Brewery: Iron Horse Brewery
Beer: Quilter’s Irish Death
Style: American Strong Ale
ABV: 7.8%
Character: Brewed as an approachable dark, smooth ale, not meant to be classified by guidelines.
Ratings: BA: 85 | RB: 79
Metal Connection: THE GREAT KAT – Death to you
BeerMetalDude Rating: 4/5
I saw Death in the name, and I saw a skull and crossbones on the label. Sure, I’ll order that! I found this wonderful beer online and had my good friend, and fellow beer blogger, Jorge Espinoza (animebeers.com) send it to me. So, as usual, I have to send a huge thanks to main man in Cali for this hook-up! I had had a sample of thid beer once before in a bottle share with my old coworkers at our company party on the river. I am just glad to finally have this bottle to call my own.
The label is simple, yet very cool. The main color of the label is a khaki color with the word “death” watermarked all over the label in the typical broken typewriter font that Iron Horse uses on their labels and logos. The main art piece features a Celtic cross silhouette with a large full focused skull and crossbones, and the same broken font displaying the beer name in bright black letters. As I said, very simple, yet eye catching. Anything with skulls will usually grab my attention.
I used a goblet glass for this session, and Quilter’s Irish Death poured a very dark brown, similar to a cola. The beer was topped with a small line of head, which remained as a thin layer atop the beer throughout the session, leaving small lines of lacing down the glass.
All caramel and toffee smells up front. Some dark fruits, like dates, and figs, and a small hint of raisins show up next. There are hints of molasses, sweet brown sugar, and some milk chocolate lingering in the nose behind the big bold flavors. What’s rather strange is that the tail end and lingering aroma has some traces of cherry, blended with sweet caramel, and chocolate.
The taste follows the aroma with caramel, and toffee hitting the palate first, followed by milk chocolate, molasses, brown sugar, dates, figs, and some raisins. In the taste, I was able to pick up some earthiness, and a hint of cherry. The aftertaste is cherry, caramel, and chocolate.
The body was medium. The mouthfeel was slick and oily with moderate carbonation. The finish was slick and oily with a fizzy tingle.
Overall, This beer was rather fantastic and full of big bold flavors. I happen to agree with Iron Horse Brewery and say that this beer isn’t easy to classify. There was so much going on here, yet the beer was smooth and easy to drink, despite it’s moderately high 7.8% ABV. I recommend this beer if it available for you to purchase in your area. Happy hunting fellow Craft Beerians!
Metal Connection: Well, shit was this one a fun one to find that perfect song. No good songs came up with the word “Quilter’s,” “Irish,” or “Irish Death,” so I just went with the word “Death.” Of course, the results were 353666345345626662346456356663 songs found. OK, that is an exaggerated number, but you know what I mean.
I went with an odd choice here with The Great Kat, a Speed Metal/Guitar Shredder. Katherine Thomas, known to the Metal world as The Great Kat has been releasing music since 1986. A lot of the songs on her releases are guitar shredding covers, and such, her first couple of albums showcased original music. Here is the song “Death to you” from her debut full length album, Worship me or Die! from 1987, released as a 12″ vinyl record on Roadrunner Records. This song simply shreds. Her way of screaming the vocals on this song are so fucking angry. The song starts off with a high scream from this Metal lady and quickly goes right into her frantically spitting out the verses of this song all while shredding on her guitar. I found this song so fitting cause majority of the second half of the song is just these awesome lyrics…
DEATH TO YOU!
DEATH! DEATH!
DEATH! DEATH!DEATH! DEATH! DEATH TO YOU!
DEATH! DEATH!
DEATH! DEATH! DEATH TO YOU!
DEATH! DEATH! DEATH!DEATH! DEATH! DEATH TO YOU!
DEATH! DEATH!
DEATH! DEATH! DEATH TO YOU!
DEATH! DEATH! DEATH!
Beer Metal Media 