There's no way I can soften the punch so I just say it. It's penguin beer. Yes, penguin... beer. And it's called Tactical Nuclear Penguin. Tactical. Nuclear. Penguin. It doesn't get much more awesome than that, now does it?
This Weekly Penguin is also an epic tale about a man – that's me – whose two life-long convictions's collided head-on; alcohol-free living and extreme penguin fanboyism. It's not tough to guess which won and as soon as I heard about the existence of a penguin beer called 'Tactical Nuclear Penguin' I knew I had to taste it. Immediately after watching the introduction video from the BrewDog, the cool-yet-apparently-as-crazy-as-me brewery behind the product, the quest began.
The quest to get our flippers on it was borderline impossible. Finnish alcohol laws are extremely strict and one does not simply order a bottle from abroad. Especially when it's as strong as 32 %, the strongest beer on the market when it was introduced. The only way to get it would've been to order a full crate of the stuff, and giving with taxes one bottle rivals Whisky in terms of price, not even this penguin fan wanted to the the plunge. And then, like a miracle, Timo stumbled upon it Alko in Helsinki.
The beer comes wrapped in special brown paper back with a hand-drawn cartoon penguin and in big lettering '32 % ABV'. The bottle itself is pretty cool looking, too, though has a severe lack of penguin imagery.
So how does it taste? Well, this was my first beer – I'm not the kind that starts with easy curve, I guess – so I have to take the word of the people present at the tasting; Petja Heiskanen, Timo 'Voice of Primo' Liimatta and Matti Jokihaara. According to them it was sturdy stuff, tasting a bit like a beer concentrate, if such thing existed. You know the kinds of juice concentrate you mix with water to make it drinkable? Now imagine a beer version of that, without water dilution.
Huge thanks to Timo for acquiring the Tactical Nuclear Penguin and to Matti for snapping the pictures of this rather impromptu tasting session. The things other-than-beer featured in the pictures are me (*) and the Internet Troll plush made by Heini 'Silveriatha' Liimatta; I'll let you deduce which one is which.
(*) taken by my cohorts as evidence of the rare event, i.e me drinking alcohol that is not Irish coffee
