Ölmönger's Lair: Beer Meets Whisky - Part 3, Founders Dirty Bastard

After some extra waiting, we've reached the last part of the trilogy. First part was good, second part showed some surprises, so this should be the disappointing unnecessary sequel. But in the end the truth can be that "your feeble skills are no match for the power of the Dark Side. You have paid the price for your lack of vision!" So, let's see and have a taste.

Wasting 0,5 cl of each fine dram...

Third beer to be disgraced by my obsession to mess things up is Founders Dirty Bastard Scotch Ale. It's Wee Heavy. Well, yes, "way heavy", but as a beer style a strong pale ale from Scotland. Sweet caramel malty, moderately bitter and slowly spicy-growing great brew.

Since there already is a bourbon barrel-ged version - also excellent Backwoods Bastard - available, I didn't mix the beer with Maker's Mark. Instead I picked two whiskies from the second part, Auchentoschan Heartwood and Glenmorangie The Quinta Ruban, first one being sherry and bourbon barrel-aged Lowlander and the latter being partly port barrel-aged Speysider. For the part of the wild card or the joker I picked Ardbeg Corryvreckan, heavily peated cask strength Islay dram.

...but here everything seems to be fine...

The test

Since the arrangements and the amounts of whisky per dose were exactly the same as in the second test, we'll get straight to the notorious table:

			Dirty Bastard
Whisky	Whisky volume (l)	Whisky abv (/1)	Beer volume (l)	Beer abv (/1)	Total abv (%)
Ardbeg Corryvreckan	0,005	0,57	0,12	0,085	10,47
Glenmorangie The Quinta Ruban	0,005	0,46	0,12	0,085	10,02
Auchentoschan Heartwood	0,005	0,43	0,12	0,085	9,90

Then comes counting the costs. You get a bottle of Dirty Bastard from Alko with 3,99 euros. Price of 0.5 cl of whisky is 27 cents (Heartwood), 50 cents (Quinta Ruban) and 71 cents (Corryvreckan). Mixing one bottle of DB with 1,5 cl of one of these whiskies costs 4,70 - 6,22 euros. Is it a lot or not? The answer is once again a question: who gives a f**k?

...until the bastard did it again!

Tasting notes

Every mix is mahogany brown in colour and because of the slow pouring, there's only a thin tan lace.

Dirty Bastard vs. Ardbeg Corryvreckan

Aroma has peaty smoke, tar, roasted caramel and stingy alcohol. Taste begins with smoked sweet malts. Heavy, peated smoke and sweet burned caramel take over with bitter salty liquorice. Towards the end sweet tar-caramel, fruity bitterness and spicy alcohol step in front. Aftertaste has tar-flavoured liquorice, smoky-piny bitterness and oaky dryness.

In this case Corryvreckan comes out first with peaty smoke, tar and liquorice. But the peated Islay whisky seems to fit Scotch ale's caramel and bitter flavour much better than a roasted porter or stout. The result reminds recently tasted Nøgne Ø Sunturnbrew, which was a superb beer. Excellent and delicious.

Dirty Bastard vs. Glenmorangie The Quinta Ruban

Aroma has sweet berries/grapes, caramel malts and spicy booze. Taste starts with sweet fruity caramel. Sweet caramel malts and fruit-berry juice take over with spicy-fruity alcohol. Towards the end fruity liquor, spicy caramel and sweetish bitterness get on top. Aftertaste has a boozy kick, spicy-fruity bitterness and lasting oaky-peppery dryness.

Quinta Ruban hits the goal again. Fruity-spicy whisky supports the brew's malty sweet character beautifully. In the end oak comes out by giving the aftertaste a lasting spicy-dry ending. Superbly delicious.

Dirty Bastard vs. Auchentoshan Heartwood

Aroma has caramel malts, sweet dark fruits and alcohol. Taste starts with spicy fruity malts. Caramel malts and sweet dark fruits take over with spicy bitter alcohol kick. Towards the end oaky-spicy whisky comes out with fruity bitterness and malty sweetness staying by its side. Aftertaste has oaky-fruity bitterness, piny-malty dryness and spicy alcohol warmth.

Heartwood's oak, fruits and spices fit to the fruit, caramel and bitter flavours of the beer beautifully. Especially oak rounds the sweet elements of the brew very pleasantly. This is an excellent treat. 

Conclusions

The result is a pleasant surprise: every Scotch single malt whisky seems to work beautifully with Wee Heavy. Auchentoschan Heartwood's spicy and oaky fruits match with the fruity caramel brew in a delicious way. Glenmorangie Quinta Ruban supports the brew's sweetness and gives it a tasty lasting oaky finale. I have to share the silver medal with these two. The gold goes to the union of Ardbeg Corryvreckan and Dirty Bastard, since in that combo the beer is the one that rounds the peat spike of the whiskey with the deep malty character - the result is a very unique but exquisite flavour.

Ölbeat

For the last and probably the best part of the trilogy I pick my personal favourite version of this title theme.

Thin Lizzy: Whiskey in the Jar (YouTube)

Released originally as a single in 1972, the song is a traditional Irish song.

Ölmönger's Lair: Beer Meets Whisky - Part 2, Õllenaut Must Eksport

So, it's time for the second part of the experiment. Since the subject is familiar and everyone remembers the first part - Obi-Wan died, the Death Star was destroyed and stuff - let's get directly to the business without any longer prologues.

First 0,5 cl of whiskey to each Glencairn...

Second beer to be messed around with happened to be Õllenaut Must Eksport. Yes, it's a Baltic Porter like Koff Porter was, too. The honest reason for this is that I just had one bottle of this fine Estonian brew lying around, so an idle beer became Ölmönger's plaything. Well, have to admit that it gave me a chance to compare the experiment with the first one.

The whiskies chosen for this round were Maker's Mark from the first part and Auchentoshan Heartwood and Glenmorangie The Quinta Ruban. Maker's Mark still is a quality American bourbon, OK? Auchentoshan Heartwood is a travel retail, NAS (no age statement) Lowland whisky matured in sherry and bourbon casks. Glenmorangie The Quinta Ruban is a partly port-cask matured, altogether 12-year old single-malt Speyside whisky.

...which is not much...

The test

The arrangements were the same as in the first test, so let's not repeat the unnecessary crap here. Only change was that I poured half of the first test's whisky - 0,5 centiliter - to the glass. Otherwise mixing whisky with beer isn't any kind of magic.

The volumes and the abv's of the whisky, the beer and the mixture are presented in this table:

			Must Eksport
Whisky	Whiskey volume (l)	Whisky abv (/1)	Beer volume (l)	Beer abv (/1)	Total abv (%)
Auchentoschan Heartwood	0,005	0,43	0,11	0,083	9,81
Glenmorangie The Quinta Ruban	0,005	0,46	0,11	0,083	9,94
Maker's Mark	0,005	0,45	0,11	0,083	9,90

About the cost of each mixture I can say that a bottle of Must Eksport cost around 3,70 euros in Hops United (R.I.P. & Thanks!). Half centiliter of Quinta Ruban costs around 50 cents and the same amount of Maker's Mark around 30 cents in Alko. Auchentoschan Heartwood was bought from tax-free in a cruise ship, and this dose cost 27 cents. When thinking bottlewise - 33 cl beer and 1,5 cl whisky - the cost would be 4,50 - 5,20 euros per set. Less whisky than last time, so a little cheaper - and so what?

... then filled 'em up with Must Eksport.

The tasting notes

Every mix is black in colour and because of the slow pouring, there's no visible head.

Must Eksport vs. Auchentoshan Heartwood

Aroma has mild roasted malts, coffee and booze. Taste starts with fruity boozy bite. Gently roasted malts and oaky-spicy whisky takes over with some sweet fruity flavours. Towards the end spicy dark fruits or berries come through with sweet boozy bitterness. Aftertaste has pepper-spicy coffee, bitter dark chocolate and oaky-fruity alcohol.

Heartwood is mostly on the driver's seat with sherry and bourbon cask originating fruity, spicy and oaky flavours. However, the porter's roast is present in the start and the the finish lifts up coffee and chocolate. I'd judge this as a rather successful experiment. 

Must Eksport vs. Glenmorangie The Quinta Ruban

Aroma has berries, grapes and hints of chocolate. Taste starts with sweet fruity chocolate. Bitter roast and dark fruits take over with dark chocolate. Towards the end fruity booze, dark chocolate and bitter roast get on top. Aftertaste has boozy dark fruits, pepper spice and bitter dark chocolate.

Wow. Didn't expect that spicy port wine characteristics of Quinta Ruban would get the chocolate flavours rise from the porter so deliciously. Absolutely beautiful combo.

Must Eksport vs. Maker's Mark

Aroma has vanilla, sweet berries and bourbon oak. Taste begins with vanillaish boozy roast. Bitter roast, bourbon vanilla and sweet boozy chocolate take over. Towards the end oaky bitterness and spiced booze step in front with sweet fruity flavours. Aftertaste has wood-roasted dryness, oaky chocolate bitterness and bourbon warmth.

In this case Maker's Mark vanilla, oak and booze clearly drive over the porter. Both roast and chocolate are mostly covered with the bourbon presence. Slightly surprised, since with Koff Porter - another Baltic Porter - a larger volume of whisky had a more pleasant effect. Not bad, but the booze strikes a bit too hard. 

Conclusions

The result hit me with a surprise: this Baltic Porter matched worst with Maker's Mark, the clear winner of the previous experiment. The bourbon just kicked too much and hindered the brew almost completely. Auchentoschan Heartwood takes the silver, since spicy and oaky fruits actually get along with the porter's flavours rather nicely. The gold goes to Glenmorangie Quinta Ruban for getting the spicy and fruity chocolate to the taste for a delicious mixture.

For the next experiment, the beer style changes, for sure. Otherwise, there will be one minor change in the whiskies tested. But that's next time.

Ölbeat

Running on the promised track, here's a newer version of the song. Any guesses on the soundtrack of the last part of the trilogy?

Metallica: Whiskey in the Jar (YouTube)

From the 1998 album Garage Inc., the song is a traditional Irish song.

Ölmönger's Lair: Beer Meets Whisky - Part 1, Sinebrychoff Koff Porter

Most of you don't probably know but I fell in love with fine whisky few years before I became a beer fan. The turn just happened overnight one day. Or the next day, if we're completely honest, because the night usually is between two days, not in the middle of one, all right?

Getting very slowly towards the point, the recent boom of barrel-aging has made me wonder, what is the point of barrel-aging i.e. storing the beer for some time from one month to one year in a barrel that used to contain spirit or wine. Yes, you'll get some of the flavours of the barreled whiskey, rum, cognac or wine to the brew and, if the result is good, the flavour from the barrel supports the original aromas and flavours of the beer and adds some features from the barrel's previous contents to them. Someone with some better knowledge about the chemistry inside the barrel could give us a little more complex explanation, but... who cares?

However, the question of a former standard whisky sipper is: can the flavours of the spirit be transferred to the beer without a rather long barreling process? Like with mixing a small dose of whisky with a larger dose of beer. The question is relevant (Oh, really?), because both the flavour and the price of the substance have some meaning, when a beer lover thinks about buying something good to drink. In my eyes, the barrel-aged brews have notably higher prices than the same style beers without the barreling have.

Since this is a case of home testing, the number of different kind of whiskies is limited. So, to make the test more relevant (Really really?), it would be nice to have some different-style beers to be test. However, for the first three parts - "the original trilogy" - I stayed on the comfort zone and picked two Baltic porters and one Scotch ale. Possibly, in the future there'll be some unorthodox, doomed and probably failed combinations involving, let's say, German bocks and any substyle of India Pale Ales. Time will tell.

First, 1 cl of each whisky to a Glencairn...

First beer to be tested had to be Sinebrychoff Porter, of course. Don't even ask why. Well, it's rather cheap, it's excellent on its own and its style seems to be suitable for barrel-aging. Enough good reasons or reasons good enough, if any are needed.

The whiskies involved in this experiment are Glenmorangie Lasanta, Ardbeg 10 Year Old and Maker's Mark. Glenmorangie Lasanta is a partly sherry-cask matured, altogether 12-year old single-malt Speyside whisky. Ardbeg Ten is a rather heavy, peat-smoky classic single-malt Islay whisky. Maker's Mark is a straight Kentucky bourbon whiskey. In my opinion, all of them taste at least fine by themselves - acquiring bad or mediocre tasting spirits to one's own shelf would be rather expensive and, clearly, very stupid (Forgetting that this is a beer blog, right?).

... then a closer look to the amount and the color of each whisky...

The test

Enough with the babbling. Let's get to the details of the test. For the first test I poured approximately one centiliter of whisky to the bottom of a Glencairn glass. Then I shared one 33 cl bottle of Koff Porter as evenly as I could by eye. Before smelling and tasting I used a simple teaspoon to mix the liquid up. If the measurements were even close to the desired ones, there would have been 1 cl of whisky and 11 cl of beer in each glass.

The volumes and the abv's of the whisky, the beer and the mixture are presented in this table:

			Koff Porter
Whisky	Whisky volume (l)	Whisky abv (/1)	Beer volume (l)	Beer abv (/1)	Total abv (%)
Glenmorangie Lasanta	0,01	0,46	0,11	0,072	10,43
Ardbeg Ten	0,01	0,46	0,11	0,072	10,43
Maker's Mark	0,01	0,45	0,11	0,072	10,35

About the cost of each mixture I can say that a bottle of Koff Porter costs around 3 euros in Alko, Finland. One centiliter of Glenmorangie or Ardbeg Ten costs around 1 euro, and Maker's Mark's price for 1 cl is a little under 60 cents. When thinking bottlewise - 33 cl beer and 3 cl whisky - the cost would be 4,80 - 6 euros per a dose. So, that's the cost - so what?

After showing the technical data, we'll get to the most important part of the experiment. The result. The experience. The one thing we've been waiting for. The mother of all results, the father of all future experiments. The journey to Beer & Whisky Cocktail Wonderland. And so on.

... finally a bottle of porter shared to the glasses

The tasting notes

Every mix is black in colour and has a bit varying, but still rather small beige head. As you can see from the pic above.

Koff Porter & Glenmorangie Lasanta

Aroma has berry-fruit liquor and coffee beans with hints of roast. Taste begins with gentle fruity and oaky roast. Dark-roasted coffee and spicy booze take over. Towards the end fruity and vanilla-spicy whisky gets mixed with bitter coffee-chocolate with an oaky twist. Aftertaste has slightly sweet fruity liquor, roasted bitterness and dark chocolate.

It's clear that the whisky dominates this. Fruits, spices and oak dominate and belong to the qualities of sherry-barrel-matured Highland whisky. Though, there are elements of  Porter present - roast, coffee and chocolate - that appear in the taste more near the finish. Good stuff - the fruity part is the one I could cut out. 

Koff Porter & Ardbeg Ten

Aroma has campfire smoke, tar and charcoal with some spices. Taste starts with powerfully bitter tar and smoke. Strong tar and smoke flavours dominate completely over the thin roasted malts in the background. Near the finish the tarry smoke grows sweeter with liquorice and roast getting through. Aftertaste has heavy campfire smoke with bitter roast and alcohol kick.

The "Ten" completely runs over Koff Porter - only the late hoppy bitterness somehow manages to show up. Otherwise it's very much of campfire smoke and tar followed by a boozy kick in the finish. The tiny liquorice part is probably a mix of whiskey tar and beer roast. It seems that a strongly smoked beer easily takes the power from a beer style based on roasted malts. For a lover of heavily smoked Islay whiskies this tastes nice but it's pretty one-dimensional and tough to drink.    

Koff Porter & Maker's Mark

Aroma has sweet bourbon vanilla and oak with caramel and booze. Taste begins with spicy roasted vanilla kick. Oaked vanilla, roasted malts and sweet milk chocolate take over. Near the finish bourbon qualities - vanilla, oak, caramel and booze - get over everything while some sweet bitterness appears. Aftertaste has bourbon vanilla-oak-caramel heaven with dark chocolate and dry roasted bitterness.

The bourbon presence is beautiful and dominant. Sweet vanilla, caramel and oak are everywhere "filtering" the other flavours but letting the Porter's original flavours through a bit enhanced. Especially bourbon caramel and vanilla seem to pair perfectly with the beer's chocolate. Excellent - one of the top beer flavours I've had recently. And I haven't been drinking much of bad beer lately.

Conclusions

In the end, the preference order of the beer-whiskey mixes is pretty clear:

• Maker's Mark is the clear winner: only whisky of this test that really enhances the qualities of the brew, others more or less suck the power from the beer. A delicious combo.
• Glenmorangie Lasanta takes the silver medal in this competition, because only the fruity flavour is the only thing that doesn't fit to the beer style. Ok, but nothing too special.
• As much as I love sipping standard Ardbeg by the fireplace, it has to be placed last because of the too strong dominance: Koff Porter turned completely to a heavily smoked strong ale. Failure - probably expected, but still a failure.

For the next experiment, I have to change the whiskies at least partially and use a little less, probably a half of the tested amount of spirit. Just out of curiousity.

Ölbeat

The song choice probably explains itself. Would it surprise you too much to tell that there's more of this kind to come?

The Dubliners: Whiskey in the Jar (YouTube)

Released originally as a single in 1968, the song is a traditional Irish song.