I’d been keeping these two to try side by side and to be honest I was a little worried about opening them, I’m a HUGE fan of Mikkeller and I had heard mixed things about both of the beers, not only that they weren’t cheap,I also think they were pretty limited edition, so didn’t want to be disappointed.

Wonderfully presented but a bugger to get into.

Mikkeller 1000 IBU Is described as an American Double IPA (DIPA or IIPA) that comes in at 9.6% ABV and according to Mikkeller the 1000 IBU relates to the theoretical IBU of the beer (you can read more about it here). Apparently he wanted to brew a beer with lots of bitterness that was ultimately well balanced and relatively easy to drink.

I seemed to make sense to start the non barrel aged version so I washed and dried my cool Mikkeller Teku Glass and carefully unwrapped the paper from the bottle, to be presented with a corked and caged champagne style bottle, It took a while to get the cork out but once I did I could really smell the sugar coming out of the bottle.

It poured a lot darker than I thought it would, really really dark brown with a huge foamy head, It smelled really sweet and bready, a bit like brioche coated in lemon and pineapple marmalade.

In the mouth it wasn’t quite as bitter as I expected, don’t get me wrong it was really bitter but not mouth puckeringly bitter.  There was a huge amount of brown sugar which reminded me a bit of the Southern Tier Cuvée I’d had not so long back. The sugar worked well with the citrus and pine from the hops. There was also a fair bit of date or raisin in there too, It was kind of hard to tell as the bitterness made it difficult to pick flavours out.

The carbonation was soft and creamy, which for me was the key to being able to drink it, if it had been too flat or too fizzy then it could have been a disaster. Overall I enjoyed 1000 IBU it wasn’t my favourite beer from Mikkeller.

After having a few glasses of water and some ice cream I decided to go for it and open the Barrel Aged version. A couple of people on twitter had pointed it that they thought it tasted like BBQ Sauce, which kind of reminded me of the 1st Open It where I had Rougue Chipotle Ale.

A whole lot darker than the 1000 IBU

It came in the same style bottle wrapped in paper and with the same near impossible cork to get out of. I believe it was the same 1000 IBU that I had earlier but that had been aged in Islay Whisky barrels.

It poured a whole lot darker than the already dark 1000 IBU with a slightly darker but similar sized head.

The aromas were pretty similar but there was a defined smoked wood characteristic which was like people said, similar to BBQ sauce, It reminded me very much of those hickory chips you get to add a bit of extra flavour to your BBQ.

In the mouth it had the same creamy texture but was no where near as bitter or sweet as the non barrel aged version.  The big flavours were the smokey wood and whisky and it also had a lovely peaty quality to it, this Im a big fan of in beer and whisky.

The hops weren’t quite as prominent and the bitterness wasn’t quite as high,  which for me made it tastier than the other bottle and a whole lot more drinkable.

Barrel aging can usually make or break a beer, I’ve had some beer that really didn’t suit sitting in a barrel but this one from Mikkeller isn’t one of them. Yes the flavours may be slightly over the top for some people but on the whole I would pick Barrel aged 1000 IBU over the standard one every time.

For those of you who want to know a bit more about Mikkeller and their beers you can read my meet the brewerwith Mikkel  here, or read my thoughts on other Mikkeller Beers here

So when Beermerchants.com got their latest delivery of delights from Mikkeller I knew just which beer I wanted for Christmas morning, this was none other than Mikkeller Beer Geek Brunch Weasel.

Deep, Dark, Delicious and one for sharing!

According to the Mikkeller website this imperial Oatmeal stout is brewed with one of the world’s most expensive coffees, made from droppings of weasel-like civet cats. The fussy Southeast Asian animals only eat the best and ripest coffee berries. Enzymes in their digestive system help to break down the bean. Workers collect the bean-containing droppings for Civet or Weasel Coffee. The exceedingly rare Civet Coffee has a strong taste and an even stronger aroma.

Sounds pretty special doesn’t it? I had a hard time not opening it the minute it arrived after reading that description. It also had a lot to live up to, not just because of the Insomniac last year but all of the other Beer Geek Beers I’ve had from Mikkeller have been outstanding.

So after what seemed like an eternity Christmas morning arrived, presents were opened and we sped off round to my parents for bacon butties.

Out came the Beer Geek Brunch Weasel, It poured almost jet black, there was a fair bit of sediment in the bottom which I decided to drink rather than waste, it was so thick and gloopy I couldn’t quite believe it.

The head was lively and an amazing coffee colour, not to dissimilar to the crema on an espresso. It smelled absolutely fantastic, quite dry with loads of roast coffee beans, hints of dark fruits and a little bit of booze.

The beer fills your mouth in a lovely thick velvety way, there’s bags of flavour to back up the aromas, these seemed more intense as the beer warmed up, which it did quickly as I couldn’t put the glass down.

There was a large amount of chocolate present, deep, dark and rich, followed by a sweet almost brown sugar then the coffee hits you like a shot of well pulled espresso then just a little bit of oats and alcohol on the finish that lingers until you take you next wonderful mouthful.

I was seriously impressed by this beer and my words can’t do it justice, this is a beer, that if you see, buy it, it’s not cheap but it is oh so worth it. Perfect for sharing, probably a wise idea at a smidgen under 11% ABV although I could have quite easily supped the whole bottle my self. Luckily my dad appreciated it too.

We went up to @davelozman ‘s where he’d pulled a few special bottles from his stash and cooked a huge chunk of lamb stuffed with haggis, It was then we realised that in our haste to choose some special beers we had ended up with a fridge full of rather strong beer

Funky Label, Funky beer!

in big bottles, luckily the night was young so we set to work.

Bottle one was Mikkeller Funky E Star (9.3% ABV), a Belgian inspired pale ale, the label was brilliant, really psychedelic, unfortunately the notes on the back were all in Danish so we had no idea what to expect. It poured a light copper colour with a little bit of yeast haze, it smelled of sugar and had a prominent yeasty smell too. Taste wise it was smooth, quite sweet and hoppy with a lovely funky spice and some hops there fore good measure, a great start to the night.

Great beer, great cause

Next up was D.W from Sharp’s, it poured very similar to the Funky E Star,  it also had a similar sort of nose, yeasty, sweet and slightly hoppy, this carried through into the flavour, it was a little bit softer, slightly less bitter, more rounded, it hid the ABV very well and despite it’s sweetness it was so easy to drink but never too over the top, to my surprise, I preferred it to the Mikkeller, although it shouldn’t be a surprise as Stuart makes some absolutely stunning beers and is always trying new things.

Beer of the night for me

Bottle 3 came in the delightfully packaged Williams Brothers Fraoch 20th Anniversary Ale, It’s their delicious heather ale that’s been left to mature in single malt whisky casks it weighs in at 11% ABV and pours a really lovely orange marmalade colour there’s definite whisky on the nose along with the some apple and floral notes, It tastes brilliant, beer of the night so far for me, it was zesty, fruity and quite dry with a lovely bitter sour finish that added a bit of spice, I couldn’t quite believe just how drinkable it was, there wasn’t even the slightest hint of the alcohol. I could have quite happily drank the entire bottle of this my self.

Excellent porter but the Peat was MIA

Next up was Moor Peat Porter, this was the beer with the lowest ABV of the night, at 4.7% it was half of just about the rest of the beers we drank, It held it’s own though, it was deep, rich and roasty, it had loads of coffee in it  and just a little bit of dark chocolate, I didn’t get much peat from it but it was lovely and smooth and went surprisingly well with Daves hazlenut and chocolate desert.

Not sure about this one

Bottle 5 was a bottle I’d brought back from GBBF with me, Rouge’s Chipotle Ale (5.5%), I think it was dedicated to a Spanish author who made some sort of ale and smoked chilli dish, but I need to check up on that, It poured a dark amber colour which was a lot lighter than I thought it would be, It smelled and tasted like someone had taken a beer and tipped a bottle of smoked Tabasco in it, there was a little bit of malt on the nose other than the chilli but that was about it. Not surprisingly it tasted much like it smelled, I’m a huge fan of smoked chilli but I’m not sure the balance was right in this one, it was soft and well carbonated in the mouth but all I could taste was the smokey chilli, which soon became over powering, the afterburn was quite nice though, definitely a beer to have in small quantities.

At this point we got a text to see if we wanted to pop round to a birthday party, never ones to turn down the chance of a party we packed the remaining few Open It beers up and headed out of the door.

Peaty whisky beer is great!

After a quick taxi ride in the snow we arrived at the party and promptly cracked open the bottle of Harviestoun Ola Dubh 40, another whisky beer, this time it was a dark one, it poured with a thin creamy colour head, the aroma was predominantly smokey with notes of peat and the whisky. The flavours were quite complex, peaty and smoky with undertones of whisky and oak, the flavours are well balanced and nice and mellow. This would be perfect sat in front of the fire after a day out in the snow.

Another excellent beer from Moor

Bottle 7 was another from Moor, this time the Cider Brandy cask aged Moor Fusion (8% ABV) This was another dark one, it poured with a much bigger head than I expected, the cider brandy was there in the nose as well as some dark sticky fruit, kind of like dates or fig rolls, the flavour was surprisingly mellow, it wasn’t as roasty as I thought it would be, there was oak in there along with some apple and toffee, there was a hint of chocolate there too but only just. This really was a winner but it’s one for sharing.

Proof that chilli and beer can work.

Next up was my last bottle of Crown Brewery’s Ring of Fire (10.3%), A huge barley wine style beer brewed with loads of  fresh chilli, it was as good as I remembered (you can read my review here) It poured with a really thin head and little aroma, although I could just pick out some chilli. The chilli really hits you in the mouth, it gets the back of your throat and warms you through, it’s incredibly rich and the brown sugar in it is  quite sweet, again it’s another beer that’s best off shared between a couple of you.

Things got a little hazy here

Last but not least was Brewdog and Mikkeller Devine Rebel Mortlach Reserve 2008, bottle number 290 of 1000, it’s another barley wine that’s been singled hopped with Nelson Sauvin then aged in the Mortlach malt whisky casks, it was at this point the tasting notes on my phone got a bit jumbled and my tweet of the picture simply said “hell yeah”, the few notes on my phone said dates, chocolate and lots of booze followed by the words “Grzd stiff bt neds longe in bottle” which I think translates as great stuff but needs longer in the bottle….luckily I’ve got a bottle in the cupboard which I’ll save for when Dave and my self are a little less worse for wear.

Beer of the day was certainly the Williams Fraoch 20th Anniversary beer, I really need to find some more of it.

And that’s it Open It day 2 …well and truly done! I think tonight’s Open It will be a little more sedate and I might just open the one beer….we shall see.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with Mikkeller, Mikkel doesn’t have a brewery so relies on being able to create and brew beers at other breweries as a result each one is different and he gets to experiment with some really crazy stuff. You can read more about him here when he did our Meet the Brewer feature.

Burger and beer...perfect!

I’ll be honest I didn’t really know much about this beer apart from it was brewed for a burger bar to sell and it was going to be a lager style beer, and it was one of the cheaper bottles in my order. The bottle is really striking red and white stripes and despite my football allegiance being to the black and white stripes the empty bottle now resides on a shelf in the garage with all the other cool empties I keep.

Burger & Bun L.A. Lager poured a lovely deep red amber colour, it’s slightly hazy and had a large frothy head. It smells light and refreshing,there’s hops, grapefruit and nectarine on the nose.

The first thing that strikes you is just how light and well balanced the beer is, there’s sweet caramel malt and slightly bitter hops, the flavours from the nose are there, not in huge amounts but enough so you know that they are there, it’s very lager like just with some added hops, so Burger & Bun L.A. Lager sits below the big hitting American IPA’s but slightly above corkers like Adnams Spindrift, this makes it amazingly light and drinkable, it’s one of those beers that really should come in a huge 750ml bottle.

It was only right that I paired it with a burger and chips, after all that’s what it was brewed for. I made my own homemade spicy chilli burger with all the trimmings (recipe here) as expected it went perfectly with the beer, the malt sweetness and hop bitterness were a perfect foil for the spice in the burger, the big hitting beef beef, mature cheddar and the slight sweetness off the onion rings…..this really was a meal to savour, I only wish I’d had more of the beer to drink…..Next time I place a Mikkeller order I am buying 2 of each, although I might have to sell a kidney first.

Anybody that knows me knows I don’t do football. I don’t watch it, I don’t show it in my pub, I don’t support a team, and I am unable to enter into ANY conversation regarding the sport due to my lack of knowledge. When I was growing up I never understood how my friends seemed to retain an encyclopedic knowledge of teams, players, matches, goals & final scores. However as I got older I could suddenly recall my own encyclopedic knowledge of beer, breweries & locations, ABV’s & styles, tastes & flavours and realised that it is easy to remember the tiniest detail about anything at all, as long as you are passionate about it!

So there are two reasons why I took part in the World Cup Beer Sweepstake, firstly due to my love of all things beer, and secondly to have something to talk about during the World Cup and an incentive to follow the tournament. I was very excited to be taking part in such a great idea, a World Cup Sweepstake, with a beer hunt & beery’ prize kindly supplied by Ales by Mail. For those who want to know more about The World Cup Beer Sweepstake see either the Beer reviews or Pencil and Spoon blogs for the organisers Andy & Mark’s take on the whole idea or search for #wcbeersweep on Twitter.

Waiting to see who I was drawn against was exciting, I didn’t want an easy life (i.e. England or USA), but I did want to be able to actually find some beer (I definitely didn’t want North Korea!) I was too impatient to watch Mark drawing the names out of the hat/bowl so I dived straight into the list to discover I had drawn Denmark. Six months ago I would have been disappointed that I had no other option than to find some Carlsberg Export, however I recently read Pete Browns Book,Three Sheets to the Wind’ and I now knew there was much more to Danish beer.

I ‘googled’ Danish breweries and remembered that Pete Browns had an eye opening visit to the Carlsberg Jacobsen brewery, the search began. A few tweets later and @BrisBeerFactory, @BeerReviewsAndy & @RecentlyDrunk confirmed that I should in fact be searching for Mikkeller beers, ‘Beer Geek Brunch Weasel’ in particular. Imperial Stouts are a great favourite of mine, but my search was fairly fruitless. I couldn’t find any REALLY interesting Mikkeller beers at any of the online beer shops and I couldn’t think of anywhere else I could possibly get hold of them. Then an old friend came to the rescue, Andrew from The Bristol Beer Factory agreed to a mini beerswap and to let me have the bottle of Brunch Weasel from his own private stash as well as a few Bristol Beer Factory beers. Bowled over I instantly agreed to let him have some Crouch Vale Apollo, Stone IPA, Red Fox Ruby Red Mild & Hardnott Granite & Aether Black from my private beershelf.

Some people said this was too easy, so in order to appease @richardmackney my search continued until I found a bottle of Amager Bryghus Nitro at Beers of Europe. This interesting little number looked like it would satisfy the other spectrum of beer I crave, a real Hopmonster, a Double (Imperial) IPA at 10%. So much for joining in football conversations, I soon realised I wouldn’t remember much after trying these two beauties!

Nitro by name, but how about nature?

First up was the Nitro. It poured a hazy golden colour with a very tight foamy head, it had a real sweet & sour aroma, lots of hops and a hint of orange, combined the strong smell of alcohol it almost smelt like Southern Comfort! An alternative description from Bernie, my Assistant Manager, was “It smells like somebody stood a daffodil in some watered down whisky”, so you’ll have guessed by now this wasn’t exactly a ‘normal’ beer.

The first sip was extreme,  now I LOVE my hops, but this was something different, huge hoppy flavours, intense bitterness, as I continued to sip it actually made me shiver! You can really taste the alcohol in this beer, much more so than alot of 10% beers, the complex flavours developed as I progressed down the glass, still with a hint of orange, and as I got to the bottom of the glass, I still didn’t like it.

Next was the highly commended Mikkeler Beer Geek Brunch Weasel (although I hasten to add I didn’t drink both beers in one session!). According to Ratebeer one of the most expensive coffees in the world is used to brew this Imperial Stout, so called because the coffee beans are previously digested by weasel-like civetcats. It pours a rich dark chocolate colour, almost black, with a fantastic caramel head. Swirling the thick beer around the glass left some great legs on the glass. Strong roasted coffee & chocolate aromas smacked me in the face.

Mmmmm weasel poo coffee beer

The first sip, almost syrupy texture with a gentle carbonation, gorgeous coffee flavour, rich dark malt and a real sticky sweet finish. It’s like drinking dessert, a velvety smooth espresso & chocolate mousse. This really is a stunning beer. I love Imperial Stouts, Brooklyn Black Chocolate, Brewdog Tokyo* but Beer Geek is a cut above, definitely one of the best beers I’ve ever drunk. Thank you Andrew!

So which beer should represent the Demark football team? Well they’re out of the cup so I guess it’ll probably have to be Carlsberg! Although what beer we could use to describe the English performance is beyond me… any thoughts?

Thanks to Mitch for taking part and for sending me this blog post, I really enjoyed reading it and hope that you do too.

If you want to find out more about Mitch then follow him on twitter here

According to the Mikkeller website Drink in the Sun is a summer-beer made in American style. Brewed with lots of American hops, wheat, ale yeast and sunshine. It was brewed at De Proef Brouwerij in Belgium, as for those of you who’ve not read our Meet the brewer with Mikkel, they don’t have their own brewery so borrow breweries from other brewers.

This not only leads to some awesome collaborations it also means that a lot of Mikkeller beers are only brewed in small batches so you have to buy them when you can, Last time I checked Beermerchants still had Drink’n The Sun available at a rather respectable £2.30 a bottle.

Drink’n The Sun comes in at a nice light 3.9% making it ideal for sitting in the sun an supping a bottle or three.

It pours a lovely light golden colour with a pale, creamy head, the aromas are very summery – wheat, flowers, peach and grapefruit fill your nose with joy. The body is a little thin but doesn’t detract from the beer at all.

The taste is fantastic, light, hoppy, peachy and slightly flowery, it has a lovely bitter finish that makes it crisp and refreshing, all of these aspects make Drink’n The Sun very very drinkable indeed.

This is one beer I would dearly love to see in huge bottles, mini casks or even multi packs as It could quite easily become one of those beers you drink all summer.

You can find more about the beer by watching the rather cool video below, visiting the Mikkeller website or joining their facebook page .

For those of you who haven’t heard of Mikkeller I suggest you try your best to track down some of their beers, every single one that I have had has been top notch, especially Stateside IPA and Beer Geek Breakfast, If you are wondering why I haven’t reviewed them on here it’s just because I’ve got a huge backlog of reviews so watch this space for rather a lot of Mikkeller beer reviews, anyway enough of me, over to Mikkel:

What is your brewery capacity?
Unlimited since I brew at many different breweries

What is different about your brewery?
Don’t have an actual brewery but brew Mikkeller beers at many different locations..

Mikkell from Mikkeller Brewery

How long have you been brewing for?
Mikkeller is 3½ years old

How did you get into brewing?
Homebrewing

What beers do you brew regularly?
So so many..Beer Geek Breakfast, Stateside, Beer Geek Bunch, Black Hole, Black, Green Gold, Draft Bear etc etc<

What special/seasonal beers do you brew?
Frelser Trippelbock, 3 diff X-mas beers, Drink’in the Sun summerbeer, Hoppy Easter and Funky E-star

Where do you think the future of brewing lies?
Where the quality is..

What is you proudest moment in brewing?
Brewing with Alesmith and Stone

What was last beer you drank?
De Dolle Stille Nacht 2008..oh yeah

What is your favourite hop?
Simcoe

What is your brewing ambition?
To make new and great beer<

Do you have a Brewing hero/inspiration?
Kris from De Dolle Brouwers

Which beer do you wish you had brewed?
Stille Nacht from De Dolle

Favourite hobby outside of brewing?
Making food and eating good food

Thanks to Mikkel for taking time out to fill this in, to find out more about Mikkel and his amazing Mikkeller beers visit his website and keep an eye on beer reviews as I type up my thoughts on the Mikkeller beers I’ve drank.