Scotch-like beer?

Look for Old Harviestoun http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/323/41154 and http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/323/47580

If you like some of that peaty taste from scotch, these will be right up your alley

 

Ola Dubh 40 was soooo nice. But if you are looking for a good smoky beer to go with a cigar, may I suggest New Holland Charkoota Rye? Pair with BBQ or a cigar, and you got a good day on your hands.

 

Was just going to say this. It's a scotch that's a beer. Total madness.

 

Gonna second/third any of the Harvieston Ola Dubh series. They're all aged in Highland Park casks, and the two I've had are delicious.

 

Wow, interesting reviews on this beer - so polarized.

 

Hello. Others have mentioned them but Bitch Please from BrewDog is an Islay whisky in beer form. Also they have their whole Paradox series which are aged in barrels from all over Scotland. You have Macallan, Springbank, Isle of Jura, etc. Those are all great. I haven't had a chance to try Dirty Bastard from Founders yet but I hear good things. Also, as others mentioned, just as good is the Mikkeller Black Hole series and they have an Islay whisky version.

Anyway, take it from someone who's been drinking single malts for over 20 years, the BrewDog stuff is as good as it gets in that category. However I wouldn't quite include Penguin in that category, and I'd be reticent to include the Bismarck. They are not whisky aged beers, they are just very high alcohol beers and that's not the same thing. Good luck.

Sesmu, the reason the reviews are so polarized is that it's a really good Islay whisky beer. That is not an easy drink for the uninitiated. It's not even an easy drink for people who drink whisky. It's one of those that you either love or hate. That's where you get the polarization.

 

maybe add a few "eye drops" of a Scotch you like to a beer you like?

 

Yup, Ola Dubh 40 was what I was going to post. It tasted exactly like Scotch to me, just without the alcohol heat.

 

I don't think imo Rauchbiers are anything like scotch. Rather I would say something like Bitch Please or Ola Dubh.

 

Oh, absolutely agree. I just pointed that this is one of those beers that you can't just judge by the rankings alone, but have to read the reviews, and a few, to understand. And you could tell who likes Islay from them, too

Now it makes me wanna try it some day Lagavulin is my favorite scotch.

 

yeah, I was surprised Michael Jackson made this comparison. Did he really? Schlenkerla is smokey, but not peaty smokey like scotch. I liked Schlenkerla, but it didn't make me think of scotch.

 

Hello. Hey crossovert is correct, Rauchbiers are literally (German) 'smoky' beers. The most common that we could all associate with is a smoked porter. That's completely different than a single malt scotch, specially a smoky and/or peaty single malt. As crossovert pointed out, those beers have the exact taste of scotch in them, not just a 'smoky' flavored beer. The two are very, very different flavors.

 

they're very different, but they're more different from almost every other flavor in beer than they are different from each other. i'd say liking beers with peat smoked malt is a good (but not knock down) indication that you'll like rauchbiers, and vice versa. edit: and by extension, if you like scotch, there's a good chance you can handle / appreciate the smokiness in rauchbiers.

 

Agree that they are not at all identical, just analogous.

I know I'm in the minority here, but I believe if you are so specifically seeking the flavors imparted by scotch (or bourbon or Pinot Noir or sherry or coffee or chocolate milk) you should drink a scotch/bourbon/wine/coffee/chocolate milk. In Scotland they had peat to fire their maltings, and they made Scotch out of it; in Bamberg they had beechwood forests to fire their maltings, and they made beer out of it. There's also a Rauchbierschnapps, which is probably a lot closer to Scotch. But, again, I assumed we were talking about wanting a beer....

 

yeah i get that they both used smoked malts but the taste difference is huge, rauchbier, at least traditional ruachbier has more of a campfire wood taste, not smoked peat.

 

True. IMO beechwood works much better than peat for smoking the malt used in beer. The opposite is no doubt true for scotch (I certainly wouldn't suggest a lover of single-malt scotch try a whiskey that used hickory wood for its maltings). I'm just a traditionalist that way, I suppose. Or perhaps I'm again a victim of U.S. craft brewing "innovation."

 

Actually, I take it back If that comparison was made, it was probably made some 15 or so years ago, and back then there wasn't a gluttony of whiskey-aged beers as we have today. So Schlenkerla's smokey profile was probably the closest you could get to scotch in a beer.

 

Michael Jackson was a huge fan of single-malt scotch. He was also a huge fan of Schlenkerla's beers (he said, of their Maerzen, that is it not only among beers, but among all alcoholic drinks, a classic). Perhaps he, too, was of the opinion that peat was best for single-malts and beechwood best for smoked beers (there were other smoked beers back then made using malt smoked with peat). For some reason the current craft beer scene has this odd Jelly Belly type obsession with making beers taste as close to some non-beer product as possible. I, for one, just don't get it.

 

Just picked up another Black Islay (Black Isle Brewery) on the weekend which is aged in Bruichladdich casks. Don't generally find that Islay casks integrate well with beer but if anyone of them is going to work its likely to be the Bruichladdich cask.

 

Kinda OT but this topic made made me think of it... Are there websites like this one, only for spirits? I read the distilling article in the new BA mag issue and I have to say I had no idea there was a "craft distilling" movement going on. I'm interested in exploring wine and spirits but I don't really know where to start.