Isn’t it funny how you can overlook something that’s right there under your nose?

I do it all the time. Like snow for example. There’s lots of it up here in the north of Sweden but it took several years before I realised you could actually use it to ski on.

Primator Premium Dark is the first of three Primator beers I'm reviewing.

The same thing regularly happens to me when I visit my local Systembolaget store. I tread the same well-worn path through the isles, instinctively searching out the small orange markers that denote a new beer is in town. Failing that I tend to switch into autopilot, heaping bottles of beers I am on familiar terms with into my shopping basket.

I rarely seem to stray from this regime, and therein lies my problem because there’s no doubt I am guilty of overlooking beers that deserve some space in my fridge back home.

Primator Premium Dark is one such beer. This dark lager from the Pivovar Nachod in the Czech Republic is a multi-award winning brew, having been voted the World’s Best Dark Lager in 2008 by the British ‘Beers of the World’ magazine.

The Pivovar Nachod brewery dates back to 1872 and first registered the Nachodsky Primator brand name (the predecessor of the current dark beer) in 1935.  Since 2006 the brewery has undergone some radical modernisation but still uses only Czech ingredients in all is beers, including South Moravian malts and spring water from an underground lake in the Adrpach National Park.

All very interesting stuff for a beer I’ve overlooked for months and months. So what’s it like then?

Primator Premium Dark pours a, well, dark russet brown with a slightly off-white head. The smell is all malts, with freshly baked brown bread, treacle, muscovado sugar and raisin juice.

It is naturally quite sweet to taste, but there’s just enough hop bite to avoid it becoming too sticky sweet. There’s also an underlying mineral taste – I assume from the water – that increases the drinkability factor considerably.

This is great beer and for me (a die-hard ale drinker) it’s altogether more interesting than its paler lager cousins. I can imagine it would pair really well with shellfish and practically any meat from the BBQ, as well as Asian dishes with some spicy heat that require a little sweetness to lift the flavours.

Primator Premium Dark

A Dark Lager from Pivovar Nachod, Czech Republic

4.8% ABV

Systembolaget Article Number: 1615