Danish Beers

I have a really good friend who married a girl from Denmark.  On their last trip up there he was kind enough to round up a few Danish beers for me and wanted me to try them.  I was impressed with a couple of these and not so much with the rest.  From what I can tell though Denmark has a pretty varied brewing culture with lots of small breweries producing obscure brews and a few big breweries producing some in mass quanties, almost makes me wish we had taken a trip up there.  Oh well, here is what I thought of the beers that I did get.

Fynsk Forar Hydleblomst Ale -  This appears to be a summer ale from Denmark. The label proudly proclaims it as a European Beer Star 2008 Tasting Gold Award winner.  It pours a cloudy straw yellow with some hints of orange.  The head is slightly off white and disappeared quickly.  The aroma is spicy citrus, somewhat reminiscent of a wheat beer.  The taste is sweet and caramelly with hints of fruits.  A little bit of hops comes in at the crisp finish.  This would be a great beer for drinking after mowing the yard on a hot summer day.  It came in a .5L bottle and at only 5.0% alcohol is something that can sipped on for awhile, definitely deserving of it's Gold Award, if only I had another one .

Vestfyen Willemoes Ale - This is a dark brown ale from Denmark.  It pours a dark brown with hints of red throughout the body.  The head was beige in color and very thin, dissolving rapidly with just some lacing on the sides of the glass.   The aroma is sweet and rich.  The taste is of well roasted malted caramel with hints of brown sugary sweetness.  Not much hops bitterness in this one.   The strength of the roasted malts is pretty overwhelming.

Ceres Bering Bryg -   This beer is supposedly from the Royal Brewery of Denmark.  Some reviews I've read called it a sweet stout, sounds good to me.  This beer pours a very dark chocolate with some hints of red throughout the body.  The head was thin to nonexsistent.  The aroma is very sweet.  That sweetness hits you in the face immediately, giving this beer an almost liqueur like taste.  The finish is wet and crisp with some alcohol overtones.  Wow this beer is really really sweet.  At times I almost thought I was sipping a spiced rum and coke.  In fact the sweetness was almost overbearing and ended up dumping this beer after a few drinks.  Alcohol abuse I know but I really couldn't take it anymore.

Wilbroe Argangsol 2011 - This beer is brewed by the Carlsberg brewery in Denmark.  I've seen it described as a malt liquer on some beer rating sites but Carlsberg calls it Pilsner.  I'm not sure it's a Pilsner but I don't think it's a malt liquer.  To begin with this beer has 10.6% alcohol by volume, so it packs a little bit of a punch.  It pours a clear copper red with a very thin head that dissolves almost immediately with some very fine lacing on the sides of the glass.  The aroma is very sweet.  That carries over into the taste which is sweet caramally malts, almsot reminiscent of a Marzen.  The finish though is where you find the alcohol and it lingers and lingers, although not overbearing.  A pretty interesting beer that you can only drink a little bit of.