Ölbeat 049: Hiisi Aarni

Brewery: Panimo Hiisi
Country: Finland
Style: India Pale Ale
Abv: 6,9 %
@RateBeer

Aarni = Griffin: partly eagle, partly lion

What about the beer?
Colour is thick amber brown with small natural white head. Aroma has vanilla toffee candy and sweet fruits like pineapple and mango. (So we have a kids' happy hour just smelling the sweetness...) Taste starts with mango-toffeeish sweet hoppy bite. Rye malts, pine and grapefruit strongly step in soon after, on the side there's some fruit, caramel and vanilla. Towards the finish tiny slice of mango is added to the flavour. Aftertaste is dry, bitter and piny.

Very good IPA with some sweet fruity flavours. The rye malts kick in and add some edge to the traditional union of pine and grapefruit. Luckily the taste doesn't fully follow the aroma: the sweetness is toned down from the candy store level and the fruitiness gets more room.

Ölbeat

The brewers recommends this to be enjoyed with Sigur Rós, but nah. We'll grab some music that has connection to the edges, the sweet feeling and the name of the beer, something that also refers to the brewery on its way to success. A huge song from one of the giants of rock after its major successes:  

Pink Floyd: Learning to Fly (YouTube)

From the 1987 album A Momentary Lapse of Reason, the song was written by David Gilmour (main writer), Anthony Moore, Bob Ezrin and Jon Carin.