What do you get when you cross Ireland’s oldest craft brewery with Ireland’s oldest independent distillery? You get Around the Clock, a unique barrel aged imperial Irish stout collaboration by Porterhouse Brewing Company and sister company Dingle Distillery.
Both companies were founded by the late Oliver Hughes and are recognised as amongst the best in their respective sectors.
Around the Clock Batch #3 has just been released and like its previous iterations, it’s a completely unique, small batch imperial stout that really couldn’t be made anywhere else in the world. The 12% ABV barrel aged imperial Irish stout has a limited release every winter. This year 15,000 bottles have been produced. It took almost 12 months from initial fermentation for them to reach store shelves.
“We brewed the batch initially in October 2020 and then placed it into barrels in November 2020,” said Jack Higgins, Brand Coordinator, Porterhouse Brewing Company.
The barrels in question are ex-bourbon casks from Dingle Distillery. The stout was aged for 250 days at the Porterhouse Brewery in Glasnevin, Dublin 9.
The brewing process for Around the Clock is unusually intense. “Two 100 hectolitre brews are boiled down to 50 HL each,” explained Jack. “There are seven hop additions and seven malt additions. These are boiled continuously for 24 hours.”
“At the end of the brewing process the Imperial stout was approximately 10%, then it gained an extra 2% abv in the barrels,” said Jack.
The resulting stout is bottled with a wax seal around the cap. It’s avilable now nationwide while stocks last via Grand Cru Beers.
