New Irish craft beers to quench your thirst this summer

Sun’s out. Time for a beer. Irish craft brewers all seem to agree that now is the time for refreshing hop-forward beers to quench our thirst in the warmer days ahead. Below are some new releases to try out in the coming weeks.

Grainne Walsh and Tim Barber of Metalman celebrate their 10th anniversary with Galactic Voyager Series, a range of hop-forward beers. First up was Giant Molecular Clouds, a deliciously fruity New England IPA, followed now by Cosmic Horseshoe, a double-hopped IPA with five varieties of hop. Later in the summer, there will be a West Coast IPA called Gravitational Wave.

Whiplash, celebrating its fifth anniversary, will relaunch Blue Ghosts. “This is a German-style pilsner, a particularly hoppy and bright traditional lager, and gives Whiplash the chance to take an old-world beer to modern intensities,” they say. “It absolutely smacks of citrus and noble herbal hop varieties and is on track to be a modern summer classic.”

Lineman has just the released the third in its intensely hoppy Electric Avenue Series. Electric Avenue #3 is made using Simcoe, Citra and Mandarina Bavaria 6% hops. Vivienne Lucey, of Lineman Brewery, says: “This is a hop-forward beer with some serious flavour; we use the freshest hops we can get our hands on and put them into similar base beers to allow the hops to sing.”

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Ballykilcavan has a couple of summer beers being canned soon and this is the first time the Ballykilcavan lager is going into cans. It is also promising a limited-edition hibiscus and pink grapefruit beer.

Wide Street has just released a session IPA as part of a Session series called Time Lapse. Coming this month will be a witbier with wheat, pale malt, oats and coriander seeds. It’s a quintessentially summer beer with its “white” appearance and orange/citrus esters resulting in a dry and refreshing mouthfeel. It will also release a Belgian pale ale with European hops and Belgian ale yeast. Its House Saison is a great summer beer too.

Wicklow Wolf has two new releases planned for June, including Vortex Illusion, a hop-charged West Coast IPA, and a rerelease of American Amber. “It was the very first beer we brewed and we haven’t brewed it again since August 2017,” Wicklow Wolf’s Darryl Murphy says. “Our head brewer Peter Reynier, the first ever Wicklow Wolf employee, is leaving us at the end of May to move to France with his fiancée. This was the first beer he brewed for us, and will be the last beer that he brews for us. The Amber Ale will be called For Pete’s Sake, in his honour.”

Juicy

Hope Brewery in Kilbarrack has just released its low ABV juicy, fruity Summer Seasonal IPA, and to celebrate its fifth birthday, will rerelease its Limited Edition Overnight Oats (thanks to a public vote).

Eight Degrees is holding the Original Gravity competition for artists, hard hit by the pandemic. The winning entries will be used on its summer releases. First up is an aromatic dry-hopped New England IPA, to be launched shortly.