Sometimes a bland lager is exactly what you need though: entirely reliable and it doesn't impinge on anything before it hits your bloodstream.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fs4LusZmrlU/T33viXfCjqI/AAAAAAAAAMM/tztwNKUmZuM/s640/sam-smith-vegan.jpg1.jpg
(can't find a picture of the genuine 3D article: scrubbed from the internet)
― mark s, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:16 (seven years ago) link
Yeah a bland lager on a really sunny day works in a way that no other beer does in that situation.
― Matt DC, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:18 (seven years ago) link
I mistakenly had a sour recently and it was viscerally upsetting , they are creeping in gradually and insidiously much the way that the volume of horrible music creeps up whenever I go into a shop, while heavily hopped beers encroach like overpriced city carpentry classes .
I like ambers the best, genial and rambling! but I am in need of new recommendations
― saer, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:19 (seven years ago) link
they definitely have their place
xpost
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Friday, 23 September 2016 15:19 (seven years ago) link
A huge variable with cask ale is how well it is kept. There really is a massive difference between a beer that's in top condition and the same beer, but poorly kept. It may not taste absolutely foul but it can taste really mediocre and may lead to the conclusion that that beer is intrinsically bad. Mind you, while I've had a good pint of the usually to be avoided Adnam's Broadside, I've never ever had a good pint of Doom Bar.
― dubmill, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:21 (seven years ago) link
Haha I was in a pub last weekend and accidentally bought a sour and basically ordered another pint straight away. They're not clearly labelled a lot of the time, last night in the pub I nearly ordered one and the barman just said "I wouldn't if I were you, it's fucking disgusting, buy a good beer instead".
― Matt DC, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:23 (seven years ago) link
I hope you tipped him
― mark s, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:25 (seven years ago) link
a friend of mine will sit and pints of sour beer. it disgusts me. like 5/6 in a sitting.
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Friday, 23 September 2016 15:27 (seven years ago) link
I wonder how it's possible to tell when a disgusting sour beer goes off?
― Tim, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:27 (seven years ago) link
Every so often something comes along in life and I think this is a prank, but these sours, with names that don't indicate anything to do with there being sour times ahead, you have to be alert, but at the same time alertness is an opponent of reverie, if i have to be alert to the foul play ahead then the moment is killed
Landlord is a safe pair of hands, to guide you through the glen
― saer, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:34 (seven years ago) link
Anyway I have a number of entirely unresearched and unproved (ie TRUE) theories about craft beer:
1) that (as hinted at above) many breweries have twitter / facebook shares as the core of their marketing plan, and in order to make that interesting to people they are forced into pursuing wacky combinations2) that the scale of production in smaller craft brews is such that it's possible to get enough people to buy 1 bottle / enough pubs to buy 1 cask to justify doing a brew; the difference in volume between a test brew and a proper brew is very small (in fact I have heard of some breweries only having test brew kit3) that regularly brewing artisanal beer to the same recipe (or few recipes) is a bit effing boring, and trying to sell repeat orders of the same brews to retail outlets is even more boring, and that messing about with recipes is more fun4) the combination of the above make this industry unusual in the context of the new wave of urban artisanal industries because unpredictability is not only rewarded but actually programmed in to the approach, and drops in quality aren't all that damaging: if you didn't like your bottle of loganberry porter from Bristleface in Beckenham, that doesn't mean you won't like their ginger and yuzu saison.
Taken together, these conditions are likely to produce a very uneven beer "scene" (but one that's very good fun if you have the energy, opportunity and cash to keep up with it).
― Tim, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:48 (seven years ago) link
always baffled & amused by lambics & other sours more than anything but imago being a partisan suddenly makes sense of them as maximalist monoliths to be held in awe
I'm not much of a beer connoisseur & I'm still pretty fond of the stodgy cask ales I have long been used to: wainwright, old peculier, landlord, pedigree, hobgoblin &c. but I have generally enjoyed all boom in IPAs & microbreweries despite the dross. been hooked on the beavertown tang lately, esp neck oil. feel sorry for everyone drinking in london
― ogmor, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:49 (seven years ago) link
enjoyed all the boom
― ogmor, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:50 (seven years ago) link
but these sours, with names that don't indicate anything to do with there being sour times ahead, you have to be alert, but at the same time alertness is an opponent of reverie, if i have to be alert to the foul play ahead then the moment is killedLandlord is a safe pair of hands, to guide you through the glen
IRL lol, partly because these sentences reminded me of some short fiction I read recently (by Gert Jonke fwiw).
― Tim, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:51 (seven years ago) link
Or maybe Saramago.
Saeramago.
― Tim, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:52 (seven years ago) link
kinda feel like a beer now
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Friday, 23 September 2016 15:54 (seven years ago) link
Oh man alive I have a bottle of good sherry in the fridge and I have been wishing the work day away just thinking about it.
https://www.grandcruwijnen.nl/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/400x/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/e/m/emilio-hidalgo-oloroso-seco-villapanes.png
― Tim, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:56 (seven years ago) link
But before that I've gotta get busy with an icy tumbler of this:
https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/vinemedia/wp-content/uploads/20150211015652/Casa-Mariol-Vermut-Negro.jpg
― Tim, Friday, 23 September 2016 15:57 (seven years ago) link
Zero beero for me.
ah vermut, lovely!
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Friday, 23 September 2016 15:59 (seven years ago) link
had some of this when in holiday in seattle recently & it was stupidly thirst quenching in the sunshinehttp://21st-amendment.com/assets/Hell-or-High-Watermelon-3d-can-copy1-230x449.png
― self-clowning cozen of ILX (cozen), Friday, 23 September 2016 16:44 (seven years ago) link
Should really have contributed to this on Friday.
Can't compete with your fancy London ways, or any other reasonably sized city tbh, but Hereford sort of does all right. Star is the Hereford Beer House, Jonny used to work for Brodies and BrewDog at various times and it's really an off-licence with a couple of kegs. But his fridges are quite excellently stocked, so a list of British beers I have loved (since I started doing Untapped to remember them 6 months ago):
Beavertown - both the Phobos and Deimos collabs recently have been great and disappointing at the same time, barrel aged Weizenbocks where the source beer is identifiably great but the BA isn't quite enough. Bloody Notorious is a big improvement on Bloody 'Ell, the orange is strong enough to support the DIPA. 8 Ball is maybe the consistently best rye of a British brewery? But their star is 'Spresso, the harshest but tastiest coffee stout on the UK market. Heavy Water was pretty great too (sour cherry stout) but impossible to find these days.
Magic Rock seem solid enough on the surface but don't make enough of an impression to seek them out imo. Vinification, High Wire, Common Grounds and maybe Contortionist are the only ones I'd go back to?
Thornbridge are far too up and down for my liking, although Love Among The Ruins and Days of Creation were truly great sours the only beers of theirs I'd seek out are the raspberry Imperial stout, and Serpent.
I haven't really explored Kernel outside of the table beer and the ipa. I should really pay them more attention.
Don't see much of Weird Beard, but love their Sadako range (with the tequila BA working far better than it should). Weird Brodmance was pretty great and their novelties are at least drinkable (A Lemon Tree My Dear Watson, A World Without Dave, Pankot Palace).
I have been disappointed by nearly everything I have ever had by Wild Beer Co. Not their fault, I have just haven't been impressed with anything except Cool As A Cucumber which is as good a summer beer as it is possible to have.
I really must explore Moor more.
I had two beautiful hefes from pressure Drop during the summer called Wu Gang Chops The Tree. I know nothing else about them, but I really should investigate.
BrewDog are arguably improving, but only in stupidly rare editions - Black Hammer was pretty tasty, the Vietnamese coffee Black Eyed King Imp was pretty good and the Ballast Point collab BA was excellent (even if it was a task to get through), Tokyo* absolutely did not disappoint and the Paradox Islay BA was exceptional. It's just a pity about all their regular beers.
Tiny Rebel are a Newport/Cardiff brewery that are beginning to take off round here - Cwtch is probably the closest they have to a house beer. Some tweaking needed on pretty much all the line but I think they'll come good soon and will take off.
Odyssey are a Hereford brewery working out of the Beer In Hand. After 3 years they still aren't getting things right and I'm beginning to doubt they ever will. The breakfast stout is probably the most successful of theirs?
A one off I had was Omnipollo's Chocolate Ice Cream Brown Ale, which was great in the summer especially as an ice cream float.
Cloudwater might secretly be the stars of the scene. I really don't think I've had anything I didn't love, though the DIPAs have been of varying quality (v3, then v6, then any of the others).
― Horizontal Superman is invulnerable (aldo), Monday, 26 September 2016 10:10 (seven years ago) link
mmm breakfast stout
― mark s, Monday, 26 September 2016 10:18 (seven years ago) link
Question from a savage: Was Brewdog canny in offering shares in 2011 before a tidal wave of what they had wrought diluted their market share? Or am I mistaken, as a savage, in their timing or their influence?
― Andrew Farrell, Monday, 26 September 2016 10:20 (seven years ago) link
Their market share may have diminished (I don't know about that) but the market itself is growing massively.
― Tim, Monday, 26 September 2016 10:27 (seven years ago) link
I suspect it's a combination of canniness and luck. You're right about dilution but that's still only in fairly major centres and amongst non-savages. It's BrewDog that have got into the supermarkets and the public consciousness. Whether they'd have done that without the share issue raising funds to hit that big a PR offensive is probably the question (see also novelties and/or 'scandals' to keep them in the public eye).
― Horizontal Superman is invulnerable (aldo), Monday, 26 September 2016 10:31 (seven years ago) link
it's a pity brodie's beer seems to be so hard to find in london. for a while it was like the only place you could get it was the old coffee house in soho
Brodies is generally available at the Cross Keys in Endell St.
A lot of craft beer is insufficiently beery for my taste (i don't want to drink IPA that tastes like Lilt), but I agree with the sentiment that it has improved real ale, esp. in London. It also seems to have led to an increase in pub re-openings or renovations. Sitting outside the reborn Prince of Wales in Wood Green drinking Five Points Pale Ale this weekend was a treat.
― mahb, Monday, 26 September 2016 11:02 (seven years ago) link
Beavertown knows what's up imo
The 'Lupuloids' can they've just come out with is maybe the best they've ever made. Not too unreasonable at 6.7% plus hey the top of the can is pink. Easily stands toe-to-toe with the best American IPAs from the Alchemist, Ballast Point, Dogfish Head etc
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Monday, 26 September 2016 11:07 (seven years ago) link
I have always wondered what 'the new era' was.
I thought it was the new ILX era.
Was it actually the craft beer era?
― the pinefox, Monday, 26 September 2016 11:07 (seven years ago) link
I think of myself as liking beer and knowing a little bit about new craft beer but this thread shows how far I really am from any such expertise.
― the pinefox, Monday, 26 September 2016 11:08 (seven years ago) link
I think you probably do know a little bit about it.
I note with a mixture of admiration and horror that one former ilxor notched up his 2500th different beer on untapped this weekend.
― Tim, Monday, 26 September 2016 11:12 (seven years ago) link
I assume that it's a reference to the Beer in the new era thread (now over 9 years old!) which is largely US-based, though the proximate cause for this one was an upswing in beer discussion in the London thread.
― Andrew Farrell, Monday, 26 September 2016 11:15 (seven years ago) link
xp Crsml by any chance?
I drank some of the Beavertown Lupuloids at the developmental stage (Declaration 1 & 2, Sgt O'Mors, Doctor Enigmaticus, Cpt Hasta) and they were all pretty good - don't know which one the new core beer is based on though.
― Horizontal Superman is invulnerable (aldo), Monday, 26 September 2016 11:16 (seven years ago) link
AF: yes, I realize this title is a reference to that one, but I had always wondered - for 9 years, apparently - what that new era was.
― the pinefox, Monday, 26 September 2016 11:17 (seven years ago) link
xpost I have only been on Untappd since Valentine's Day and have 268 distinct beers. That feels like a lot, although 2500 puts it into perspective.
― Horizontal Superman is invulnerable (aldo), Monday, 26 September 2016 11:18 (seven years ago) link
i know v little about beer but love beavertown (my local brewery) neck oil and gamma ray as every day beers. they did a blood orange-brewed beer earlier this year which was excellent. love kernel, and wu gang chops the tree, by pressure drop, which reminds me slightly of a weiss beer, my go-to kind of beer before the new era.
― tongue and cheek (stevie), Monday, 26 September 2016 11:48 (seven years ago) link
I drink a lot of five points pale and Fourpure's pilsner, which is the best pilsner imo
Also had a delicious Norwegian pale ale called Thirsty Frontier in Lisbon last week which I guess I won't be able to find in London
― Dadjokke (Sgt. Biscuits), Monday, 26 September 2016 12:10 (seven years ago) link
I only know about eight adjectives to describe the taste of food and/or drink with and one of them is "crunchy", I'd like to improve on this because some of the beers I drink are quite fancy and I sometimes worry I'm not selling them v well
― Dadjokke (Sgt. Biscuits), Monday, 26 September 2016 12:12 (seven years ago) link
oh yes, five points is great
― tongue and cheek (stevie), Monday, 26 September 2016 12:14 (seven years ago) link
some beers are pretty crunchy imo
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Monday, 26 September 2016 12:14 (seven years ago) link
Thirsty Frontier - only in cans according to a quick Google.
― Andrew Farrell, Monday, 26 September 2016 12:42 (seven years ago) link
i had a can of thirsty frontier last night! you can buy it in clapton craft. was nice. that brewery is generally reliable.
i also had a can of mikkeller's peter pale and mary - that's one of my main go-to beers at home, a really nice fairly light pale ale.
on saturday i had a kernel black ipa, which was welcome given my complaining upthread, and i tried that new beavertown, lupuloid. i didn't think it was great tbh - it was fine but too sweet. i prefer gamma ray or neck oil.
― Bein' Sean Bean (LocalGarda), Monday, 26 September 2016 13:12 (seven years ago) link
Oh ok
Maybe it is time for me to spend all of my wages in hop burns and black on a Monday night
― Dadjokke (Sgt. Biscuits), Monday, 26 September 2016 14:19 (seven years ago) link
Is HB&B local to you, Sgt. B? (It is to me.)
― Tim, Monday, 26 September 2016 14:21 (seven years ago) link
(I really like The Beer Shop in Nunhead, is why I ask.)
― Tim, Monday, 26 September 2016 15:38 (seven years ago) link
The great off license near Seven Sisters tube, next to the Sainsburys, has Beavertown cans cheaper than I've seen anywhere else (£3.50 for two neck oil, iirc), and stocks more local beers, if there's any fellow Tottenham dwellers about.
― tongue and cheek (stevie), Monday, 26 September 2016 15:43 (seven years ago) link
I am, but see above re: beer-hating savage. Though at that price I may chance my arm (my girlfriend is less of a savage, anyway).
― Andrew Farrell, Monday, 26 September 2016 15:59 (seven years ago) link
Yeah I'm near there on the Dulwich side, Bossman wines on Lordship Lane has started stocking cans of crafty stuff that I like lately and is mostly a fair bit cheaper, but H B&B has a really big choice and also occasionally sends e-mails indicating that someone called "ken c" has won some kind of chili/karaoke endurance contest there
― Dadjokke (Sgt. Biscuits), Monday, 26 September 2016 17:20 (seven years ago) link
Hooray for having a beer thread I can contribute something to! I'll drink anything with "saison" or "gose" on the label, find sours and wheat beers hit/miss and tend to skip on IPAs. Favourite UK breweries would be Brew By Numbers and Wild Beer Co but the one I find most interesting is probably Buxton.
― ǂbait (seandalai), Monday, 26 September 2016 19:42 (seven years ago) link
I can conclusively report Goblin Cleaver stomps all over Foehammer, which it makes taste thin even at 11%.
― Hello I'm shitty gatsworth (aldo), Sunday, 4 December 2022 23:19 (one year ago) link
Sorry aldo, I left your question hanging there.
I'm buried in the midst of December retail servitude and can't really face any additional socialising this weekend, much as I'd love to. Just pretty exhausted, sorry.
― brain (krakow), Friday, 9 December 2022 15:54 (one year ago) link
No worries, it was pretty short notice and December is a busy month.
On the way back down the road dropping in to Top Out (in their second last week of trading) and Tempest to pick up their barley wine drops.
― Hello I'm shitty gatsworth (aldo), Friday, 9 December 2022 17:11 (one year ago) link
New Bristol Brewery have done some things with cinder toffee and stout that shouldn't be legal. Now I am about to go on a hike and I'm drunk! Hurray
― imago, Friday, 17 February 2023 13:05 (one year ago) link
Happy birthday imago!
― nxd, Friday, 17 February 2023 16:25 (one year ago) link
Ty I'm about to do the THORNBRIDGE BREWERY TOUR BITCHES
― imago, Sunday, 19 February 2023 12:57 (one year ago) link
^which ruled
Anyway, props to Little Earth Project for not only being the first brewery I've seen to name a beer after a Half Man Half Biscuit song, but to have said beer, In A Suffolk Ditch, be a fully credible and very barnyardy fruited wild red ale
― imago, Sunday, 24 September 2023 11:55 (six months ago) link
Think Pomona Island had a HMHB beer but I can't remember what it was called. Their Songs About Fucking beer was their peak I think.
― Hello I'm shitty gatsworth (aldo), Sunday, 24 September 2023 12:00 (six months ago) link
Lmao, someone at Pomona Island has very ILXy tastes, I was very impressed that they recently named a beer after a bit from Severance ("This Music Dance Experience Is Officially Cancelled"), although it was a drab-looking IPA so I didn't actually get it
― imago, Sunday, 24 September 2023 12:12 (six months ago) link
enjoy your sourpatch kefir porters
― Tracer Hand, Sunday, 24 September 2023 15:40 (six months ago) link
observation based on being in glasgow for 1 day
scotland is way less obsessed with IPAs than england is
― imago, Saturday, 30 September 2023 19:42 (six months ago) link
Where have you been beer-wise, for the purposes of this thread?
― brain (krakow), Saturday, 30 September 2023 20:23 (six months ago) link
Drygate Brewery and West Brewery - so, two craft ale taprooms (although this one is def going for 'beerhall', shame Oktober isn't until tomorrow)
― imago, Saturday, 30 September 2023 20:30 (six months ago) link
(my 'guess the city' was Cumbernauld btw. fuck me that central building is something eh)
― imago, Saturday, 30 September 2023 20:31 (six months ago) link
I know this won't go down well on this thread, but I'm quite addicted to Brewdog "Lost Lager" in Blood Orange. It's on a three 8-packs for £23 offer at Morrisons and say no more!
― vodkaitamin effrtvescent (calzino), Wednesday, 4 October 2023 23:04 (six months ago) link
they probably just add whatever chemical additive goes into vimto orange, yet it works.
― vodkaitamin effrtvescent (calzino), Wednesday, 4 October 2023 23:06 (six months ago) link
to be fair there is probably a brewdog beer out there I'd enjoy, but it will always be a mystery which one
― the world is your octopus (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Wednesday, 4 October 2023 23:09 (six months ago) link
a Dill Pickle Gose at Pretty Decent Brewery/Taproom in Forest Gate.
they added dill and cucumbers to the brew apparently.
wasn't bad, but then again I had to psyche myself up before I took each sip.
that's increasingly the way with flavoured craft beer IMO.
― my opinionation (Hamildan), Thursday, 5 October 2023 12:24 (six months ago) link