In America they have one special day of the year that celebrates the preposterous lengths beer geeks and enthusiasts will go to in order get hold of a beer. It’s called Dark Lord Day.
This annual event held in the last week of April each year attracts thousands of crazed beer fans from around the world to the Three Floyds Brewing Company’s brewpub, located on a rather unglamorous industrial estate in the hard-to-get-to town of Munster, Indiana.
Thousands of beer lovers queue for hours to get a taste of the fabled Dark Lord.
Such is its fearsome reputation that grown men are known to happily abandon their families and head off on a thousand mile road-trip just to taste it. Those who can’t attend will gladly bid for bottles that unscrupulous profiteers always put up for sale on eBay, with the asking price of the $15 bottle fetching up to eight times that amount.
In Sweden we don’t have a beer that would generate such blind devotion and hype (in fact we do, this one, but I doubt if Närke will be launching a Kaggen Day anytime soon).
However if I was to nominate one day of the year for us to get ridiculously excited about the release of a beer, tomorrow would be that day.
That’s because tomorrow marks the annual return of one of the biggest, tastiest and best value-for-money beers you can buy in Sweden – Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout.
This huge stout is one of just five beers being released in around 30 selected Systembolaget stores from tomorrow. It is utterly intoxicating stuff, both in terms of the 10% of alcohol it carries and for its rich, heady, decadent flavours of the darkest chocolate, dried plums, vanilla and oak.
I was lucky enough to taste a bottle of 2010 Dark Lord at BrewDog Aberdeen recently.
Although it seems a little ‘cheap’ to mention the price I’m going to do it anyway, because at 19,90SEK a bottle this has to be one of the biggest steals since The Great Train Robbery.
I therefore don’t recommend you buy a bottle of it tomorrow. I recommend you buy 5. Drink one or two now before the snow melts and then store the rest away for between 2-10 years, during which time I promise you they will evolve into formidable beer experiences.
And lets not forget the other four beers going on sale tomorrow because they too are worthy of our attention and paychecks.
Two of them come from the world’s smallest and least known Trappist brewery, Achel, located in north-east corner of Belgium. Achel doesn’t covert attention (see if you can spot a single reference to beer on its website!) nor does it get the attention of its bigger ‘brothers’ like Chimay or Westmalle but its Bruin (brown) and Blond (blonde) ales both have a noted hop aromas and bitterness not often associated with Trappist beers and I highly recommend you try them both.
Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale is another annual beer release that may not attract the fanaticism of Dark Lord but is still something a lot of beer fans dutifully pencil into their diaries. This very American tasting ale is dry hopped using fresh whole US hop cones to deliver an intensely ‘green’ and invigoratingly bitter beer. Another must try!
Lastly we have Three Philosophers from Ommegang Brewery in New York, a US Belgium beer speciality brewery that likes to put a new world spin on old world beer styles .
The recipe for this limited 9.8% edition beer is based on a home brewer’s winning description of his dream beer in an international online beer competition. It is a rare blend of the brewery’s strong, malty quadruple and some cherry-infused lambic from Lindemans in Belgium.
Think of one of those luxury bars of dark Swiss chocolate with a soft cherry liquor centre and you’ll be getting close. This is a perfect beer to serve to die-hard wine lovers who look down their noses at beer’s supposed lack of complexity and in its corked 75cl bottle is another keeper. While running the risk of repeating myself it’s another must-buy!
