Brú Rua – a red beer from Co. Meath, Ireland

 

Over the summer months, I have been enjoying tasting Irish craft beers. Ireland seems to be exploding with breweries, with one in nearly every county. I have certainly tasted beers from every provence over the last three months.

One suggestion, from an Off Licence, I visited was that the recession in Ireland has prompted many career changes and some of these have led to the creation of a microbreweries. There was also the caution that they’re not all good! Still I bought a bottle  or so from most of the 18 different types they had.

What’s particularly interesting is that, they are making different beers to those being made in the UK. There was oatmeal stout and rye red ale, just to name two types of beer I have never seen in the shops in Cardiff. This was very nice to see.

Tonight, I am drinking Brú Rua, a red beer made by Brú Brewey in Co. Meath. Red ales are popular in Ireland and most of the big and microbreweries will make a version. This one looks the part with a pale brown colour. It tastes dry but a little fruity and my wife says ‘leather’. I’m not so sure about that but it does have a flavour that’s a little difficult to describe. Enjoyable and going down very nicely, thank you very much.

They have some funny sales info on the back of the bottle including a nice picture of Cú Chulainn. Nice.

Craigies Irish Cider

Craigies is made in County Wicklow, Ireland. According to the bottle, it has Dabinett, Katy and Bramley apples. This sounds like a nice blend of cider apples, sweet apples and cooking apples.
It’s a sparkling cider and was cloudy and brown. Not the most appetizing colour to be honest.
It had a nice dry apple taste with medium tannins. I enjoyed it. I ate it with a veg and bread stew. They went well together.
5.8% alc by vol.

e