All beer giants, except Heineken, have already entered the field of “flavor beer. For some reason Heineken has stubbornly ignored this segment until now. Maybe they do not consider this segment large enough for themselves or for some other reason. But, recently, they have released two types of Northern Hunting beers – Northern Hunting Nordic Berries and Northern Hunting Forest Herbs.
This is what the official description of this beer says:
A differentiated lager made especially for men. Balanced taste thanks to long aging and specially selected Nordic ingredients.
What is meant by “Differentiated Lager” God only knows, but it sounds mysterious. It’s better than boiler lager!
Northern Hunting Nordic Berries and Forest Herbs (Russia, Nizhny Novgorod) – 5.5% alcohol. I see no point in describing each of these beers separately. Both beers are ordinary pale lagers with either berry or pine flavoring. Nordic Berries gives the aroma of “forest berries” lemonade, slightly sweet, but a little tart in the aftertaste. Forest Herbs is similar in flavor and aftertaste to dishwashing detergent with pine fragrance.
I did not finish the latter. And it’s not about snobbery, it’s just unpleasant. I guess if someone likes alco-pop, then this kind of creation might be okay. And it’s not that flavorings are used (nothing against them, and many craft breweries dabble in them too), but that these flavorings give such an unpleasant “chemical” taste. “Specially selected northern ingredients” turned out to be poorly selected ingredients. I will grade both beers as “D+.”
