St Andrews Brewing Company was chosen by the BrewDog St Andrews team for their CollabFest 2019 festival of collaborative brewing. The beers launched simultaneously today across the UK Brewdog bar estate plus several continental BrewDog bars. One 20 litre keg was sent to each bar in the UK and several made their away to the overseas BrewDog bars.
The St Andrews beer is called Hippophae Fife; a Sea Buckthorn IPA 6.2%. Sea Buckthorn is a superfood made famous by a top Danish chef, an invasive weed, an incredible source of Vitamin C. Sea Buckthorn is used by golf course designers who plant it to stabilize the dunes and provide a wind break on links courses. Something growing abundantly around St Andrews and Fife.
So what’s with the name Hippophae? The ancient Greeks fed it to their horses to give them a silky coat. Hippo is the ancient Greek for Horse; think of Philippos – the lover of horses or Hippopotamus – the river horse.
Not wanting to attract undue attention from the Portman group, but I can’t wait for my shiny mane and resilience to winter colds.
So how does the beer taste? Sour beers and sour IPAs are in demand at the moment, and the natural tartness of the berries is the most obvious flavour. Secondary flavours are star fruit, unripe mango and hints of pineapple. Like all St Andrews Brewing Co beers, it is really well balanced. It is incredibly refreshing and there is a nice viscosity from the berries.
International Brewdog Bars pouring Hippophae: Barcelona, Brussels, Dogtap Berlin, St Pauli in Hamburg, Budapest, Oslo, Malmö, Södermalm in Stockholm, Norrköping, Nice, Paris, Reykjavík, Tallinn.
UK Brewdog Bars pouring Hippophae: Castlegate in Aberdeen, Shoreditch, Tower Hill, Canary Wharf, Camden, Seven Dials, Paddington, Shepherds Bush, Brixton, Leeds, Lothian Road in Edinburgh, Merchant City in Glasgow, Manchester, Bristol, Cambridge, Cardiff, Carlisle, Dundee, Inverurie, Leicester, Liverpool, Norwich, Overworks Taproom in Ellon, Oxford, Reading, Southampton, St Andrews.
St Andrews Brewing Company
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