24 Bars in Aarhus - part 24

Fermentoren Aarhus

Fermentoren is my regular. It's a craft beer bar that opened spring 2014 in Aarhus. It changed the beer scene in aarhus.

Fermentoren has 22 fast rotating taps.

Here is how one half of the blackboard looked on a random day in November

and here is a photo from 22nd December:

Fermentoren have beers from the best danish breweries on:

Fermentoren (their own brewery, made by one of the owners), Dry and Bitter (made by another of the owners), To Øl, Mikkeller, Amager and many more. A lot of the beers are from good danish breweries, but you can also find beers from other Scandinavian countries, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, UK, USA and probably more

There is also a big selection of bottled beers.

Once or twice a month Fermentoren has tap takeovers, where the focus is on one brewery (usually), but there has also been country themed tap takeovers.  

The music is my favourite playlist in Aarhus. Classic rock style. But played low volume so it doesn't interfer with chatting what-so-ever. 

Except for the blackboard lightning, all the light in bar is provided by candles. It's a cozy, rustic bar, with old wooden furnitures and old sofas. There is even an 80s style arcade machine in the corner.

Fermentoren has a small spirit selection with mainly whisky and rums, but also gin and mezcal

Here is todays photo of the whiskies

There is no food in Fermentoren, but if you ask nicely, you can usually bring some take-away in. There is an abundance of places to buy food in neighbourhood

22 taps

Fermentoren is the sister bar of the original Fermentoren in Copenhagen. Fermentoren Aarhus has a facebook page

24 Bars in Aarhus MAP

Cozy bar, great music, fantastic beers, nice knowledgeable staff and a lot of really nice regulars. What else can you ask for ?

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24 Bars in Aarhus - part 23

Highlanders

Highlanders is THE whisky bar in Aarhus. 

Highlanders have a big selection of whisky. Most OB's can be found. It's also SMWS partnership bar, so there is a big selection of SMWS whiskies as well. The bar also hass a particular big selection of Kavalan. Beside whiskies there is also a big selection of rums

Some of the whiskies at Highlander

Highlanders is not just whiskies, they also have a good selection of beers. There is about 13 different beers on tap

Beside the tap list there is also a huge selection of bottled beers. As there is not a lot of rotation of the beers on tap I often dig into one of the bottled beers when I visit

Highlanders often hosts whisky tastings and rum tastings. As an SMWS partnership bar there is a bimonthly casual day where members can come down and taste and buy the whiskies of the new outturn.

The food at Highlander's is pub food de luxe, and it's very good

Highlander's has a website here

24 Bars in Aarhus MAP

I recommend this place, no matter if you going for a beer or a whisky

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 22

Krofatter's mad- og ølbar

Krofatter's is a new beer and dapas place (danish tapas)

Er den apostrof korrekt dansk ?

There is 10 taps of beers from Syndikatet and Coisbo. It's nice to see a place that offers beers from alternative breweries 

The selection and variety of beers is good. Unfortunately 3 of the taps were off when I visited.

7 taps of Coisbo

My choice of beer was a 5th Avenue lager and later Four, a russian imperial stout. The first was good, but the latter lacked a bit of sweetness and was a bit too much on the acidic side. Not the best balanced russian imperial stout I have tried.

Beside the 10 taps, there is also a bout 30-40 bottled beers to choose from

The food is exciting and not like anywhere else, but also very expensive as the portions is very small. But Tapas is supposed to be small, I think they forgot to adjust the prices to the sizes of the portions

I would say the style of food appeals to men and the sizes of the portions appeals to women or men that isn't very hungry

Krofatter's has a website here

24 Bars of Aarhus MAP

It's unlikely I would go to eat here again, but I will probably pop in for a beer very occasionally

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 21

Cafe Albert

It's daring to open a beer place outside the city center, Nevertheless, this is what Cafe Albert did in 2015. And let me be clear, this is a great place, and not something you'd expect to find in the inner suburbs. When you enter this place the atmossphere is more like a cafe in the latin quater.

Cafe Albert has around 4 taps of beer. There is some taps from Aarhus Bryghus. Aarhus Bryghus Pislner is far better than the pislners served at 90% of the bars in Aarhus. There is usually also a tap of IPA, usually from Mikkeller

The day I visited the IPA was Amass West Coast IPA, it was delicious and very fresh

Beside the taps, Cafe Albert has a medium selection of bottled beers. The selection is very varied, and very very good. It's dominated by belgian beers and beers from the danish brewery To Øl

After the Amass IPA I had one of my favourite barrel aged beers. Rio Reserva from de Struise

Followed by a saison from To Øl. All three beers were magnificient

The interior at Cafe Albert is old style living room, very similar to Vesterlauget

The place is very cozy and relaxed and judging from the pumpkin soup I had the food is really delicious

Pumpkin, chili, koriander and serrano

I can highly recommend Cafe Albert

Cafe Albert website is HERE

24 Bars in Aarhus MAP

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 20

Mikkeller Bar

This is the newest addition to the beer scene in Aarhus. Mikkeller runs/co-runs several bars and restaurants in Copenhagen. Mikkeller also have bars in selected cities around the world of which I have visited the one in San Francisco.

28th November was the opening day and the event attracted a lot of local beer entusiasts

Queue to get in at Mikkeller Bar at the opening day

Mikkeller Bar Aarhus has 20 taps and a very good bottle selection

The 20 taps seems to be 3 regular Mikkeller House Beers (Wit, Pils and Brown) 5 guest beers and 12 rotating Mikkellers

So far I have seen guest beers from Boon, Hoppin Frog, Warpigs and Alesmith (including their Vietnamese Coffee Stout!)

Mikeller Tap List and Lucas the Bar Manager

The tap list seems to include a lot of the beer styles that is very popular amongst entusiasts, like Stouts, Sours and IPA's. The beer prices varies a bit and some of the more special stuff can be very pricy, but there is always a lot of "normal" priced beers

The beer I decided to drink at this vist was the supreme Koppi IPA Citra - Santa Barbara, and this is one of most well made beers I have ever tried. A perfect balance of the hops, and also the hops versus the coffee. Also the advantage of being so associated with the brewery, the beers are usually very very freash. And this Koppi IPA was delicious fresh. One of the best beers I had this December

Mikkeller Bar Aarhus has a a range of their own spirits, but also some whiskies

Just a short time after my visit, Mikkeller Bar had an event with the release of the newest batch of Mexas Ranger. For that they had Mexican food from the excellent Chido, and with the mexican theme Lucas had also obtained one of the finest spirits in the world. the del Maguey Chicicapa

I highly recommend Mikkeller Bar Aarhus. It's a must visit for a beer entusiast in Aarhus 

Mikkeller Bar Aarhus has a webpage HERE 

24 Bars in Aarhus Beer MAP

Glenlivet Nadurra - Dumbed down whisky ?

So this is actually my 19th bar visit for my 24 Bars in Aarhus advent calendar

But it's also time for a rant. The NAS rant - every whisky blogger just has to go there I guess.

I went down to an irish pub in Aarhus called Tir Na Nog for a Glenlivet Gueardian event. The purpose of the tasting was the introduction of 1 or 2 new versions of Glenlivet Nadurra

Let me start from the beginning. What is NAS whisky ?

NAS means No Age Statement

Quite often a whisky will have an age statement. Like 12 years old, or 25 years old. This means the youngest whisky in the bottle has matured at least 12 or 25 years in oak casks. Or whatever the label says. Other whiskies have age statement by letting you know the distillitation and bottling dates. Somethng like: Distilled 25th October 1990, Bottled Spring 2012.

NAS whisky has no indication of the age of the whisky, or not much. It can be 25 years old or it can be 3 years old. You don't know. 3 years is the minimum age for scottish whisky, so that is guarenteed.

The setup for this tasting was Glenlivet Founders Reserve, 15yo, 18yo, 21yo, 25yo and 3 different versions of Glenlivet Nadurra. The First Fill Nadurra, Nadurra Oloroso and Peated Nadurra

Let me focus on Nadurra here. The very first Nadurras were cask strength and had an age statement. 16 years old. They were fantastic whiskies. And very popular. Nadurra means natural in gaelic and I was told that Glenlivet wanted to bottle "natural" whisky. I assumed this is why they bottled this at cask strength and the casks choosed were first fill ex-bourbon. No messing around with the whisky from winecasks.

But then the dumbing down of an excellent product started. First versions bottled at 48% appeared, then no age statement oloroso versions came, and now we see releases of NAS cask strength and NAS 48% versions of Nadurra First Fill

And it doesn't taste anything like the original batches

The whisky of the new 63.1% Fist Fill Nadurra is nothing like the Age Statement 16yo original cask strength versions. They were vanilla-oak-citrus bombs and fantastic whiskies. The new version is perfumy, newmaky and hot. So what happened? Glenlivet builds up a fantastic brand of quality whisky. And now they try to sell much yonger, not as good whisky, for the same price. Caveat Emptor

This is one reason I don't like NAS whiskies. It usually goes as above. A great brand. It used to be good whisky, but the good whisky is replaced with younger whisky, and the quality declines. The price usually doesn't

I do know that an age statement doesn't mean the quality for a whisky stays the same, but at least the consumer got a little bit of guarentee of what they buy

And don't get me wrong. I don't dislike NAS whisky or young whisky. There is plenty of examples of good whisky that have no age statement and there is plenty of examples of good whiskies that are young and has an age statement. Unfortunately, the main reason that producers change a version from an age statement to NAS is so that they can dumb down the quality

I don't have to go far to find another example. Glenlivet Founder's Reserve. This is slowly replacing Glenlivet 12yo in many market and retail shops. It was the first whisky of the tasting at Tir Na Nog, and it tasted like Glenlivet with added New Make. Another Dumbed Down Product

Go back 5 years and read this press release from Chivas Bros

http://pernod-ricard.com/files/fichiers/Presse/Documents/201006028%20The%20age%20matters%20UK.pdf

How ironic

Now back to Tir Na Nog

Tir Na Nog is another irish pub in Aarhus. They have an excellent selection of irish whiskies

I don't recall beeing in another bar with so many different irish whiskies. 

Beside the irish whiskies there was also a lot of scottish whiskies. A lineup of OB's from better known distilleries, Glenlivet included

The main problem with the whisky here is that it was terrible overpriced. 250Dkr (25£) for 1999 single cask 2cl ?

If you buy 4cl you get 50% of the last 2cl's. Still expensive, and I am not a big supporter of volume discounts. Doesn't really fit into my drink responsible, drink less - drink better pholosophy for the concerned whisky entusiast where taste matters more than volume.

The beer selection was mainly standard stuff

A lineup like this scares me

But there were a few good alternatives for the beer entusiast

!

Ok, You might still not be impressed but I found this gem in the bar

Which was a very good stout from Porterhouse

I had to try a whisky and my choice went on

It was ok to try a cask strength irish whisky and it had a somewhat sensible price of "just" 90DKR (9£) for 2cl

Would I recommend Tir Na Nog. Not really. It's a party place and more "corporate" than "entusiast"

After the tasting most of the people went to the bar and one of the staff asked us what we thought of the tasting. Our answers were in the line of. Good Whisky, but the Nadurra was a pale shadow compared to the original version. (I probably said "The new Nadurra is crap, I want the old one back, which was excellent")

The guy behind the bar started arguing with the group "It's all a matter of taste"

I was about to bang my head down the bar and answer "No, it's a matter of you don't have a clue about what a good whisky is" but I was luckily "rescued" by a colleague who tapped me on the shoulder

"Hey, Steffen, Are you here?, what a coincidence"

Saved by the bell

I could say that Johnny Walker Red is just as good as Brora 1972. It's all a matter of taste!. Aye, it's a matter of taste. But would you trust my other whiskyrecommendations ? or buy whisky from me? No. You would go somewhere else, somewhere where people makes more sense

PS I really liked the 15, 18, 21 and 25yo. Especially the 25. Age Does Matter. Sometimes

Tir Na Nog has a website here

24 Bars in Aarhus MAP

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 18

Cirkuskroen

Cirkuskroen is a small local pub near the water

It's one of many local pubs in Aarhus that have a few things in common

Local
Smoking

The beer you drink is Ceres Top

It's cheap

Cirkuskroen is a bit different as it is decorated with more than 1300 clown dolls

My choice of drink went to Ceres Top. Ceres used to be the town brewery, but as it got a bigger operator it was bought up or had a fusion with Thor/Albani/Faxe which are other regional danish standard pilsners. They now moved the production of all their brands to a factory somewhere I forgot, so it's not a local beer anymore

I drank quite a lot of Ceres Top over the years, and I still prefer this to other danish SIL's (Standard International Lagers). It's probably pure nostalgia. Aarhus Bryghus, a true local brewery makes a better pilsner and if you move to craft beer, we have a very small brewery called Humleland that makes great beers

Circuskroen has a website 

If you want to try a good cold Ceres Top, I would go here. The clown dolls are a magnificient display. If Stephen King made you scared of clowns, don't come here. The staff and locals are very friendly

24 Bars in Aarhus MAP

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 17

Die Kleine Bierstube

This is the german pub in Aarhus, at least it's the one, if you are after good beers

The bar has 9 taps, mainly of traditional bigger german brands, but also some newer more craft beer style beers.

Here in December there was a special winter beer selection

On tap there is always a pilsner, a dunkel and a weissbier. Köstritzer schwarzbier is also a regular, which is a favourite of mine. Riegele Simco 3, a nice hopped pilsner have been on tap as a regular the last couple of years. Beside the taps there is a huge slecetion of bottled beers. Crew republic, Ayinger, Schneider, Acht Schlenkerla, Veldensteiner, Jever and many more

My choice of drinks was a Warsteiner Winter and half a bottle of Augustus 8, a wheat doppelbock from Riegele

Köstritzer on tap

Die Kleine Bierstube have food at selected times, the music is kitchy german schlager/pop music and you can always go for a game of hitting nails in the log

I highly recommend this place. The beers are good and the staff are friendly. The staff are also germanspeaking, and they wear Dirndl or Lederhosen.  

Die Kleine Bierstube has a website here

24 bars in Aarhus MAP

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 16

Memphis Road House

This is an american barbecue restaurant. Beside the american style food, this place also serves alcohol in a very american way

The spirit selection is focused on bourbon, american gins, tequila and mezcals

Their wine is californian red wines, mainly from Lodi and Santa Barbara

The beer list is a short list of a few american microbrews and also some of their big brands like Miller and Budweiser

Soft drinks are also very american. Coca Cola or root beer ?

On top of this there is a small selection of classic cocktails, like Margarita, Bourbon Sour and Old Fashioned

This time we went in for some food. Burgers, pulled pork, brisket were some of the things on the menu. My choice went on "all you can eat hot chicken wings". With a nice starter of deep fried spring rolls filled with various meat and cheese

All very delicious

Memphis Road House has the best selection of bourbons in Aarhus

My choice of beer was a very good Yellow Dog Pilsner, followed by a Yellow Dog IPA. This was standard american microbrew and you have to look hard to find a restaurant in Aarhus with a better beer selection than Memphis. I can only think of 2-3 other places and they will also be mentioned in this Advent Calendar: Beside this yellow dog there were a couple of other offerings from Anchor

With the starter I also had a Four Roses Limited Small Batch 2013, and as this is one of the best bourbons bottled in this decade, you can't really go wrong there

As they made a mistake on our payment we got a taste on the house of this on our way out

Which kickstarted a geeky discussion with one of the staff, what Corn Whiskey actually is. 

Corn whiskey must have an 80% corn mashbill and be matured in used barrels or non-charred new barrels.

As this Mellow Corn is a "Bottled in Bond" it is at least 4 years old, and the label says it's distilled at DSP KY-31 which is prefire Heaven Hill

I liked it

This is a great restaurant to visit, which is very true to it's inspiration. It's hard to find a restaurant in Aarhus with a better overall drink selection

Memphis Road House website is here

24 Bars in Aarhus MAP

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 15

Fairbar

Fairbar is a craft beer pub, but also a charity. The place is non-proft and run by the local YMCA/YWCA. The staff is volunteer and the current project they support is called Minglebar Myanmar

You can read more about on their website here

As the staff group is volunteer, there is a many people who works here. The beer knowledge is usually not the same level as other bars of this type, but sometimes the occasioal beer geek is behind the bar

But don't get me wrong, this is a modern craft beer pub, laid out cafe style mixed with a small art gallery

A few days prior to our visit, Fairbar had a tap takeover by Jopen, so the tap list was heavily dominated by Jopen

6 beers from dutch Jopen and 4 danish microbrew

Fairbar has the possibility of a sampler board. 5 10cl samples of beer your own choice and a glass of peanuts

My choice went to 5 beers from Jopen I hadn't tried before, despite I've just been on a beer trip to the Netherlands, where I tried plenty of Jopen

It was a nice set of beers, the beers were very frash. My favourite of the set was the Bloemenmarkt, a saison and Hop Zij Met Ons, a fresh american style IPA

The music is relaxed modern pop music

Fairbar is one of the top beer bars in Aarhus. Highly recommended

24 Beer bars in Aarhus MAP 

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 14

Great Coffee 

Today I am moving away from my comfort zone again, and I was really impressed by this place

This is a coffee bar is the most geeky bar I have ever been to, and I have been to a few

First you can choose your coffee bean and then comes at least 5 different ways of brewing, of which I hadn't heard of 4

Our choice fell on the same bean, my friend choosed Siphon and I went for Chemex. The bean was Fully Washed Ethiopian Yirga-Cheffe. And I can promise you the two cups tased different

Here is their coffee board

And the Siphon looked like this:

One thing I particular liked about this place is that it was designed more like a bar than a cafe. Made me feel more at home I guess

For a "dessert" we had the Signature Drink

This was a weird drink made from sirup mad from coffee shells (not sweet at all), Espresso that had been "matured" in a rowan tree log for some days and then topped up with a hot double espresso

 

The place is inside parts of an old chocolate factory and hidden in the back yeard

Fun place and highly recommended, Their website is here

24 bars in Aarhus - the map is growing

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 13

Vesterlauget

Beers on tap

Vesterlauget. A restaurant with a good beer selection. Or is it a beer bar with great food?

I don't really know. It's a small place. The 5 taps are quite easy to remember so the blackboard has the bottled beers list

This place have excellent beers and in Aarhus, this is the restaurant with the best beer selection. At least of the ones I have been to.

The interior is a bit old fashioned living room style, with some more cafe style tables in the back. Especially one corner in the front is totally retro style, and that's where we took a seat

The food is great. Our choice was a tablet board of food served with some really good bread. The tablet contained 3 cheeces, rillettes de canard, pate and fennel sausage with a few pickled minicucumbers, onions and beetroots

This is delicious

From the tap I had a Ebeltoft IPA and later a Kihoskh Saison Sally from Mikkeller on bottle

The whisky selection was limited to three bottles, but some not that usual bottles. 10yo Benriach Curiositas, Te Bheag blend and 12yo Auchentoshan

Vesterlauget is a  very cozy place, the food is great and relaxed, and it's a good place to go for the beer entusiast. This is a little gem in Aarhus

Their webiste is here 

24 bars in Aarhus MAP

24 Bars in Aarhus - part 12

Barstart

Barstart is another hidden bar in Aarhus. It is well hidden behind a few other bars and under the pedestrian street bridge that also crosses Aarhus Å (A small river coming through town, and in this area both sides are littered with Cafe's, restaurants and bars)

Barstart is a cocktail bar, but they have a good selection of bourbons. Elijah Craig 12, Wild Turkey 101, a couple of Blanton's, Rittenhouse 100, Four Roses Small Batch and more

There is also a couple of good bottled beers, Crew Republic and Ugly Duck

My drink of choice fell on a couple of Classic Whisky Cocktails, Old Fashioned made from Elijah Craig 12 and a Manhattan from Rittenhouse 100

It's a cozy little place, where the bartenders and the bar is taking up a substatial part of the room. So you have a first seat view of your cocktails getting prepared

Nice staff, and good cocktails

Reviewing Cocktail Bars is very much out of my comfort zone, but I like this place and will give it my recommendations in case you want to exchange your dram or beer with an Old Fashioned

24 bars map is HERE