The social distancing drinker

While trawling around my local SuperValu the other day looking for something new to drink, I noticed several interesting beers from Dublin-based

Rascals Brewing Co.

I’ve recommended several beers from this six-year-old brewery before, but have never spent an evening drinking different Rascals in order to appreciate the extent of their ambition to create distinctive beers for enthusiasts. Rascals is the result of a classic post-crash business idea. It was set up by two young entrepreneurs, Emma Devlin and Cathal O’Donoghue, who happened to like the craft beer scene in New Zealand, and returned home to give Irish people something new.

It worked. Since then, Rascals has brewed an ambitious range of craft beer, from Chardonnay Saisons to Mint Choc Stouts and Strawberry Vanilla Milkshake IPAs, and won the odd award — including a gold at the 2016 World Beer Awards for their Yankee White IPA. As well as selling their beer in off-licences and supermarkets, they have also created a pizza restaurant — which, in normal times, can seat 150 customers — alongside the brewery in Inchicore.

The brewery makes two special limited-edition beers every month — for example, a Berliner Weisse with raspberry and milk sugar; and a grapefruit Brut IPA.

I’d be the first to admit that the traditional red-coloured Berliner Weisse is a strange beer, probably not worth drinking outside dive bars in Berlin, but it holds a special place in my heart for nostalgic reasons, and I’m grateful to any brewery that makes an effort to regularly bring its followers something new.

Like other relatively simple hipster pursuits such as grinding coffee or trimming beards, many brewers adopt a rather po-faced approach to their craft which squeezes the joy out of their achievements. I like the Rascal ethos. Pizza is a great accompaniment to beer. So is curiosity.