Black Rain

Nøgne Ø Black Rain is a Black IPA collaboration between Nøgne Ø and Naparbier of Spain at 7.5% and has 75 IBU. Brewed with pale, crystal 75 and black malt with chinook, amarillo and simcoe hops. I believe this was the first ever Black IPA brewed by Nøgne Ø.

Naparbier started in 2009 in Pamplona, Navarra, Spain a place probably best known for bullfights and Hemingway, and now great beer. The name is a combination of the Basque word for Navarra (Napar) and the German name for beer (bier, of course).

Pours really well, dark brown body with a large off-white creamy head. First aroma was roasted malts, coffee, chocolate, black berries like bramble berries. Hops in aroma were mild with touches of licorice, I am starting to like this beer and this is positive as I am not a Black IPA fat at all.

The taste was medium and slightly creamy, nice balance between hops and malt but I am suspecting that many who are more home with this beer style expect more hops kick as it still is an IPA beer. I liked the gentle sweetness in the beer which is always a plus with darker beers as it makes them easier to drink. The after-taste was slightly bitter and hoppy, this is a beer i like and would definitely buy again if I get the chance to drink it.

Continue

Chmiel Iunga IPA

Nøgne Ø Chimel lunga IPA is a beer brewed using a Polish hop variety called lunga. Always exciting to try new hops and see what else is out there and possibly works.

Quite light and blonde looking for an IPA with yellow to golden in colour and having a small egg-white head. Aroma is very strong and not what i expected, very herbal and grassy and definately not an aroma i can associate with other beers i have tasted. After reading up on this rare bitter hops i am getting lots of pineapple and honey mixed in with its herbal and floral body that makes us a right cocktail. Cant say i am too gone on this aroma.

Medium in body with more pineapple and honey tones and a lot of bitterness, now it starts to feel more like an IPA than before. Sweetness from the malt is there but the bitterness from the hops seems to dominate my palette. Some cirrus from the bitterness that struggles to stay in line with the malts, the taste grows on you and i like it a lot now, even though this was a strange one to review.

Continue

Citrus Hystrix IPA

Nøgne Ø Citrus Hystrix IPA is an India Pale Ale of strength 7.5% abv. This beer was designed in cooperation with chef Trond Moi of Bølgen & Moi and brewed with rye, oats, kaffir lime (aka Citrus Hystrix) and tangerine juice., a beer that was easy to pair with foods was his request. 

Quite murky and cloudy brown in appearance with a nice beige to orange head. Aroma is very fruity, hoppy, citrus, oranges, malty, floral and has some tangerine there. Flavour starts off being quite malty and a little bit sweet before the hops kick in where there is a hop explosion with tropical fruitiness and some toffee. Getting some nice caramel flavours and there is definitely some lime and tangerine there also with a quite strong bitter finish. 

Nøgne Ø Citrus Hystrix is not your average IPA and I guess this was the point here, just starting with appearance it is a lot darker and browner for this style of beer. This was a beer that I liked in small doses and I thought the citrus hops kick was just a little bit too strong for my taste buds, with food this big giant of an IPA bomb is probably tamed a lot. I love the idea of adding the exotic lime and tangerine juice to an IPA style and the sweaty malt backbone is really made to work here to somewhat balance out the bitterness here. 

Continue

India Pale Ale

Nøgne Ø India Pale Ale, been a while since I had the Nøgne Ø India Pale Ale and I was as happy with it now as I was the last time, super aroma and a great full bodied IPA with a nice malty caramel back bone to it. Quite an explosive head on this beer with a large off-white head to this golden orange beer. Like most Nøgne Ø beers, they can be quite hazy as they are not filtered and usually contain quite a lot of yeast still in the bottle. Right from the beginning the aroma is full of citrusy and tropical fruits, oranges, passion fruit and some grape which is very intense and what I like in an IPA. Piney hops and pine sap in the aroma which is very hoppy both on the fruity and flowery side.

The bitterness is huge in this beer but not over the top thanks to the good malty body to this beer and helps to make it a really big full-bodied juicy IPA. Cascade hops is very overpowering which gives the beer it’s long after-taste of grapefruit and herbs. The hops intensity are more in the aroma that in the taste and this is a great sign of how well the beer is balanced and the alcohol is hidden, one would expect this beer based on it’s aroma to kill your tongue but this is not the case, the bitterness is very well balanced and more to the end which is a little dry.

Right up there with the top IPA beers I have tasted and easily in my Top 5 Nøgne Ø beers.

 

Continue

Kjell Pop Double Hop

Nøgne Ø Kjell Pop Double Hop is the second of two beers that are available on draft at Grunerløkka Brygghus in Oslo. 6.5% in strength but with 10 more IBU that the Single Hop version making it 60 IBU. Hazy orange in colour with also a large off-white head, looked great in the wine glass that they server Nøgne Single & Double hop in. Aroma was similar in ways to Single Hop but a lot more subtle with flavours of herbal hops, citrusy and some pine resin. Grapefruit, malt with a very tasty hoppy body to this beer which was a lot more balanced and rounded in both taste and aroma. A little more bitterness that the Single Hop, still medium in my opinion and nice that this brew was not too sweet.

Nøgne Ø Kjell Pop Double Hop IPA has the same malt bill as Single Hop Citra. It has Chinook hops for bittering, Cascade hops for aroma, and is dry hopped with Chinook. Two of my favourite American hops, got to love this beer and was one of the better if not best draft beers I had during my trip to Oslo. Definitely will be making a return to Grunerløkka Brygghus if I return to Oslo again in the future and will look forward to having many glasses of Pop Single and Double Hop IPA.

Continue

Kjell Pop Single Hop (Single Hop Citra IPA)

Nøgne Ø Kjell Pop Single Hop also know as Single Hop Citra IPA is one of two special brews from Nøgne just for Grunerløkka Brygghus in Oslo. An IPA where the US Citra hops is used for bittering, flavour and aroma. The malt used in this beer is Maris Otter and crystal and an English ale yeast. This brew is quite rich and malty and very grape-fruity both in aroma and flavour. 6.5% with 50 IBU this IPA is not as bitter as one expected, brownish orange in colour with a large off-white head, there was lots of citrus fruits in the aroma and some caramel with a taste of grapefruit's and bitter oranges. Flavour is all about the hop and has some nice balance between the citrusy fruits and the caramel malt backbone, loved it.

Citra is a dual-purpose hop released in 2007 by the Hop Breeding Company. A hybrid of a number of different hops (50% Hallertauer Mittelfrüh, 25% U.S. Tettnanger, 25% East Kent Golding, Bavarian, Brewers Gold, and other unknown hops) It's typically used as an aroma hop, but due to it's high alpha % and low cohumulone content, it makes an excellent bittering hop as well. Sierra Nevada is using Citra for it's dry hopping of their Torpedo Extra IPA.

Continue

Mandarina IPA

 

Nøgne Ø Mandarina IPA from Nøgne Ø which was just 7 weeks old is probably my favourite IPA from this craft brewery to date. Coming in at 50 IBU makes this an easy drinking IPA with appealing aroma/taste of tangerine, citrus and is somewhat sweet for this style of beer. Lovely fruity and resiny aroma and taste with slight bitterness like in lemons and gooseberry, but a nice sweetness like you get from tangerines and apricots.

Mandarina Baveria is a new German hop bred from cascade. The flavour variety was bred in Huell at the request of the beer industry in light of its demand for bold tastes and new aroma. It was introduced to the market in 2012.

Continue

Session IPA

Nøgne Ø Session IPA is a collaboration brew with Naparbier from Spain. Light orange in colour with a small white head, bit hazy. Aroma was quite mild and grassy, pale malt and some citrus fruits. Tastes of grapefruit, more light malt tones, grass and was medium dry and bitter. Great session beer but prefer to drink beers with more flavour and dimensions.

Continue

Vic Abstract IPA

Nøgne Vic Abstract IPA is a pretty new beer from Nøgne Ø that is based on their Vic Secret IPA, but fermented with Brettanomyces. This brett IPA takes on a whole new dimension of tropical fruits, passion fruit and pineapple and has a lovely dryness.

Light amber in colour with a quite large carbonation, initial aroma if very fresh fruit, peaches, sweet citrus fruits like grapefruit's. Oranges, mango the aroma is packed with fruitiness and a slight funkiness that is expected from the brett influence.

Taste is very similar to the aroma and even more, lovely tropical fruitiness and lot of citrus tones and there is lots of passion fruit and pineapple here. The dryness comes at the end and somehow enhances the freshness of all the tropical fruits. Here the hops and pine needles are left along with a nice lemon peel zest to the  long and delicate dry bitterness on the end. Definitely not a brett fan by any means but this beer is a huge winner for me, would even go out on a limb and say it is the best Nøgne Ø beer I had in 2015.

An amazing fruity and funky beer that I would love to drink again and such an easy beer to drink and enjoy all the tropical fruits. 

Continue

Vic Secret

Nøgne Vic Secret IPA is a new IPA from Nøgne Ø from the Summer of 2014 and is a single-hop IPA brewed using a new Australian hop called Vic Secret.

Cloudy yellow in colour with a nice fluffy off-white head, this IPA looked very nice and like it was meant to be, West Coast. Hazy with lots of sediment and yeast in the bottle of the bottle that did not bother me. Aroma was in my opinion lots of pine and citrus fruits and did not get any peach that many people have talked about. To me it had a very West Coast aroma like a Green Flash West Coast IPA.

The flavour had also lots of pine and bitterness, very dry and bitter finish that did not appeal to my taste buds at all. After taking a few mouthfuls I decided to read the label again and to my surprise I found the culprit, 100 IBU ouch. Beside the pine and citrus there is some grapefruit and not ripe pineapple on the taste. A very good example of a West Coast IPA but a way too bitter and dry for what I liked to drink. 

Continue

We Love Wheat

Nøgne Ø We Love Wheat is a collaboration beer with Lervig and classified as a Wheat IPA. Brewed using just 100% wheat malts (munich & cara) and generously hopped and dry hopped with centennial, cascade, warrior and simcoe. Nice to see these 2 big and market leading Norwegian breweries come together to brew such an unique beer together.


Amazing looking beer, blood orange in colour with a very hazy body as expected from just wheat malts, and the head was a light yellow to cream colour. Aroma was big and very fresh, so much citrus, pine, oranges and spices here. Very hoppy aroma which I just loved and ranked this as one of the better Nøgne Ø IPA aromas I have tasted.

The body was medium, had some sweetness in it and was also packed with juicy oranges and hoppy pine resin. Not sure what the IBU was for this beer, it was bitter but the sweetness seemed to be more dominant. At 7.9% this was very hard to tell, would love to have many of these bottles to drink on a warm summers day.

Wheat IPA is something I plan to brew, best of both worlds it seems with some spiciness coming from the wheat and the strong hops line-up making it a great IPA. Kjetil & Mike, great job, I love this beer.

Continue