uses of "indeed". Use it once, or be a pansy.

I don't turn to a beer label for pearls of wisdom or the meaning of life, but for a something about the fucking beer, for God's sake, is that so much to ask for? I'm not searching for "meaning", just tell me about the f'ing beer, already!

No, my emptiness comes from the fact that the beer doesn't taste very good, and isn't impressive in the least, but covers it up with a lot posturing, pride, machismo, attitude, and words, words, words. Words with no meaning. And a lot of debating about what meaning means. I call bullshit.

Stone has made their name with their attitude and backed it up with their beer. BrewDog is much the same, and you'd expect their combination to be something spectacular. When I spend $5 on a 12 ounce bottle, it had better be special, it shouldn't be a lot of words covering up a very ordinary stab a a lame pseudo-style.

P.S. I didn't taste the "Belgian", either.