Beer Man: Hops dominate new ‘Game of Thrones’ beer
Beer Man is a weekly profile of beers from across the country and around the world.
This week: Seven Kingdoms
Brewery Ommegang, Cooperstown, N.Y.
Fans of the Game of Thrones series on HBO have eagerly been anticipating Sunday’s season premiere.
It will be the first season that ventures from George R.R. Martin’s book series into unknown territory. Martin has been working on the latest book for about six years and his schedule was not able to keep up with the cable series.
Brewery Ommegang started brewing a Game of Thrones line in 2013 in collaboration with HBO, releasing the beers before the season premieres of the show.
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The latest is called Seven Kingdoms and is described as a “hoppy wheat ale” on the label.
The brewery started out specializing in Belgian-style beers and is very good at it. I’m a fan of all of their base beers, such as Rare Vos, Witte, Abbey Ale, Hennepin, Three Philosophers and Gnomegang.
In recent years, however, Ommegang has been releasing Americanized versions of Belgian styles, which means the addition of pine and grapefruit-forward American hops. Seven Kingdoms, at 6.9% ABV, is such a beer and falls more into the American Pale Ale style.
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It started off with beautiful, intoxicating floral hop aromas, with a hint of citrus. Among the best I’ve experienced. The beer formed a bright white head on top of a cloudy gold body — the cloudiness is from not filtering out the yeast, so that fermentation continues in the bottle.
Nice ropes of lacing formed on the sides of the glass, intensifying the aromas. So far so good.
As with most American ales, however, the taste was dominated by pine, with lingering bitterness and harshness at the end. There was a nice prickly carbonation to the beer that was more in line with Belgian pale ales.
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The hops made it difficult to find the “wheaty maltiness” that was promised on the label. It became more noticeable as the ale warmed in the glass, but was still overshadowed. Drinkers of American pale and India pale ales will find much to enjoy about this beer; others still have the other Ommegang beers to enjoy.
Ommegang has wide distribution throughout the U.S.; it has a “Find a Beer” link at the top of its home page.
Many beers are available only regionally. Check the brewer's website, which often contains information on product availability by mail. Contact Todd Haefer at beerman@postcrescent.com. To read previous Beer Man columns, click here.