Hoportunity Knocks at Brewdog Aberdeen

We had been voting for beer styles and added ingredients in Brewdog Aberdeen for a couple of weeks now in anticipation of yesterdays visit of the Brewdog Pilot brew plant and Lead Brewer Franz.

 The voting system (high tech chalk board) would not have stood up to scrutiny by international UN observers, but unlike the people of Zimbabwae after their last election the patrons of Brewdog Aberdeen were generally happy with the result. It was decided to brew a brown ale with added hazelnuts and honey.

Brewdogs "Brew Magic" Pilot Plant

 So on Sunday morning Franz, fresh from his holidays and extended layover in Paris, loaded the Brewdog van with the pilot plant and loads of hops and malt. He also went to the bother of taking filtered treated water from the brewery, not wanting the complications of the chlorine in the Aberdeen municipal supply.

The event started about 1.30, but as I had had a bit of a heavy night on Saturday I didn't it make for the start and by the time I arrived Franz had already mashed in.

Malt Bill

Me giving the mash a stir.



Brewing on gas with added magic. Note the Meantime keg being used as a "brewery ladder" It was still full of beer.



The hop varieties which were considered for this brew.



The silver bags are hops. Franz brought an awful lot of hops. Ruination Brown Ale anyone?



The hops that actually went into the boil.

 When I arrived Franz was circulating the wort through the mash and waiting for the water for sparging to reach the required temperature.



 After sparging twice we had 47 litres of wort, to which 35g of Green Bullet was added as the bittering hops.

Bittering Hops



Franz testing the quality of the honey.

The Brewdog Aberdeen team adding the Pacifica hops.

After the boil which went on for about an hour, 50g of Pacifica hops were added along with the honey, and nuts. I'm not sure the rasins were in the original recipe, but those which hadn't been munched at this point went into the kettle too.

 The brew will be heading back to the brewery for fermentation and should be about 7% abv when it is finished. I'm looking forward to tasting it, when it comes back to the Aberdeen bar.

All in all it was a very enjoyable afternoon, and I learned a great deal more about the brewing process.

Franz is a friendly easy going guy and is more than happy to share his brewing knowledge.

Brewdog are planning similar events for their Edinburgh and Glasgow bars and I would recomend anyone with an interest in brewing to try and make it along.

You can read the official Brewdog Blog post about this here

Ghost Deer

 Last Night I paid my shortest ever visit to Brewdog Aberdeen. Ghost Deer was on for one night only and I just happened to be on nightshift so I popped in for a (part)* growler fill on my way to work, rather than miss trying this record breaking 28% ABV naturally fermented blonde ale. The beer has been fermented using three types of yeast, with the brewers feeding the yeast "exotic" sugars to keep it alive, to obtain the 28% alcohol content.

 A lot has been written over the last week about Ghost Deer. I thought I'd wait until I'd actually tasted the stuff before sharing my thoughts.

The controversy this time is the method of dispense. Brewdog have revisited taxidermy and this beer will only ever be sold poured from the head of a stuffed deer.

Ghost Deers first outing in Brewdog Edinburgh

As with the previous high strength beers from Brewdog a hilarious promotional video has been made, with the return of the dastardly sausage munchers, Hans & Wolfgang, and a special guest appearance of Jim Koch of the Sam Adams brewery, who brewed Utopias the previous record holder for a naturally fermented beer. A comment on an American blog suggested that Brewdog were being disrespectful to Jim Koch in the video, and were not acting in the colaborative way that US craft brewers do. I prefer to think that James and Martin are paying homage to Mr Koch as he is after all the guy who set the figure they were aiming to beat.
 You can see the video here http://vimeo.com/28692044

Will this provoke an ABV battle between Brewdog and Sam Adams. Utopias has been getting progressively stronger over a number of years now, but if the yeast can survive to produce 29 or 30% ABV remains to be seen. At least there can be no argument over whether this brew is actually beer.

So how does this beer actually taste. I'm not the greatest at describing aromas and flavours, but what I get is a very smooth whisky aroma and  flavour, not in the least bit harsh despite the 28% alcohol content. The mouth feel is substanial and despite all the added sugar, it isn't unpleasantly sweet. It is very very, perhaps dangerously drinkable stuff. It is actually quite viscous, and leaves oily legs on the side of the glass. It's not a beer you should want to drink a lot of at a time and is definitely a sipping beer. If you get the chance to try this beer I strongly suggest that you do. It will undoubtably be making an appearance at Brewdog Glasgow. After that I don't know, but I wouldn't be surprised if it paid a visit to Sweden, and was the Guest star at the opening of Brewdog Camden.

So have Brewdog as the beer monkey suggests jumped the shark? It all depends on your point of view I suppose. It seems to be fashionable in the beer blogging world right now to dismiss Brewdog as a bunch of immature schoolboys playing yet another prank. I on the other hand still find the marketing entertaining and amusing, but I suspect that Brewdog have played this hand one too many times now. Royal Virility Performance, managed to get some coverage in the Sun as well as few other national newspapers. Ghost Deer seems to have failed to get any sort of press coverage at all. The animal rights activists are strangely silent also, but then again deer are not as cute as squirrells!

 The deliberate creation of controversy no longer seems to be working for them as a marketing tool. I can't help thinking that perhaps the taxidermy has backfired on them and the fact that they have brewed a record breaking beer could have got them the publicty they desire on its own.

So where do Brewdog go from here? Do they turn the dial on the controversy machine up even further, until the national press gives them free coverage again, or do they maybe have to consider paying for advertising? Right now with the brewery capacity issues this isn't really a problem, but once the new brewery is up and running they will be eager to sell a lot more beer. They have after all about 4000 shareholders now who will be looking to see a return on their investment.


* I reckon a full Brewdog growler fill of Ghost Deer would cost somewhere in the region of £170. Would this be the record for most expensive growler fill too?