Nøgne Ø #100 I believe was the 2nd ever beer from this favourite brewery of mine that I have tasted, many years ago I was a big fan of #100. Now many years later I still like this beer but there are a few other Nøgne Ø beers that I still think are even better. Lots of people are not sure what the style of this beer really is, in the US it is labelled as a Barleywine and for the rest of the world, an IIPA or DIPA if there is a difference between the two.
Mahogany in colour with a very thick beige head, aroma was full of roasted malt, caramel and quite piney. Quite a lot of hops in this DIPA and I am not 100% sure this time round that it balances out with the maltiness of this beer. Initially this beer was brewed for the employees of the brewery as a celebration of being their 100th brew. It became such a success that Nøgne Ø decided to add this to their yearly assortment. Quite a complex flavour to this beer, everything from roasted malt/coffee to licorice and bitter piney hops. This beer has tones of bitter chocolate and some nuttiness in the initial taste, but the main part of this beer is quite bitter and roasted.
Medium bodied brew that has some cola and caramel sweetness with the bitterness of the hops to the front in both the aroma and body of the beer. This makes the finish quite bitter but with the carbonation and body weight of the beer, it balances out quite well. Still a big favourite of mine.
Nøgne Ø # 500 was brewed as a celebration to their 500th batch of beer. It was brewed using five malts & hops and 2 of the hops are new world funky hops from New Zealand with high alpha acids. The result is an incredibly rich and hoppy Imperial IPA. Malty enough to be almost a barley wine, but intensely fruity, mainly because it is dry hopped with generous amounts of Nelson Sauvin hops from New Zealand.
This beer has a reddish brown appearance, more towards amber brown and was quite murky, remember all beers are unfiltered and bottle conditioned. Not the prettiest of DIPA to look at due to the cloudy body but this is long forgotten when one moves on to the aroma and taste. This type of beer I could spend hours and hours just sniffing it, I LOVE the aroma to this beer where it has all my favourite characteristics, tropical fruits, hugs amounts of sweet citrusy fruits, sweet malts, pine and resin.
Right away one can tell that this beer is highly hopped but also has huge amounts of malts to back this up and the balance is just perfect. The body was sweet, oily and quite meaty with an abundance of exotic fruits bursting out. The sweet malt backbone is very caramel/toffee on the tongue and it is easy to see why many people say this beer is between a very hoppy IPA and a Barleywine. Strong hops presence from beginning to end with strong toffee malt flavour that blends very well with all the hops and both hide the alcohol in this beer very well.
When I drink this beer it reminds me of Oppigårds Bangalore Twice & Ale Smith IPA, I love this beer and is right up there with my favourite Nøgne Ø beers.
Nøgne Ø Dobbel IPA is actually the first ever Nøgne Ø beer I tasted and this was back in 2008 when it was first release and I fell in love with this beer and the brewery. Since then I did manage to taste this beer late 2009 and now again in 2011 and unfortunately the beer is not the same as it was the first time I tasted it as expected. In 2008 I would have rated this beer very highly but now 2 ½ year on, it has changed an awful lot and unfortunately lost a lot of its hops character being a 100 IBU beer.
Very murky amber chestnut brown in colour and still had this amazing beige head even after a few years with and aroma/flavour that were very much the same, malty, bready, some fruits like raisins and figs. Just a pity that the 5 hop variety is now well mixed into this malty toffee juice. Strong caramel and toffee aroma and flavour with some hops character still remaining but more towards resin from pine. Very rounded in body, medium and very easy to drink which probably comes from the malty sweetness that is left, definitely well past its prime but still delivery in some ways.
"This limited DIPA or W-IPA (as it is referred to in Japan) is the result of a collaboration between brewmasters Kjetil Jikium, Nøgne Ø, and Toshi Ishii, Yo-Ho Brewing, Japan." Toshi Ishii has built a strong legacy in craft brewing worldwide. He learned American brewing philosophy with Stone Brewing years ago and has taken that experience overseas with him to complement the rest of his brewing knowledge. He brought the art of cask-conditioning into the Japanese pub, and became a strong proponent of West Coast hopping.
Nøgne Ø Two Captains Double IPA was brewed by Jan Halvor Fjeld, winner of the 2010 Norwegian Home Brewing championship who was invited to brew his award winning Imperial IPA at Nøgne Ø. The name of the original beer was Pliny goes to Telemark and Two Captains refers to both Kjetil & Jan Halvor’s flying interests. Travelled all the way to Copenhagen to get my hands on this beer and found had it at Mikkeller’s bar which was a great experience.
Murky orange on colour with a heavy off-white head the aroma was bursting with hops as expected being 100 IBU. Some grapefruit in the body but more grassy that citrusy character to this beer. Finish was quite bitter with some sweet tones and a very easy DIPA to drink with little to no signs of the 8.5% alcohol present.
After finally having tasted all 3 of Nøgne Ø Double IPA beers I have to admit #500 is my favourite (which I am currently drinking and will make the next post) because of the fact that it has more sweet fruit character and is not as dry as the other 2.
Being such a dry and bitter DIPA it is all about the hops, very hoppy in the beginning with a mild malty middle and more hops bitterness in the finish. I liked this beer but was not going crazy about it like other beers from Nøgne Ø but am happy that my facebook vote helped to get Nøgne to brew this again.
Tasted the new and final batch a few times both in Kristiansand & Oslo that was Batch Nr. 691 which was brewed 6th September 2011. Drinking a "fresh" bottle of Two Captains is a completely different ballgame, this version was bursting out oranges, mangoes, hops, lemons, sweet caramel, candied citrus peel and a lot more delicate flavours right out of the bottle. Very high up on the Top 5 Nøgne Ø beer now and easily this new batch gets a 5 star rating.
