tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19155469258859931402024-03-14T05:55:15.823+00:00On pubs and beer - screeds by jesusjohnA repository of articles, musings and hazy recollections concerning pubs and beer from a London-dwelling beer user.John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.comBlogger45125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-7732327585205120712011-06-14T12:25:00.006+01:002011-06-14T12:58:29.056+01:00Keg is expensive - and here to stay<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0a1QtG3HzlA/TfdHdwv2klI/AAAAAAAAAII/QPSkAFnN3To/s1600/noncask.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0a1QtG3HzlA/TfdHdwv2klI/AAAAAAAAAII/QPSkAFnN3To/s320/noncask.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5618037636795372114" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">I don't think there can be any doubt that <a href="http://tandlemanbeerblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/pricey-keg.html">Tandleman is right</a> about keg in general being more expensive than cask and craft keg being markedly so (where markedly = 30p-50p)</span>.<br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Two points:</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">1) Craft keg in craft beer bars (aka 'the niche within a niche within a niche') - the reason it's expensive here is twofold. First, there is the genuine extra expense in kegging for the brewer, <a href="http://bit.ly/llYv0f">summed up well here</a>.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Second, there is the fact that the first craft keg wave (which started five or fewer years ago in major cities, certainly London) was foreign beer - chiefly Belgian, German or US. Some of this stuff, and Tandie is fair on this matter, is rightly pricey. But it means that new UK keg falls into that price bracket (the owner of a craft beer bar has two issues here: a) if I can charge bonkers money for it, why not? A reasonable thing, that; b) customers might ask why the foreign stuff is so expensive - easier to keep every keg in the same rough price bracket).</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">2) Despite this, craft keg will find a wider audience and it will do it relatively soon. As I wrote BTL at <a href="http://www.reluctantscooper.co.uk/2011/06/revolution-will-be-pressurised.html">Reluctant Scooper</a>...</span> <span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />'...since the rumblings of 2007 and the full-on [economic] crash of 2008, pubcos have had to look at their estates as businesses and not simply real estate investments. So we've seen an explosion of interesting beer in pubco pubs, with Punch doing a good job, Greene King noticeably weakening in the face of lobbying from keen licencees and Mitchells & Butlers' Nicholsons managed chain leading the way.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">It won't be long before these pubcos realise the potential to extend this thinking to the keg fonts. Already in London - and what happens in that London is picked up by marketing bods and suits - there are many Punch names carrying Meantime keg fonts. Likewise, several freehouses are stocking keg Brooklyn and Camden Hells. The Byron burger chain also stocks bottles of Brooklyn - the New York beer is fast becoming ubiquitous in bottles and the go-to in swanky but cask-free places such as hotels, gig venues.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">At the lower end of this activity, we've already seen scores of pubs - yes, including pubco pubs - take on Budvar and Urquell. I know a freehouse that gave up on Urquell in 2003 due to supply issues. Now it's widely available.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">My point is it will only take a pubco push of Brooklyn, Sierra Nevada or Meantime nationwide to make the craft keg scene an almost instant reality. Those such as Thornbridge positioning for that moment are right to do so.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">For that reason, I think those saying 'craft keg is a niche within a niche' are missing what could well be a significant shift in the on trade in the coming five years.'</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Aside from the industry aspects, I think <a href="http://www.thornbridgebrewery.co.uk/thornbridge_beers.php#jaipurcast">Thornbridge Jaipur</a> is very good on keg and bottle but both are very harsh and - yes - carbonic compared to the excellent cask version, which is very coherent and has a superior mouthfeel.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">But then it's primarily a cask beer, designed as such. I'm not sure I'd prefer, say, <a href="http://www.lovibonds.co.uk/shop_product.php?id=882&cat=0">Lovibond's excellent kegged 69 IPA</a> (hoppy and richly bodied but not cloying and beautifully carbonated - how?) or <a href="http://www.bearrepublic.com/ourbeers.php">Bear Republic's Racer 5</a> on cask. When I've tried (well kept) American style IPAs north of 6-7% on cask, many (not all) have tended to be hop teas.</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Keen observers will note: a) I've come out of retirement; b) the picture shows us nothing useful in relation to the article except bottles of non-real ale (illustrating a market for the stuff?!) and evidence of </span>Campari<span style="font-style: italic;"> consumption, to which I happily plead guilty.</span><br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-75397297188487647582010-10-29T14:13:00.005+01:002010-10-29T14:30:10.987+01:00Sparkler wars II - Is this the way to Amarill-O?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TMrMFHqgKYI/AAAAAAAAAHw/CT7YkZZvqKE/s1600/DSC00394.JPG"><img style="float: right; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TMrMFHqgKYI/AAAAAAAAAHw/CT7YkZZvqKE/s320/DSC00394.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5533459480506804610" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Again, I start a blogpost referencing BGBW Beer Writer of the Year 2009 Pete Brown.<br /><br />You have to pity the fellow; he goes all the way to south Wales to get hold of some <a href="http://www.otleybrewing.co.uk/index.php?id=1">Otley</a> Amarill-O for his latest <a href="http://petebrown.blogspot.com/2010/10/october-video-blog-wales.html">video post</a> and - lo-and-behold - the very same turns up in his Stoke Newington local, the <a href="http://jollybutchers.co.uk/">Jolly Butchers</a> (see picture).<br /><br />I thought it a very impressive and refreshing brew, well balanced with the malt and very drinkable. It struck me as exactly the level of interesting beer you'd want a few of while watching the Six Nations with pals.<br /><br />Of course, the real reason for my posting this picture is to offer further evidence in the sparkler wars, with Tandleman very cheekily claiming game, set and match by offering <a href="http://tandlemanbeerblog.blogspot.com/2010/10/right-and-wrong-illustrated.html">two pictures</a> - one of two pint glasses filled with foam and the other with unsparkled beer that looked badly conditioned or past its best...<br /><br />...this perfect pint was, of course, unsparkled.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:78%;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;">Though I know from reading his excellent blog that Tandie was joshing a little; he may prefer sparkled beer, but he'd be the first to concede that condition is all. As he knows all too well, so often doon sooth, a sparkler is used to 'give life' to badly conditioned beer. Which is just about the worst thing you can do.</span></span></span><br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-61649179693677908762010-10-23T12:11:00.015+01:002010-10-23T14:25:42.481+01:00Number of booze kids admitted to hospital falls to 0.103% - Alcohol Concern<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br />I'm <a href="http://petebrown.blogspot.com/2010/01/answering-neo-prohibitionists-1-of-10.html">doing a Pete Brown</a>.<br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TMLeQ3mrobI/AAAAAAAAAHg/duPSILqUrYo/s1600/DSC00388.JPG"><img style="float: right; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; cursor: pointer; width: 222px; height: 296px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TMLeQ3mrobI/AAAAAAAAAHg/duPSILqUrYo/s320/DSC00388.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5531227673749856690" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Saturday mornings are always fun for telly addicts: bit of James Martin fooling around with other chefs on BBC1; luscious Nigella cooking something up for men of a certain age; and, what with the weekend generally being slow news-wise, a decent bout of activist-press-release-as-major-story syndrome.<br /><br />The BBC carried on its midday bulletin a story based on a report from the perennial neo-prohibitionist's favourite, <a href="http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/">Alcohol Concern</a>. According to their research, just under 13,000 children were admitted to hospital over 2008/09 in alcohol-related incid</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">ents. The cost of all this to the NHS came to a staggering £19m. Alcohol Concern's</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> Don </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Shenker is quoted as saying drinking among youngsters is a 'huge problem'.<br /><br />There are, as you might expect, several problems with the </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">report's coverage by the cut-and-paste maestros at BBC towers and the </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">methodology used by Alcohol Concern to get their figures.<br /><br />To begin with, even if you take the report at face value, it's tentatively good news - according to the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-11605549">BBC web</a></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-11605549">site</a>, the number of under-18s admitted to hospital rose from 10,976 in 2002/03 to 14,501 in 2007/08 but - get this! - <span style="font-weight: bold;">fell</span> to 12,832 in 2008/09. This seems backed up by a trawl through <a href="http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/publications/policy-reports/right-time-right-place">the report</a> (though they seem to divide data for 2007-09 by two). The Alcohol Concern message is clearly getting through, <span style="font-style: italic;">thank god</span>. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Trebles all round!</span><br /><br />But taking it at face value would be a mistake.<br /><br />First of all, and here I admit to being utterly subjective, I have a big problem with the classification, or understanding, of under-18s as children for the purposes of the report. Almost any alcohol-related hospitalisation under the age of twelve probably should set off alarm bells. But while many in Alcohol Concern consider it an abomination that teenagers may on occasion imbibe, it does happen and - when unsupervised - can lead to the odd mishap. Is that right? No. Should parents do all they can to prevent such mishaps? Yes. Does that mean they won't happen anyway? No.<br /><br />Take an anecdotal example. My friend Andrew (I've changed his name, obviously) is from a nice family with a detached house; three kids, two cars, a summer b</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">arbecue and the most attentive and loving parents imaginable. Now Andrew, aged about 17, got himself in a right pickle with a bottle of vodka and ended up slumped outside a shop and needing his stomach pumped. This shit happens. Since then, he has been nothing but the most responsible drinker - even engaging in lengthy bouts of abstinence if he's working hard. I'm not saying that we should all have our stomachs pumped to teach us our boundaries - what I am saying is: a) most experimentation - even going too far and feeling the worse for wear for it - does not end up in hospitalisation; b) a one-off hospitalisation is not evidence of a drink problem.<br /><br />On to more statistical terrain. Now I'm no <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/public-accounts/2010/03/sarah-palin-national-carol">Carol Vorderman</a>, but that 12,832 figure did set me off to thinking about what percentage of under-18s that actually represents. A quick look at the </span><a href="http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=6"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Office for National Statistics web</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><a href="http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=6">site</a> says in that in 2009, roughly 1-in-5 in the UK were 16 or under, which comes to 12,358,400; <a href="http://www.statistics.gov.uk/downloads/theme_population/mid-2009-population-estimates-analysis-tool.zip"><span style="text-decoration: underline;">those 19 or under</span></a> accounted for 13,101,000 (unfortunately, a quick search doesn't yield an exact under-18 figure). So we can comforta</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">bly assume a rough figure of 12,500,000. This would mean that the percentage of children admitted to hospital in alcohol-related cases is...wait for it...0.103%.<br /><br />That's right - 0.103%. Perhaps 0.103% too much, but I fancy that any sociologist passing by will confirm that a shocking state of affairs that affects only 0.103% of any given population is not a serious problem worthy of the label.<br /><br />Finally, and this is the part I really like, how did Alcohol Concern calculate the £19m cost to the NHS and the 12,832 admissions figure?<br /><br />The cost. Now this is based on an estimated price per incident, using 2007/08 data, of ambulance call-outs, hospital admissions and A&E attendances (and given the shaky nature of the last two of those, as I explain below, there could be major overlap there). It's all fairly weak stuff in the end - but the real shocker here is that ambulance data. In an examination of three ambulance trusts, they extrapolate nationwide to get 23,254 call-outs costing c.£4.6m.<br /><br />Which three ambulance trusts did they look at? London, West Midlands and the North East.<br /><br />I'm saying nothing more.</span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br />And the admissions? Well, given page four of <a href="http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/publications/policy-reports/right-time-right-place">the report</a> solemnly opines that 'We have no way of knowing how many children and young people are attending EDs [emergency departments - A&E to you and me] due to alcohol', you'd have to salute their bravery in trying and, then, convincing the BBC that what they've written is gospel.<br /><br />So let's have the report explain what they've done:</span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TMLedB-ZeuI/AAAAAAAAAHo/miIOWtzxj7c/s1600/DSC00383.jpg"><img style="float: right; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; cursor: pointer; width: 210px; height: 280px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TMLedB-ZeuI/AAAAAAAAAHo/miIOWtzxj7c/s320/DSC00383.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5531227882692115170" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">'Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), the national health statistics data source, is only able to provide data on ED attendances with a primary diagnosis of ‘poisoning (including overdose)’ of substa</span></span></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">nces that include alcohol. Between 2007 and 2009, 25,767 children and young people under the age of 18 attended an ED with this primary diagnosis. However this data is inclusive of all poisoning episodes (for example accidental ingestion of bleach) it does not allow for isolation of alcohol alone as a cause for attendance and is therefore of limited use.'<br /><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span></span></span></span></span><span style=";font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Divide by two and what do you get...? 12,883.5 (which is as close as dammit I can get to the reported 12,832). But of course, these admissions, not broken down by type of poisoning, do not tell us anything like a full picture regarding the impact of alcohol. Could be heroin; could be weed killer; could be <span style="font-style: italic;">anything</span>.<br /></span><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span><span style=";font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >What can we conclude from this? I don't want to give the impression that I do not care about the problem of kids drinking early, to excess, or in the absence of parental supervision. Such issues are evidently welcome and necessary components of any national debate about Britain's confused relationship with alcohol.<br /><br />But that debate must be evidence-led and the statistics used should be bomb-proof. To be fair to the report, it highlights some of its own shortcomings as a piece of statistical analysis - but this has not stopped the organisation issuing a <a href="http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/news-centre/press-releases/young-drinkers-cost">press release</a> that is far less equivocal.<br /><br />That the BBC laps it up so unquestioningly, and without any contrary voice in a debate between honest players with differing opinions, does not flatter its journalism.</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Keen observers will notice I've decided - in the spirit of such reports - to illustrate this post with utterly irrelevant pictures of people having fun. As if to suggest: 'let's hope this revelry doesn't descend into mindless thuggery.'</span></span><br /></span></span></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-76439846975938877952010-09-28T11:08:00.010+01:002010-09-28T11:54:24.629+01:00J'accuse: Wenlock runs out<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TKHFy00DnNI/AAAAAAAAAHQ/F9g3Pfv_H8I/s1600/wenlock-arms-53969.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 254px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TKHFy00DnNI/AAAAAAAAAHQ/F9g3Pfv_H8I/s320/wenlock-arms-53969.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5521912095094054098" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">So <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Hoxton's</span> <a href="http://www.wenlock-arms.co.uk/"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Wenlock</span> Arms</a> faces the chop, eh? One co-owner wants to se</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">ll and the other cannot buy him out, so it's to the estate agents they go. The dread of redevelopment hangs heavy.<br /><br />Those unfamiliar with this pub, famous</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> in London at least, will not be aware of just how polarised the <a href="http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/13/1316/Wenlock_Arms/Hoxton">debate</a> is</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> over this establishment. Dirty, mean-spirited and clique-ridden? Or ale palace, characterful and charming?<br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The truth is it is bot</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">h, but never at the same time. On a day when there's Chas & Dave-style tinkling of the ivories and singalongs and the locals are in on the fun it's a ding-dong right <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">aaaahld</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Laaaaahndon</span> boozer, with all welcome to join in. But you'll go in the next day to the silence of the disgusted, with tumbleweed the only distraction between you and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">contemptful</span> locals who would rather sit in an empty pub without your sort. On that day, the service will run the full gamut between silent, inattentive and outright - and even shockingly - ru</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">de.<br /><br />The hipsters so routinely disdained by the locals and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">barstaff</span> seem to be running <a href="http://savethewenlock.blogspot.com/">a campaign to keep the place open</a>. I certainly welcome that - even if I regard their patience at the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Wenlock's</span> unfathomably mercurial mood swings as saintly in the extreme. The current management have had the place for 16 years and fresh blood could tart the pub up (a deep clean might eradicate the retch-worthy stench of foetid, dried urine emanating from the gents) without blitzing what is, all told, a characterful interior. It would be a real pity to lose a 175 year old pub that stands alone in its street as a living link with times gone by and could, in the right hands, continue to offer a great deal to the area.<br /><br />And yet I cannot tolerate the notion, expressed <a href="http://lydall.standard.co.uk/2010/09/drinkers-campaign-to-save-best-pub-in-london.html">here in the Evening Standard</a>, that its loss would disfigure London's pub-going scene for good or eradicate 'London's best pub' - for all that it has an admirable focus on excellent craft cask beer.</span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br />The <a href="http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/82/8262/Globe_on_Morning_Lane/Hackney">Globe in Morning Lane</a>, Hackney, only has London Pride and Young's Bitter on cask - but both are kept well and the service is unfailingly friendly. After a couple of visits, </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">the</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">y may not know your name but they recognise you and ask after you. The locals - mostly 50+, working class and mixed between men and women and black and white - are not in the least bothered by the minority of middle class 20-somethings that come in, rallying round to offer seats and organise tables when live jazz is </span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TKHF5yvjchI/AAAAAAAAAHY/jatlNjfa78Y/s1600/globe.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 294px; height: 221px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TKHF5yvjchI/AAAAAAAAAHY/jatlNjfa78Y/s320/globe.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5521912214797382162" border="0" /></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">playing on a Sunday. The late night regulars cheer on the midnight karaoke come Saturday ('I Get a Kick Out of You - Swing Version' is considered a bracing challenge). There are teas organised for Monday afternoons and special offers that encourage the odd treat (bottle of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Prosecco</span> for £11.50) while not promoting crass binges.<br /><br />I think you see where I'm heading. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">CAMRA</span> may have afforded the Globe a place in the Good Beer Guide 2010 (I don't know if it's in the 2011 edition yet) but its safe selection of ales would not excite the beer blogging world and - god forbid - were it under threat, I wonder how much support in the wider media it would muster.<br /><br />London would miss the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Wenlock's</span> potential. But the Globe is a vital community resource, with dedicated staff who put in the hours and refresh the offer.<br /><br />I know where I've spent most money.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:85%;" >Wenlock Arms photo (Creative Commons Licence) courtesy of <a href="http://www.yourlocalweb.co.uk/greater-london/pictures/page10/">Glyn Baker</a>.</span></span><em style="font-style: italic;"></em><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:85%;" >Globe on Morning Lane photo (Creative Commons Licence) courtesy of <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/55935853@N00/">Ewan Munro</a>.</span><br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-22733441319127296732010-07-01T21:01:00.010+01:002010-07-02T08:13:21.199+01:00Bottle 193 - a tribute to @HardKnottDave hits the Æther<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TC0JzgdnXLI/AAAAAAAAAHA/_ao6eOaB0yA/s1600/hardknott.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/TC0JzgdnXLI/AAAAAAAAAHA/_ao6eOaB0yA/s320/hardknott.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5489054301326630066" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">It's not often my wife's crashing physical ineptitude wins my thanks, but one act of startling stupidity - of heroic clumsiness - has made me a very contented man, thankful for a maladroit life partner.<br /><br />'John, I'm just calling about your beer...'<br /><br />'Claire, I'm at work...a beer is of course the last thing on my mind, so dedicated am I to my numerous tasks and legion responsibilities [current and future employers take note] - what can possibly be up?'<br /><br />'The fridge door...a bottle...it just flew out...'<br /><br />'No...not the Captain Lawrence IIPA; not Pipedream, the Alvinne, De Struise & Pipeworks collaboration; not the BrewDog AB:01 or BrewDog AB:02 I've stored in there to guard them from the heat? For the love of god, woman...the humanity!'<br /><br />'Worse, John - the <a href="http://hardknott.blogspot.com/2010/04/diphthongs.html">Ha<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">rdknott </span>Æther Blæc</a>.'<br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">'The </span>Æther Blæc?! Dave Bailey's limited edition 8% stout, fermented with Belgian style yeast, matured in a 28-year Islay whisky cask along with dry hops and then bottled in a limited run of only 458?! Cumbria's finest?! What British Guild of Beer Writers Beer Writer of the Year 2009 Pete Brown has dubbed, and I quote, "one of the best wood-aged beers yet"?!'<br /><br />'Yes,' she chillingly affirmed.<br /><br />The situation was indeed grave. My wife's foot may have been grazed, necessitating a salve of TCP and a waterproof Boots plaster, but - far more pressingly - the </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Æther Blæc cap had clearly been heard to go 'phust' and viscous bubbles were beginning to emerge. Claire's report had an air of the crazed: 'should I pour it away?' How could she be expected to know? To understand? Such beers as dreams are made on...no, my only option was to rush to the Tube, run like the proverbial for a train back to Cambridge and try to salvage what might be left after what was surely the most important spillage of black, thick liquid in living memory.<br /><br />This was an environmental disaster the birds would actually flock to - if actually rendered at sea, no tern would be left unstoned.<br /><br />Two hours later, back home, I was naturally more sanguine - this was an excuse, after all, to try a beer impertinently early that had insisted on being cellared...<br /><br />And I'm so glad I did. Just take a look at that picture. Such condition, such inviting, thick-set foam. The nose was all rich <span style="font-style: italic;">olorosso</span> - anyone who has had Gonzalez Byass's peerless <a href="http://www.waitrosewine.com/230508717/Product.aspx">Matusalem</a> will be familiar with the rich vinous, fruity aroma of Churchill's favourite sherry. Then the stouty smoke, a baritone note just the Ovaltine side of Marmite, accompanied by crashing wave vapours of boozy scotch. The taste was extreme, but balanced - extremely balanced, smooth. With rich, imperial stouts there is a very fine line to tread - too bitter and the heady malts jar and the whole becomes wincingly astringent; too much body and the sweetness can be cloying. It takes skill to hit that middle point - burnt, but clean; rich, but refreshing; bitter, but not harsh.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Ha<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">rdknott </span>Æther Blæc doesn't just hit that sweet spot. It <span style="font-style: italic;">is </span>that sweet spot. Have I had a better cask-aged beer? Hell, no. Have I had a better stout? Not many.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Thankfully, Mill Road's stunning <a href="http://twitter.com/bacchanalia_cam">Bacchanalia</a> off licence has a case of this stunning achievement, so I was able to grab another to lay down (bottle 202, since you asked). I may buy a couple more, so if you're in the Cambridge area, I'd get cracking. Can't wait to try </span>Granite, <span style="font-style: italic;">Dave's 10% barley wine (bottle 300 of 504). To get your grubby mits on some, keep an eye out on </span><a href="http://www.beermerchants.com/">beermerchants.com</a><span style="font-style: italic;"> - it'll be appearing there soon.<br /><br />Follow Dave on Twitter - <a href="http://twitter.com/hardknottdave">@HardKnottDave</a><br /><br />Needless to say, Claire is back in my good books.<span style="text-decoration: underline;"></span></span><span style="text-decoration: underline;"></span></span><br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-12746296087147108982010-04-15T09:26:00.007+01:002010-04-15T10:36:28.062+01:00Battle of the beer apps!<meta equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"><meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><link rel="File-List" href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5Cwestjo%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C02%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="City"></o:smarttagtype><o:smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="place"></o:smarttagtype><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:donotoptimizeforbrowser/> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><object classid="clsid:38481807-CA0E-42D2-BF39-B33AF135CC4D" id="ieooui"></object> <style> st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } </style> <![endif]--><style> <!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:Verdana; panose-1:2 11 6 4 3 5 4 4 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:swiss; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:536871559 0 0 0 415 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; background:white; mso-shading:windowtext; mso-pattern:solid white; font-size:10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt; font-family:Verdana; mso-fareast-font-family:Verdana; mso-bidi-font-family:Verdana; color:black; background:white; mso-shading:windowtext; mso-pattern:solid white; mso-ansi-language:RU; mso-fareast-language:RU;} p.Div, li.Div, div.Div {mso-style-name:Div; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; background:white; mso-shading:windowtext; mso-pattern:solid white; font-size:10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt; font-family:Verdana; mso-fareast-font-family:Verdana; mso-bidi-font-family:Verdana; color:black; background:white; mso-shading:windowtext; mso-pattern:solid white; mso-ansi-language:RU; mso-fareast-language:RU;} @page Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 90.0pt 72.0pt 90.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> </style><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style=""><span style="font-style: italic;">Enjoy this guest post from </span><a href="http://www.blacklagoon.info/">Black Lagoon</a> <span style="font-style: italic;">blogger and TV industry legend Matt Nida. You may remember him from the optimisitically titled Cambridge pub guide video </span><a href="http://vimeo.com/1857395">Pubcast #1</a>. <span style="font-style: italic;">This copy was written before CAMRA very recently changed its pricing policy on its GBG app - I've published the original review plus a footnote to demonstrate how wrong it was before and how much better the situation is now.</span>
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<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="">Demographically speaking, the smartphone crowd is probably more at home in an All Bar One than a traditional pub. But whilst Apple's much-hyped iPhone might now be the archetypal accessory of the <a href="http://api.ning.com/files/gqcG-mvWSU6cBWYAYiM06jj2P6FN2UKqiFUecLGiLL8vm3Z285Oylq7wj-sOhlJnp1WduEWwCph6aZjWv*XeiBMiDtvaBFZB/NathanBarley.jpg">Modern London Media Tosser</a>, few people who've actually bought one would deny that having that level of fast, easy, ubiquitous access to the internet is incredibly useful - never more so than when trying to locate a good place to drink in unfamiliar surroundings. To this end, two new applications recently turned up in the iPhone's App Store with the sole purpose of connecting drinkers to watering holes.</span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S8bYNN5CWkI/AAAAAAAAAGw/rl0BOoPDFwI/s1600/cf2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 199px; height: 297px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S8bYNN5CWkI/AAAAAAAAAGw/rl0BOoPDFwI/s320/cf2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5460289319812094530" border="0" /></a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="">
<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style=""> <a href="http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/caskfinder/id362023416?mt=8">CaskFinder</a> is a fre</span><span style="">e</span><span style=""> app that pulls its data from two different sources: the <a href="http://www.cask-marque.co.uk/">Cas</a></span><span style=""><a href="http://www.cask-marque.co.uk/">k </a></span><span style=""><a href="http://www.cask-marque.co.uk/">Ma</a></span><span style=""><a href="http://www.cask-marque.co.uk/">rque Trust</a>'s pub quality inspection schem</span><span style="">e and the Cyclops beer database. This gives you two different ways to find a new pub. Click on the </span><span style="">Cask Marque Pubs button and you'll immediately be taken to a map showing your current locatio</span><span style="">n (courtesy of the iPhone's handy built-in GPS) with all the </span><span style="">nearby Cask Marque-accredited pubs marked clearly with quaint little pint icons. Tapping on a pub takes you to a page which gives you t</span><span style="">he address and telephone number of the pub (tap again to ring the pu</span><span style="">b directly), a link to the pub's website and a list of beers currently on offer. These are divided into those tested by Cask Marque and those that haven't been; tapping on one of the tested beers takes you to a page giving you some basic facts about the brew in question, such as alcohol content, colour, taste and smell. From here, you c</span><span style="">an add your own rating which will be reflected in the average star rating at the top of the page.</span></p><p face="trebuchet ms" class="MsoNormal"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S8bXyq8ztsI/AAAAAAAAAGo/MKPVqzzEbT4/s1600/cf1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 165px; height: 248px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S8bXyq8ztsI/AAAAAAAAAGo/MKPVqzzEbT4/s320/cf1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5460288863756072642" border="0" /></a>
<br /><span style=""> <!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="Div" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="">Back on the main menu, there's also a Beers button, which takes you to a database of beers that you can view either by </span><span style="">name or by brewery. Tapping on a beer will take you to its stats page, at the top of which there's a "Wh</span><span style="">ere to Drink?" button. Tap this and you'll be taken to a map showing all the pubs in the surrounding area serving this particular beer (as results are likely to be sparse for most beers listed, you </span><span style="">can zoom out to increase the range and thus the likelihood of a pub serving your beer). This is potentially a killer feature, but annoyingly the list of beers itself is somewhat patchy; for example, there</span><span style=""> are no Harvey's or Timothy Taylor's beers listed at all. Still, it's a neat idea, and Cyclops claim to update the database daily, so hopefully it'll become more useful over time</span><span style="">. There's also a couple of other fun features in the form of a "beer of the week", a beer festival calendar and a beer blog by <a href="http://petebrown.blogspot.com/">Pete Brown</a>.</span></p><p class="Div" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">
<br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="Div" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="">Where CaskFinder falls down somewhat is the interface. Whilst I admire the developer's coura</span><span style="">ge in shunning Apple's a</span><span style="">ttempts to standardise all UIs to the same conventions, the rather sickly yellows and Tellytubby-ish icons and typefaces aren't particular polished or pleasant to use, whilst the background, although clearly intended to be a foaming pint of ale, looks rather like a pale blue Aero. Moreover, the lack of any overt curation or comment about the pubs in question ultimately limits the app's usefulness; beyond their certification, there's little indication what a pub might be like to drink in once you get there. Still, if you trust Cask Marque's standards then there's no doubt that CaskFinder will speed up the process of finding a decent pint, and once it's a bit more comprehensive the beer location feature could well prove incredibly useful.
<br /></span></p><p class="Div" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S8bYb-Nz37I/AAAAAAAAAG4/JhNbFbO5H4A/s1600/gbg.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 204px; height: 305px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S8bYb-Nz37I/AAAAAAAAAG4/JhNbFbO5H4A/s320/gbg.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5460289573302296498" border="0" /></a>
<br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="Div" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="">Elsewhere on the App Store is CAMRA's own <a href="http://www.camra.org.uk/page.aspx?o=283782">Good Beer Guide Mobile</a>, an iPhone</span><span style=""> version of the organisation's hugely successful annual book/bible. CAMRA are by no means infa</span><span style="">llible, and I could probably argue some of the finer details about their criteria for what makes a good pub, but there's no denying that the GBG is an authoritative and on the whole reliable guide, so you could be forgiven for approaching the app with high expectations. Its premium heritage is reflected in the price - a princely £1.19 - and upon launching you're immediately presented with a much classier, Apple-ish menu than CaskFinder's. The main menu offers you several ways to search for a pub; once again you can use the GPS to look for GBG-listed pubs in your immediate vicinity, or you can search by address, postcode or (neatly) <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">London</st1:place></st1:city> tube station. Search results are presented in a listed sorted by distance in miles, with a range of icons indicating amenities at each venue. Alternatively, they can be viewed on a map. Tapping on the pub takes you contact details, and tabs at the bottom of the page allow you to pull up a beer menu (with comments on e</span><span style="">ach beer from the GBG), a list of features, a map and the all-important Good Beer Guide review. Tapping a star button at the top of the page let you save the pub to a list of favourites for quick access later on.
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<br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="Div" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="">And... that's it. There's no access to any of the other editorial features of the GBG, no beer or brewery index, no user ratings, no ability to search for pubs via beers available or indeed using any criteria other than location. It's an unbelievable own goal. Given that the app pulls its data from one of the most comprehensive critical drinking resources on the market, it's incredibly limited in terms of how one can interface with this data. Even a simple full text search would have been nice, but that's too much to ask for. Essentially, unless you're using the GPS feature, it's actually quicker to find a pub that piques your interest by flicking through the paper copy than using the app.</span></p><p class="Div" style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">
<br /><span style=""> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="Div" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span style="">And then there's the pricing. Your up-front £1.19 isn't the only cost. Once you've downloaded the app, you can use it for thirty days, after which time you'll be asked to pay a further £8.99 (!) for another year's access. If you're a CAMRA member this actually makes the app more expensive than a physical copy of the book, despite being significantly less functional and despite the distribution and material costs of the app being a fraction of those behind publishing a book. If you already own the book, you've got no choice other than to pay for it again. In the past I've been critical of the aggressive race-to-the-bottom price wars in the App Store, and am happy to pay a fair price for a decent app, but there's no excuse for the Murdochian "PROTECT THE PRINT REVENUE!!" pricing of digital goods this way.
<br /></span></p><p class="Div" face="trebuchet ms">
<br /><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="Div" style=""><span style=""><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Ultimately, CAMRA could have sewn up the market here, but in classic foreheard-slapping CAMRA fashion they've dropped the ball badly. The Good Beer Guide text remains useful and dependable, but the really limited interface indicates that no-one really thought through how users might actually want to use this app. The hugely unrealistic pricing is the final nail in the coffin, suggesting that CAMRA developed this app because someone told them they ought to do one in order to keep up - shovelware of the worst kind. CaskFinder, on the other hand, is ugly and patchy in places, but makes a few gestures at dynamic content and has some fun features that give the user a few different options for tracking down a good pint quickly. Plus it's free, so you can use the money that CAMRA would otherwise gouge you for and spend it on, say, some beer.<span style="font-style: italic;">
<br /></span></span></span></p><p class="Div" style=""><span style=""><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;">
<br /></span></span></span></p><p class="Div" style=""><span style=""><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;">STOP PRESS!! It seems CAMRA decided very recently to adopt a different pricing model, slashing the £8.99 cost to just £4.99 and allowing users to download the data. This means you still have access to the 2010 Guide on your iPhone if you decide not to renew the subscription in 2011 - fair dos and a big improvement. Good job. Having spoken to Matt, he confirms, however, that his review of the app as an app remains the same.
<br /></span></span></span></p><p class="Div" style=""><span style=""><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;">
<br /></span></span></span></p><p class="Div" style=""><span style=""><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Finally, take a look at <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2010/apr/14/beer-pub-guides">this debate</a> on the Guardian's excellent </span>Word of Mouth <span style="font-style: italic;">blog about which pub guide is best. The comments promise to be entertaining.</span>
<br /></span></span></p><p class="Div" style=""></p>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-2832969715556903092010-03-21T17:01:00.013+00:002010-03-21T20:08:14.167+00:00Call me Old Fashioned...<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S6Z04MEtb-I/AAAAAAAAAGY/LyHd9O_dWsw/s1600-h/riverbar1.jpg"><img style="float: right; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 230px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S6Z04MEtb-I/AAAAAAAAAGY/LyHd9O_dWsw/s320/riverbar1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5451172907641040866" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Beer geeks look away now. One thing we do well in this country is pubs. Low beams, warm fires, foaming pints of nut brown ale, a slothful hound, the bedraggled excess of the cricket team, the wannabe bachelor, the joke that went too far. I love all these things, and more, about our pubs - this blog stands as testament to my affection for the pub in all its guises.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Yet there are times when even beer stalkers would like, for at least a moment, to pass themselves off as urban sophisticates, cosmopolitan aesthetes. And there are occasions when only a cocktail will do - the subtle blends of spirits and bitters, fruit oils and mixers, peel and purée. Aficionados of the TV serial <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/tvandradioblog/2008/aug/01/youdonthavetowatchmadmen">Mad Men</a> will, like me, have found this urge unbearable during its latest run. </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">But try getting a decent cocktail in all but the biggest cities and you're more often than not on a hiding to nothing.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Cambridge for a while boasted the best cocktail maker I've ever come across, an unfathomably young chap called Mark who worked at the restaurant <a href="http://restaurantalimentum.co.uk/">Alimentum</a> (reviewed in the Sunday Times <a href="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/food_and_drink/eating_out/a_a_gill/article7063758.ece">this week</a> by monkey killing arse Adrian Gill). He steeped raisins in rum, developed wonderful <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bellini_%28cocktail%29">Bellinis</a> from seasonal fruits and assembled the finest <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Fashioned">Old Fashioned</a> possible (of which more later). He disappeared from the restaurant a while back and seems to have vanished from the banks of the Cam for good, one hopes setting sail for bigger and better things.<br /><br />Like many provincial cities, Cambridge boasts its All Bar Ones and Revolutions and Slug & Lettuces. The main night clubs provide little incentive to enter, let alone experiment with the (usually anodyne) selection of beverages.<br /><br />The saving grace is <a href="http://www.riverbarkitchen.com/">River Bar & Kitchen</a> (*sigh* how I hated typing the modish and inescapable '& Kitchen' - they do food, <span style="font-style: italic;">geddit</span>?), where - as is often the case - an Old Fashioned may not be on the menu but can be knocked up on request - and that with spirit from my favourite bourbon distillery, <a href="http://blantonsbourbon.com/Bourbons.aspx">Blanton's</a>. Painstakingly served with bitters, orange twist, sugar...sharp, oaky, sweet. I'd have stuck a cherry in, but cocktail making is an art, not a science, and I'm usually happy to try out the bartender's take so long as it's honest and avoids howling errors. My wife had a terrific Bellini - we </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">both agreed the best we'd tasted outside the peerless effort to be found at Venice's iconic (and secretive...) <a href="http://www.harrysbarvenezia.com/">Harry's Bar</a>.<br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S6Z1GwXl6FI/AAAAAAAAAGg/MaQKD9qA3S8/s1600-h/riverbar2.jpg"><img style="float: left; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; cursor: pointer; width: 196px; height: 273px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S6Z1GwXl6FI/AAAAAAAAAGg/MaQKD9qA3S8/s320/riverbar2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5451173157902084178" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">River Bar's Conran-eqsque interior (appropriate really, given it was apparently designed by the great man's son, presumably Sebastian), boasting a spiral staircase up to a swanky interior balcony, is well con</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">ceived - cool, but not cold. All steel and red backlights.<br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The food looked good, too, with steaks and burgers pleasing the assembled diners perched by the window, who would glance occasionally to take in the view across the Cam to the grounds of Magdalene College. Modernity meets old time class in Cambridge at the best of times.<br /><br /></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The one (or two...) cocktails we had certainly made Saturday's aperitif hour the best of times.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;">Ok, something for the beer geeks - </span></span><span><span style="font-size:85%;">River Bar</span></span><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;"> rather depressingly falls into the trap, so often the case in joints like this, of having an enviable spirits selection sullied somewhat by its lacklustre choice of brews. Bottled Budvar is ok, of course (though I personally dislike it) but Peroni? Eek...I think </span></span><span><span style="font-size:85%;">BrewDog Punk IPA</span></span><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;"> should be absolutely dominating venues like this, but I would guess distribution is the issue right now.<br /><br /><br />For those in need of the skills to make an Old Fashioned, here's a master at work - enjoy!<br /><br /><object height="385" width="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/oEr7ym4-r5I&hl=en_US&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/oEr7ym4-r5I&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="385" width="480"></embed></object><br /></span></span><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span><br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-22549433489454494872010-03-08T17:55:00.007+00:002010-03-17T11:36:40.930+00:00Achel not be the end of it<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S6C5s6m9myI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/UOtEGFYb1cM/s1600-h/achelblond.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S6C5s6m9myI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/UOtEGFYb1cM/s320/achelblond.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5449559730416360226" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">You never seem to read much about Achel, the relative newbies of Belgian trappist brewing. Open for business since 1998, they nevertheless come in under the radar, never starring in debates about how long to store them, <a href="http://drinkwiththewench.com/?p=1861">like Orval</a>. Never disappointing old hands, <a href="http://twitter.com/tandleman/status/9444648513">like Chimay</a>. Never <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9wOt27rJSo">being boring</a>, like Westmalle. Never winning the hyped-up (albeit deserved) plaudits of Rochefort and Westvleteren. Never being Dutch, like La Trappe.<br /><br />It was in an effort to throw off the constant search for the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmag4vL7hnQ">shock of the new</a>, that I made for Achel Blonde (8%), a beer I'd had a few times but thought nothing of.<br /><br />What a surprise it was.<br /><br />There is something unmistakably <span style="font-style: italic;">Belgian</span> about its rich, floral, sweet character. The smell of it is just sensational, deliciously perfumed and fresh all in one. The body is thick but peppered with lovely darts of bubbles. Behind it all is a welcome, and somewhat surprising, bitterness that just fades without a trace as soon as it's registered. Pouring in the yeast midway revives the head gloriously, adding the theatre you'd expect from such an act, and only seeming to enrichen the body at no expense to the flavours but a little to the beer's crispness - as ever, horses for courses here.<br /><br />These flavours and this style (I suppose it's a tripel, in that it's blonde, strong and relatively sweet) are what I first thought of as uniquely Belgian in beer. Achel's contribution is a stunning example and stands as a welcome reminder that beers - even pale ones - need not be hopped by a psychopath to stand out. Go out and buy some!<br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-9149214943617274222010-02-23T10:53:00.006+00:002010-02-23T20:12:35.615+00:00Imperial stout from Royal Ascot<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S4O6-iXiDlI/AAAAAAAAAGI/zYfsE4Sz158/s1600-h/ascotneth.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 191px; height: 257px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S4O6-iXiDlI/AAAAAAAAAGI/zYfsE4Sz158/s320/ascotneth.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5441398358333853266" border="0" /></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">I for one think <a href="http://www.ascot-ales.co.uk/">Ascot Ales</a> should be given a royal charter. Delighted by the quality of the brewery's Cascade-hopped <a href="http://www.ascot-ales.co.uk/regular_beers.html">Alligator Ale</a> (4.6%) and the properly bitter experience of its Anastasia's Exile Stout (5.0%), it was with a spring in my step that I hurried after work yesterday to the Gunmakers to get a load of the <a href="http://www.ascot-ales.co.uk/seasonal_beers.html">Anastasia's Imperial Stout</a>.<br /><br />Well, I <span style="font-style: italic;">say</span> 'a load'. At 8% I had no more than a half of the stuff and that after some of the very finest <a href="http://www.timothytaylor.co.uk/OurProducts_Landlord.aspx">Timothy Taylor Landlord</a> I've ever had and the what-should-be famous sirloin steak with<span style="font-style: italic;"> </span>fried potatoes</span><em></em><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">. (On a side-note, both <a href="http://twitter.com/tandleman">Tandleman</a> and <a href="http://twitter.com/jeffpickthall">Jeff Pickthall</a> have noted on their Twitter feeds that Landlord has hit a terrific run of form lately - I agree. Anyone know why?)<br /><br />As you can see from the picture, it had a super espresso <span style="font-style: italic;">crema</span> of a head and, as ever at this fine pub, was in the most splendid condition. The rich roasted coffee, bitter chocolate combo is just sublime and the booze sets it all up as an intense winter treat. It is without doubt the equal of Stone's superb - but much stronger - <a href="http://www.stonebrew.com/irs/">Imperial Russian Stout</a> and, on cask, was served from my preferred dispense method. It was a helluva treat and a sign to me, off the back of my previous experiences, that Ascot is a brewery to watch like a hawk.<br /><br />They know what they're doing.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Keen observers will note the picture above is not of me. There was one taken of <a href="http://twitter.com/jesus_john">jesusjohn</a> - equally handsome, I might add - but sadly it clearly illustrates the moment where this glorious beer trundled into that <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corridor_of_uncertainty">corridor of uncertainty</a> between glass and lip and cascaded down my jumper. Not a good look for a beer writer with delusions he's also a member of the human race.<br /></span></span></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-49548079853208609452010-02-21T19:06:00.013+00:002013-07-11T14:05:52.960+01:00Freddie Starr drank my Bismarck!<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S4GH7iom79I/AAAAAAAAAFo/_GG5-tV9oRY/s1600-h/Rakebar.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5440779281819430866" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S4GH7iom79I/AAAAAAAAAFo/_GG5-tV9oRY/s320/Rakebar.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; float: right; height: 240px; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; width: 320px;" /></a><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Ok, he didn't (nor, apparently - and much to my disappointment, did the erstwhile Saturday night TV star <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddie_Starr#Freddie_Starr_.22ate_my_hamster.22">chomp on a rodent</a>). But the five-month incubation and subsequent naming of BrewDog's latest <del>publicity stunt</del> brewing innovation, the 41%, freeze-concentrated hop leviathan <a href="http://www.brewdog.com/blog-article.php?id=251">Sink the Bismarck!</a>, seems to be equal in its attempt to catch the eye as the infamous tabloid headline.<br /><br />This 'quadruple IPA', currently the strongest beer by ABV in the world, has been named in response to <a href="http://www.benz-weltweit.de/derbraeuvomberch/index_eng.html">Schorschbräu</a>'s recent 40% bock, which itself - albeit briefly - took the wor</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">ld record from BrewDog's own 32% Tactical Nuclear Penguin. All of which screams '<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2002/feb/25/pressandpublishing.falklands">Gotcha</a>!'<br /><br />The online debate over the choice to name a beer after an event that saw some 2,000 lose their lives has</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"> been all too Manichean in character, overly polarised between those who see the name as a total disgrace traducing the memory of the fallen an</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">d those who see it as 'a bit of a laugh'. For my part, I think it's dreadfully silly. I'm less offended, to be honest, by the connection to the deaths of drafted sailors than the implication given by the naming of the beer in the here and now that we can still only see rivalry with Germans through the prism of the war. At least, given BrewDog is a Scottish enterprise, we are collectively saved the indignity of MD <a href="http://twitter.com/BrewdogJames">James Watt</a> screeching 'one World Cup and two World Wars, doo-dah, doo-dah...'<br /><br />If Stella is 'wife beater', Sink the Bismarck! is evidently 'Sun reader' - and I'm enough of a liberal lefty to wince at that.<br /><br />'And so to beer,' as Pepys would no doubt have put it. The seventeenth cent</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">ury diarist would have approved of BrewDog's excellent choice of the <a href="http://twitter.com/Rakebar">Rake</a> to launch STB! last Friday, given as he was to drinking in the shadow of Southwark Cathedral himself ('Lo, I spake to Lizzie, how many drames of thee Bismark have I hadde? Is it mee or does the Citee fire still grow?' - <a href="http://www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1666/09/02/">2 S</a></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><a href="http://www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1666/09/02/">eptember 1666</a>.)<br /><br />Up we trotted to</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"> the first floor of this fine establishment, my wife Claire and I in the first of several groups t</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">o get to taste the furore. The session began very well, with the formal unveiling of the tweaked Hardcore IPA, itself lifted in ABV to 9.2% from 9.0%. It is a splendid beer and this reboot surely wins it the accolade of </span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">the most delicious US double-IPA-</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">style beer brewed in the UK. The hops remain warming and multi-layered but the malt balance is notably thicker (the beer is darker than its ancestor) and has a solid working relationship with the booze to usher the intense bitterness through without the drinker wishing to give </span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">up and swig some water by way of respite.<br /><br />Tokyo* was up next. I've tweeted about this 18.2% imperial stout before - unflatteringly, I have to say. Claire and I settled on a description of it as 'like burned plastic blended with candy sugar.' 'Nuff said.</span><br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S4GJD9qvs9I/AAAAAAAAAF4/1Q7EL6II7as/s1600-h/STB%21.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5440780526026732498" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S4GJD9qvs9I/AAAAAAAAAF4/1Q7EL6II7as/s320/STB%21.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; float: right; height: 182px; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; width: 135px;" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">STB! It arrived, as one would fully expect - <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east/8517607.stm">Alcohol <del>Fuckwits</del> Focus Scotla</a></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east/8517607.stm">nd</a> ta</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">ke no</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">t</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">e - in a spirit measure and was met with reverent hush by the fan boys and gals, all forcing their beaks down into the glass to get a first wave of what this might actually be like. It smells very fresh, like a dewy meadow but with a pine-meets-citrus backbone. The look is pale a</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">nd oily; this is not deceptive, as a sip is</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"> seriously viscous. The first wave is a hop hurricane, but the sweet, golden-syrup body carries it. The bum note for me was that to support that intense, take-your-breath-away bitterness clearly required the beer to have a <a href="http://www.geoffcapes.com/">Geoff Capes</a>-esque body. This, in turn - and unexpectedly - neutralises the taste of much of the massive alcohol content, which I </span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">would want to burn a</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">way at the richness of the beast.<br /><br />It's an intriguing beer, one that seriously and sensationally tests the boundaries of beer production, but I do not rate it as an out-and-out taste success. I wonder what a few drops of water would do to it (as this can <span style="font-family: trebuchet ms; font-size: 100%;">open up a rich malt whisky), but at £40 per bottle, I suspect my first port of call would be a bottle of rich malt whisky. There is one final problem; as Hopdaemon brewer and fellow blogger Pete Brissenden has so succinctly <a href="http://thebeerfly.blogspot.com/2010/02/drinkability.html">put it</a>: </span></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms; font-size: 100%;">'one of the main things I str</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms; font-size: 100%;">uggle with BrewDog's new Sink! beer is that I can't really ever imagine a time or place I would really want to drink it.' </span><br />
<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><br />Introducing STB!, James Watt failed to convince even his biggest fans with a faux-naïve ejaculation that '...we weren't expecting such controversy.' This was greeted, rightly, with cynical laughter. It's one thing to go, as Alan Partridge would put it, '<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_IoPAd_Yw0&feature=related#t=7m30s">balls out of the bath</a>' to whip up interest, but to knock on the door and run away impresses no-one.</span><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S4GJ2zHX6bI/AAAAAAAAAGA/-9UPrbObZSM/s1600-h/STB%212.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5440781399367346610" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/S4GJ2zHX6bI/AAAAAAAAAGA/-9UPrbObZSM/s320/STB%212.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; float: right; height: 320px; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; width: 240px;" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">It is difficult to talk about BrewDog without getting sucked into</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"> the vortex of their PR agenda, but talk about them we do and the reason for that is the beer. Punk IPA astounded when it hit the market and on cask is one of the very finest beers you will ever</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"> taste. BrewDog's brashness grates when it misses the mark but even their efforts here will sur</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">ely persuade other UK brewers to rethink how they get themselves to market; many make superb concoctions and then issue a pumpclip of a <a href="http://pumpclipparade.blogspot.com/2009/11/hart-masters-of-art.html">thong-wearing Princess Zelda</a> to flog 'em. Any effort to break out of this ad paradigm can only be welcomed.<br /><br />Watt says 2010 is 'all about the beer' for BrewDog. Let's hope so - if as much effort goes into a 4-7% ale as went into STB!, craft beer fans up and down the land w</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">ould have much to cheer.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size: 85%;">I'd very much like to thank BrewDog and the Rake for hosting what was a most enjoyable event. The Rake has been my spiritual home of late and should be recognised not only for its splendid beer evangelism but also the strides it has made in recognition of suggestions made by its patrons to offer a more friendly face to the world. Duly noted and appreciated.</span></span></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-80363090425924667512010-02-17T09:18:00.005+00:002010-02-17T10:05:20.861+00:00Too Stoned to blog - a leaf out of Tandie's book<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">He won't realise the effect he's had on me. Both of my loyal readers have been plaguing me of late, asking what I've been up to.<br /><br />In fact, I've been taking <a href="http://tandlemanbeerblog.blogspot.com/">Tandleman</a>'s oft exclaimed advice to get out of the house and drink beer in pubs a lot more - which has led to me writing about ales and the pub trade a lot less.<br /><br />Every visit to the <a href="http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=54503601650&ref=ts">St Radegund Pub</a> - with its gorgeous, reinvented and dry-hopped Milton Habit Ale, the <a href="http://stonch.blogspot.com/2007/03/rake-borough-market.html">Rake</a> (where decent, friendly staff have finally been found and <a href="http://www.stonebrew.com/irs/">Stone Imperial Russian Stout</a> can be supped), <a href="http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/15/1564/Ye_Old_Mitre/Holborn">Ye Olde Mitre</a> and Stonch's peerless gaff the <a href="http://twitter.com/thegunmakers">Gunmakers</a> (where the food has gone from super to destination-class) has seen me whip out my phone, take a snap and resolve - this time! - to update the blog.<br /><br />To no avail. Though - and I suspect this is where I'll face Tandie's wrath - I have been updating the <a href="http://twitter.com/jesus_john">@jesus_john</a> Twitter feed with beery experiences, et al. That's still worth a look for the criminally bored among you.<br /><br />But I'm hoping this <span style="font-style: italic;">mea culpa</span> will spur me to greater things in the coming weeks and months before another inevitable trough in activity.<br /><br />In the meantime, it would be remiss of me not to point all and sundry to the beer blogging masterclass BGBW 2009 top gong winner Pete Brown gave on how parliamentary forces are warping statistics to back their claim we're all one Drambuie away from liver-related oblivion. This work is proper journalism at its finest, challenging perceptions with a fair approach. Good work - read all the related posts, they start <a href="http://petebrown.blogspot.com/2010/01/answering-neo-prohibitionists-1-of-10.html">here</a>.<br /><br />Until next time, beer fans.<br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-61086532558623292832009-11-30T19:10:00.010+00:002009-11-30T20:40:34.176+00:00Beer pilgrims welcome in Assisi<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SxQrm6mgvNI/AAAAAAAAAFI/Ru9T_nyiu2Q/s1600/WeddingHoneymoon+321.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 199px; height: 265px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SxQrm6mgvNI/AAAAAAAAAFI/Ru9T_nyiu2Q/s320/WeddingHoneymoon+321.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5409996999944617170" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Having raved about the <a href="http://jesusjohn.blogspot.com/2009/10/roman-holiday.html">Rome beer scene</a>, it is only fitting I make time for the unexpected brewy pleasures I encountered in Umbria in September. Many make a pilgrimage to Assisi to find solace or other spiritual enhancement via the tomb of San Francesco, the Dr Doolittle of his day, or that of his <strike>girlfriend</strike> spiritual soulmate Santa Chiara. In search of hillside views, black truffle-infused cuisine and </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">architectural marvels, it was with some heart-stopping joy my wife Claire and I came across the timeless legend 'Birra Artigianale Umbra'.<br /><br />Not that it was, I concede, entirely serendipitous. Justen at <a href="http://www.love-umbria.com/">Love Umbria</a> had alerted us that the former monastery of San Biagio was producing 'organic, unfiltered, unpasteurised, bottle refermented beers'. But a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spritz_%28alcoholic_beverage%29">spritz</a> or two had convinced us not to go looking for these nectars. Perhaps the (excellent) wines and aperitifs would see us through.<br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">But the sign bade us take notice. And in we stepped to the '<a href="http://www.luoghispeciali.com/">Far</a></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><a href="http://www.luoghispeciali.com/">mer Shop</a>', offering 'traditionally brewed ale, the best wild boar salamis and high quality gastronomical products' - quite the boast!<br /><br />It seems the <a href="http://www.luoghispeciali.it/ws/servizi/Birra-Monasta.html">San Biagio</a> outfit has set up shop in town, on the main street leading the faithful straight to the basilica. Though it is possible to munch on the most exquisite slow-roasted suckling pig sandwiches and arrange wine tastings and the like, this ambient farm shop, with low vaulted ceilings and chic minimalist shelving, is all about the beer.<br /><br />Carlo (pictured below) took the time to talk us through the San Biagio fayre and was clearly dedicated to the craft products under his stewardship. Two of the beers stood out; first, the flagshi</span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SxQsJjqXxeI/AAAAAAAAAFQ/ankbxUX-skk/s1600/WeddingHoneymoon+352.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 194px; height: 258px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SxQsJjqXxeI/AAAAAAAAAFQ/ankbxUX-skk/s320/WeddingHoneymoon+352.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5409997595082212834" border="0" /></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">p Monasta ale (7%). Ruby, full of gorgeous </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">condition and rounded with a Belgian abbey-style floral yeastiness, it was a splendidly crafted beer with a malt-hop balance of such maturity it reminded both both Claire and I of that platonic pint of London Pride found only in Chiswick. With the extra body and aromatic booze, it made for a compelling drop.<br /><br />Second was the dark, chocolatey Ambar (5%), which the brewery describes as a dunkel. Claire and I thought it more porter/stouty. It was richly malty with a bitter cocoa tang and struck us as perfect for wintry </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">night and as an accompaniment to vanilla ice creams.<br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SxQsvj4d0EI/AAAAAAAAAFY/PP_--mRNYPE/s1600/WeddingHoneymoon+353.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 208px; height: 158px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SxQsvj4d0EI/AAAAAAAAAFY/PP_--mRNYPE/s320/WeddingHoneymoon+353.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5409998247976357954" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Thanks, then, to both Justen and Carlo. The As</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">sisi trip was much enhanced by this beery diversion and it was a real eye-opener. I'd heard go</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">od and bad things about the Italian craft brewing scene and had not had the opportunity to try f</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">or myself. The <a href="http://www.birrificiolambrate.com/index.asp?L=eng">Lambrate</a> and San Biagio brews stand as testament to the excellence being achieved throughout the country.</span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />One thing's for sure - those snobbishly dismissing these efforts are missing out.<br /><br /><br /><br /></span><img src="file:///Users/johnwest/Pictures/iPhoto%20Library/Originals/2009/WeddingHoneymoon/WeddingHoneymoon%20321.jpg" alt="" /><br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/BT7tf46t1G0&hl=en_US&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/BT7tf46t1G0&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-88007036193089175102009-11-23T12:59:00.005+00:002009-11-23T13:13:31.701+00:00Lights, CAMRA, action!<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">A conversation with <a href="http://impymalting.wordpress.com/">Impy Malting</a> led inevitably to the subject of pubs & beer and, for want of something new to say about them, their presence on the silver screen.<br /><br />Can any cinematic beer moment top this from classic 1958 war flick <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice-Cold_in_Alex"><span style="font-style: italic;">Ice Cold in Alex</span></a>?<br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/G9Ra7hQoHpE&hl=en_GB&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/G9Ra7hQoHpE&hl=en_GB&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />No, basically. John Mills' able quaffing has me all aflutter - though not, perhaps, as much as the charming Sylvia Syms does.<br /><br />There is, however, a fierce contender. This depiction of the <a href="http://www.wenlock-arms.co.uk/">Wenlock Arms</a> from 1981's <span style="font-style: italic;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_American_Werewolf_in_London">An American Werewolf in London</a> </span>stands the test of time. As does the pub itself - it hasn't changed a bit.<br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Qu_2likGlok&hl=en_GB&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Qu_2likGlok&hl=en_GB&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">So, what other good'uns are out there?</span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-8088779481694963792009-11-09T10:50:00.008+00:002009-11-09T13:45:29.998+00:00Ale tied up...<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The Publican <a href="http://www.thepublican.com/story.asp?sectioncode=7&storycode=65653&c=1">reports</a> CAMRA is mulling whether to mount a legal challenge against the <a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/33a09908-bf6d-11de-a696-00144feab49a.html">OFT's decision</a> not to refer the casketeers' super complaint fingering the tie up to the Competition Commission. Furthermore, in a logical step, it looks likely the St Albans-based pressure group [full disclosure - I am a member] will lobby the European Commission's steely competition hawk Neelie Kroes</span>.<br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br />For those readers unaware, when a brewery or pubco attracts licensees to run its pubs, the latter sign deals through which they agree to pay rent and secure booze through their landlord. CAMRA, among many others, believes this practice makes it difficult for licensees to make a living and considers it to be anti-competitive, restricting the access of smaller breweries into the marketplace (as pubcos buy in bulk for their estates). This said, it fits ill with CAMRA's brief to attack breweries, so it takes the view they ought to be allowed an estate of pubs to get their wares to market while pubcos not in the business of brewing are considered fair game.<br /><br />There are problems with the tie as it stands. The widespread complaint of unfairly high rents needs greater exploration and a solution could benefit all concerned - scroll down to the bottom of this Morning Advertiser <a href="http://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/news.ma/article/84825?PagingData=Po_0%7EPs_10%7EPsd_Asc">article</a> for a concise rundown from KPMG's Mike Coughtrey; here's a sample:<br /><br /></span><blockquote><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">[...] in some cases the combined rent made up of the standard dry rent, the landlord's margin on the tied beer and machine profits, is not always being set at sustainable levels, making it increasingly difficult for the tenant to trade profitably and sustainably.</span><br /></blockquote><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">However, Coughtrey also points out that the tie offers 'a low cost entry point' into the pub trade with considerably fewer risks than buying freehold. This is unarguably true, but presumes all go into the agreement with their eyes open. I am not sure </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">that this is the case </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">- and by that I mean more research is required, not that I have a fixed view. There is much anecdotal evidence of questionable practices employed to entice wannabe landlords and Jeff Pickthall's recent <a href="http://jeffpickthall.blogspot.com/2009/10/undercover-mission.html">experience</a> with an Enterprise Inns operative certainly makes for interesting reading.<br /><br />For all this, I would advise CAMRA to limit itself to lobbying for reform to the tie without the threatening, and thus far unproductive, willy-waving.<br /><br />As pubco-tied landlord and blogger Jeff Bell <a href="http://stonch.blogspot.com/2009/10/tie.html">has argued</a>, the unshackled free house dream would leave individual pubs with no intermediary between them and mega breweries, who would offer all-in, cheap deals. The tie would in effect remain, but for the consumer variety would diminish. Given the number of competent licensees is not likely to increase, it is probable our pubs would become more ale-unfriendly, akin to the Irish pub scene, where bonhomie is as plentiful as here but beer choice is generally woeful.<br /><br />'But pubco beer choice <span style="font-style: italic;">is </span>woeful,' you cry. A couple of years ago, I'd have agreed. But those pubcos, previously slobbering over the option of converting their businesses into <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_estate_investment_trust#United_Kingdom">real estate investment trusts</a> as property prices skyrocketed have taken a sudden interest in their core revenue streams. Readers who like beers from micros such as Mordue, Moorhouse's, Woodforde's and Meantime will have noticed them appearing in greater numbers in solidly-run pubco pubs.<br /><br />Recent economic turmoil pushed ajar a door that the nudge-nudge of proper market research-led lobbying and representations by savvy licensees is throwing wide open. The consumer has far better choice than two years ago, despite the number of outlets having fallen dramatically. As Pete Brown argues from the cold statistics in his recent <a href="http://www.caskreport.co.uk/index.php">Cask Report</a>, ale-friendly taverns are closing at a far slower rate than mega-swill dens - and pubcos are taking note.<br /><br />This is not an 'in praise of pubcos' eulogy; I believe there is merit in a proper investigation of both how pubcos recruit lessees and whether a more transparent rent setting regime can be implemented. I am convinced licensees ought to be given greater freedom to supply beer to a pump from local micros (say, those within 30 miles, with a small percentage of takings going to the pubco). The latter move might well offset rent concerns.<br /><br />But CAMRA is wasting its time if it thinks its posturing will secure advances for the beer consumer; legal challenges are desperately unlikely to succeed and will further alienate the organisation from big players in the industry who are actually moving in their direction.<br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-30969971405126548972009-11-04T20:54:00.017+00:002009-11-05T10:18:59.960+00:00Bye Bunter: an ode to the pub<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SvH43qOocSI/AAAAAAAAAE4/x3EH-tfLGro/s1600-h/JohnrobedinRad.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SvH43qOocSI/AAAAAAAAAE4/x3EH-tfLGro/s320/JohnrobedinRad.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5400371063306088738" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">And so it was an era came to an end. Terry Kavanagh rang the bell last Saturday to call time on a fabulous 17 years as landlord of the <a href="http://www.radegund.org.uk/">St Radegund</a>, King Street, Cambridge. The Rad may not have the fireplace, secret garden or pewter pots of <a href="http://www.whitebeertravels.co.uk/orwell.html#moon">Orwellian design</a>, yet there is perfection in this Cantabrigian institution. Its locals are loyal but not jingoistic, often seen in other pubs. Despite a knowing cynicism, a faint whiff of the bear pit (one of Terry's many taglines extolling the virtues of the pub being 'St Radegund...a better class of insult'), its patrons will, and do, stand by each other.<br /><br />Readers will understand the communal bonds between disparate men and women forged in the best of pubs. The St Radegund is the best of pubs. Several met wives or husbands there for the first time. When I wanted my wife, then girlfriend, to understand what I was about, taking her to the Rad seemed the finest possible shorthand. She is now a regular, too.<br /><br />As a student, it was the place to intrigue in shady corners. It is still and ever shall be </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">a place to hail triumphs, see off the day, battle the demons, right public wrongs, castigate bounder politicos, cheer sporting triumph, wallow in defeat and drown immeasurable sorrows.<br /><br />Of course the beer is good. It stands to reason. And we talk about the beer, chew over it. It's difficult not to when local brewer Richard Naisby of <a href="http://www.miltonbrewery.co.uk/">Milton Brewery</a> is in there, supping his own wares and holding forth. And he does hold forth. But we can forgive a man who's brought us the delights of Mammon, the winterly splendidness of Nero and has conjured magic with Hackney's <a href="http://www.individualpubs.co.uk/pembury/">Pembury Tavern</a>. Even if he did go to Oxford.<br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SvH2XXfoEWI/AAAAAAAAAEw/5eMmgo5Khm8/s1600-h/mounthum.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 104px; height: 172px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SvH2XXfoEWI/AAAAAAAAAEw/5eMmgo5Khm8/s320/mounthum.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5400368309498024290" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">But the pub itself is also the talking point - so much so there's even a book about </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">its overseas exploits. Steve Haslemere's <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ascent-Mount-Hum-Croatian-Cricketing/dp/1904955487">The Ascent of Mount Hum</a> chronicles a Rad cricket tour to the Croatia</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">n island of Vis. Other sports undertaken by Rad regulars include running with the <a href="http://www.ch3.co.uk/hashtory.htm">Hash House Harriers</a> ('a drinking club with a runni</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">ng problem'), rowing and conkers.<br /><br />Those preferring extreme sports should consider the biennial <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Street_Run">King Street Run</a>, a brutal eight-pint drinking race down a street that used to boast a far greater number of pubs. Don't worry, the good'uns are still there, so competitors double up now. The course record, fact fans, is 14 minutes and was carried out in a monk's costume by a man so skinny you'd assume him abstemious. How wrong you'd be.<br /><br />Put off by the activity? More a culture vulture? Would the true sackcloth 'drawers of St Radegund' tempt pilgrims? Those of a religious bent ought not to sneer - committed theologians from nearby Westcott House will often drop by to admire the undergarment, parading down King Street holding the bloomers aloft, with Terry ejaculating hastily improvised Latin chants by way of accompaniment.<br /><br />Perhaps Friday's Vera Lynn Appreciation Society would be more up your alley - listen to the forces sweetheart and indulge yourself with a double G&T aperitif as god intended. On the subject of our 1940s heritage, the Rad has its own homage to the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eagle_%28pub%29">Eagle</a>'s famous RAF bar, with names of regulars past and present burned on to the ceiling for posterity. <span style="font-style: italic;">Ex officio</span> of his Blue Flame Club membership (don't ask), jesusjohn is very proud to be up there himself (though, arguably, far less proud to refer to himself in the third person).<br /><br />The pub is a maelstrom of variety, in no small part courtesy of its patrons. But getting the pub to this point, holding it together, providing the glue, setting the tone, arguing the toss and belligerently ruling the roost has been Terry. He's seen B52s fly over Cambodia. He's done Bali and the Falklands. He's ushered countless students through evenings of unbridled alcoholic vice. And he's pissed in each barrel to make sure it was up to scratch.<br /><br />He coined the moniker jesusjohn in my very first term as a sign of true belonging. Thanks to him, the St Radegund will always be the pub I go back to.<br /><br />Cheers Bunter.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">The Pubcast video, below, we made a year ago features a long segment on the Radegund and an interview with Terry Kavanagh - watch the whole thing if you've time. If not, scroll to 07:25.<br /><br />I'd like to take this opportunity also to wish new landlord James Hoskins the very best of luck in taking over the Rad - I'm sure he'll do a cracking job.<br /><br />The top picture shows jesusjohn in typical Cambridge attire - at the Rad, naturally.<br /><br /><br /><object width="400" height="302"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="movie" value="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1857395&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1"><embed src="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1857395&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="400" height="302"></embed></object><p><a href="http://vimeo.com/1857395">Pubcast #1: Cambridge</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/pubcast">The Pubcast</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.</p><br /></span></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-34372071394119210872009-10-26T19:25:00.007+00:002009-10-27T09:42:09.800+00:00Home brew<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuX_sEWC0dI/AAAAAAAAAEo/S2toV4dJ1mE/s1600-h/homebrew.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuX_sEWC0dI/AAAAAAAAAEo/S2toV4dJ1mE/s320/homebrew.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5397000861018935762" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Missed in the beer blogging world, as far as I can see, were BSkyB's stellar 3Q earnings. Pretax profits rose 39.5% y/y while revenues shot to £1.38bn, boosted by the addition of 94,000 subscribers. The twitterati may be spluttering into their lattes about Rupert Murdoch's quaint belief he'll be able to make cash from online content by sticking it <a href="http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/technology/shanerichmond/100002791/murdochs-paywall-is-a-gift-to-the-competition/">behind a paywall</a>, but his son James knows his onions (even if he is, like his dad, a <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/fourth-estate/2009/10/sun-support-murdoch-cameron">rightwing bastard</a>).<br /><br />Pubs, normally seen as a stable sector in a downturn, have endured terrible trading conditions in this recession. This reflects a number of changes in society, both its leisure options and attitudes to alcohol. As I've <a href="http://jesusjohn.blogspot.com/2009/08/raking-over-coals.html">written before</a>, with the likes of facebook making the spontaneous pint a thing of the past, that just-pop-in-for-a-brew trade is dying </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">(see if Steve and Mary fancy a drink, organise where to meet - the tarted up cocktail bar, the Aussie wine place or is it on with the pullovers to that pub with the ales?)</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">. We work long hours, so we flop home - these days an attractive place to be, especially with the internet, on demand TV (who needs DVD boxsets?) and an exciting wave of bottled beers available from a range of sources. To the non-beer connoisseur, the price difference is far too much to warrant going to the pub frequently.<br /><br />The pub is in this recession facing unparalleled leisure competition.<br /><br />Add to this the puritanical tone of the baying press, constantly howling against 'Binge Britain' and I suspect there are plenty who avoid conspicuous consumption out and about and prefer to indulge at home with the husband, wife, significant other, kids or whoever they see so little of.<br /><br />In this context, £30 per month for Sky+ is a no-brainer, especially given that's almost the cost of one night out down the pub if you're eating there, too.<br /><br />Which means one thing - there are too many pubs and many more need to close for the sector to be competitive and for those running them to be able to make a living. This does not mean the fight to retain rural pubs is lost. There can and should be review of planning laws that assumes a community must have a pub </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">as standard </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">and <a href="http://www.camra.org.uk/">CAMRA</a> ought to more robustly market its knowledge on how locals can jointly campaign to save pubs and even club together to run one.<br /><br />But the broader picture is this - for pubs to survive there need to be fewer of them and we need margins to rise, especially for real ale - a premium product sold at a ludicrous discount to megabrew swill. Prices will need to jump. Anyone who's boozed in Ireland will know where we're heading.<br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-37474851257784504102009-10-25T11:41:00.009+00:002009-10-25T13:00:52.986+00:00Roman holiday<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuRKbaWdZYI/AAAAAAAAAEY/rkZFlchwZ1s/s1600-h/WeddingHoneymoon+172.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 238px; height: 178px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuRKbaWdZYI/AAAAAAAAAEY/rkZFlchwZ1s/s320/WeddingHoneymoon+172.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5396520088287143298" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">While the two-week honeymoon my wife and I enjoyed from Rome through Umbria in September was, perhaps, a little too </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">geographically </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">limited to qualify on the eighteenth century Grand Tour scale of mind expansion (we didn't, after all, visit many brothels), some of the beers we enjoyed certainly did. Italy is incubating a beer culture that looks almost ready to pop out of its parochial shell.<br /><br />On his blog, Jeff has <a href="http://stonch.blogspot.com/2007/03/birra-in-roma-ma-che-siete-venuti-fa.html">waxed lyrical</a> about the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trastevere">Trastevere</a> district of Rome and its stellar pub <a href="http://www.football-pub.com/">Ma Che Siete Venuti a Fà</a> - none of which will stop me doing the same. First of all, the tiny, long corridor of an interior, with wood smothered in footie memorabilia (chiming with the establishment's nickname as 'The Football Pub') is in itself tremendously imbued with the charm of its locals, exuding warmth </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">and humour. On mentioning I knew Jeff a little, Manuele (pictured above, left with jesusjohn) was generous to a fault and invited his locals to regale us with anecdotes of their trip to see Jeff and experience <a href="http://gbbf.camra.org.uk/home">CAMRA's GBBF</a> a couple of years ago. To hear Romans excitedly claim, seemingly with genuine affection, 'I love Earl's Court - it's a special place' was one of the more surreal experiences of the trip, but lovely for all that.<br /><br />Manuele's beer selection is first class and his sourcing of these nectars, on questioning, seemed to rely on byzantine links of friends with vans and hauliers able to grab some bottles, a keg or a cask (yes, cask) or two on their way back from other business. All a bit <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2Rjhoi0PJo">Smokey and the Bandit</a>, I thought.<br /><br />The mind-boggling collection of international beers was striking (BrewDog Chaos Theory on keg, Tokyo* in its bottle - not many places you'd find that here in Blighty - among many others), but the Italian offering was com</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">pelling.<br /><br />Would that I could wax lyrical about a selection, but Manuele directed me to Urtiga (4.8%) from Milan's very own <a href="http://www.birrificiolambrate.com/index.asp?L=eng">Birrificio Lambrate</a> and I dropped on that for most of the session. With a slight haze, orange-gold hue and generous head, the impact was gorgeously earthy, with herbal hops and a well-matched body of malt. A superb lesson in the art of balance and proof, if any were needed, that mid-ABV beers can deliver a distinctively pleasing experience (something I think we beer enthusiasts lose sight of all too often in the quest for novelty).<br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuRLytAqIJI/AAAAAAAAAEg/tZ9SYl2jaCI/s1600-h/WeddingHoneymoon+174.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 283px; height: 212px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuRLytAqIJI/AAAAAAAAAEg/tZ9SYl2jaCI/s320/WeddingHoneymoon+174.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5396521587944595602" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The clientele spilled into the street; young and cosmopolitan, the crowd was split between those there for the beer, those th</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">ere for the football - crammed round a tiny TV right in front of the bar itself and those who</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> just wanted a good time.<br /><br />All are well-served by this terrific institution, which could teach bars the world over a thing or two.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Do watch that </span><span>Smokey & the Bandit <span style="font-style: italic;">video, incidentally (link above).<br /><br /></span></span><span style="font-style: italic;">Here, gratuitously, is a trailer for Andre de la Varre Jr's epic </span>Grand Tour '70, <span style="font-style: italic;">which is described in what I can only assume is de la Varre Jr's characteristically modest tone as 'probably the most important travel adventure you've ever seen'.<br /><br />I'll let you be the judge of that.<br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/4f4-_kA0YhE&hl=en&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/4f4-_kA0YhE&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br /><br /></span></span><br /><br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-18251041862190267152009-10-24T10:23:00.010+01:002009-10-24T13:18:28.643+01:00Smoking out brews at Octoberfest (sic)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuLteUWB8aI/AAAAAAAAAEQ/tRapFbPHRrE/s1600-h/Olaf.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuLteUWB8aI/AAAAAAAAAEQ/tRapFbPHRrE/s320/Olaf.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5396136408656245154" border="0" /></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">While we're still clinging on to the month, it seems fitting to report back on <a href="http://www.cambridge-camra.org.uk/">Cambridge CAMRA</a><a href="http://www.cambridge-camra.org.uk/">'s</a> excellent Octoberfest (sic), the third in what I hope will be a long succession of such events.
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<br />Some thirty-odd real ales were on, including <a href="http://www.miltonbrewery.co.uk/">Milton Brewery's</a> annual rauchbier effort. Lovely stuff.
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<br />But the real star was Olaf Schellenberg (pictured above, peering in from the right - I'm no photographer, eh?), a friend of the area who has imported German beers for more than 25 years. In addition to fest favourites from <a href="http://www.augustiner-braeu.de/enverabfrage.html#">Augustiner</a>, <a href="http://www.hacker-pschorr.de/">Hacker Pschorr</a> and <a href="http://www.spatenbraeu.de/0_start/index.php">Spaten</a>, focus turned inevitably to Bamberg's very own Aecht <a href="http://www.schlenkerla.de/">Schlenkerla</a> Rauchbier Märzen. Olaf is keen to evangelise about this thick, gluggable, rich dark brown and powerfully smoky tincture. Served on draught, the body of the beer is certainly more viscous than from the bottle and this seems to enhance the sweetness of the malt, pleasantly balancing the smoke attack. But don't let this p</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">ut you off buying it in bottle - to obsess over the difference is splitting hairs**.
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<br />Dark lager Nothelfer <a href="http://vierzehnheiligen.brauereien.bierland-oberfranken.de/">Trunk</a> Dunkel on draught was my prize find. Richly, decadently malty with a hint of warming spice, it's a mince pie of a beer sporting Belgian dubbel characteristics. It seems pretty rare to find over here, so when I learned local beer paradise the <a href="http://www.the-cambridgeblue.co.uk/">Cambridge Blue</a> would be having its own Oktoberfest, I pleaded with Olaf to send them some. He graciously agreed, though in the bottle (as it was at the pub), it was quite thin and seemed to have lost some complexity vs the draught. Still very good, though.
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<br />It's to CAMRA's credit that they have foreign beers at festivals but I am particularly pleased the Cambridge branch takes this opportunity to put them centre stage. Turnout was poor this year; last year's weekend was a washout while this year (and this is something a branch official conceded) </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">it was </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">both poorly advertised and scheduled. It was held 2-3 October; two weeks later and the students would all have been back and chomping at the bit.
<br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuLtDovoiLI/AAAAAAAAAEI/aFOu7agi6zU/s1600-h/octfestlist.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SuLtDovoiLI/AAAAAAAAAEI/aFOu7agi6zU/s320/octfestlist.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5396135950275872946" border="0" /></a>
<br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">I sincerely hope this doesn't mean the event will not run again in 2010. The first fest in 2007, correctly scheduled and well advertised, was a big success. My personal view is that CAMRA should keep its focus on cask but do much more to celebrate good beer from all countries and - yes - all dispense types. My key example is this - that CAMRA could not bring itself to showcase Taddington Brewery's superb <a href="http://jesusjohn.blogspot.com/2009/04/unhackneyed-lager-in-hackney.html">Moravka</a> lager, even on a special stall, just bemuses me.
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<br />So big congrats to the branch for getting the balance right. With some logistical tweaking, it'll run and run. After all, their May festival - the third largest in the country - is an absolute stormer, with a very diverse following.
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<br /></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;">** I should add the Schlenkerla Helles is terrific - no smoked malt is used at all, but as it's brewed in the same vats and kettles as the Märzen and other of their beers it has a light peaty aftertaste. Absolutely superb.
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<br /></span></span></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;">Olaf is an experienced importer and an absolute gent. Here are his contact details:
<br /></span></span><span style="font-size:85%;">Olaf Schellenberg (U.K.) Ltd., P.O.Box 71, Perth, PH1 5YG. Tel: +44 (0)77 537 1750</span></span>
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<br /><a href="http://boakandbailey.com/"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;">Boak & Baile</span></span></span><span style=";font-family:";font-size:12;" lang="EN-GB"></span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><a href="http://boakandbailey.com/">y</a> - the UK's beer blogging dynamic duo - have written about Trunk <a href="http://boakandbailey.com/2008/07/08/fraenkische-schweiz-2-brauerei-trunk-vierzehnheiligen/">here</a> and on Bamberg and Schlenkerla <a href="http://boakandbailey.com/2008/07/02/bamberg-revisited/">here</a>.
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<br /></span></span></span><meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"><meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><link rel="File-List" href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5CCLAIRE%7E1%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><link rel="Edit-Time-Data" href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5CCLAIRE%7E1%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_editdata.mso"><!--[if !mso]> <style> v\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} o\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} w\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} .shape {behavior:url(#default#VML);} </style> <![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:hyphenationzone>21</w:HyphenationZone> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:browserlevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><style> <!-- /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB;} @page Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:70.85pt 70.85pt 70.85pt 70.85pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Sect</style><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-14818138169200885712009-10-23T13:15:00.004+01:002009-10-23T13:30:59.065+01:00Dogged journalism<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">A clarifying <a href="http://www.brewdog.com/blog-article.php?id=184">post</a> on the BrewDog website and a brief email exchange with MD James Watt throw up some interesting points re. <a href="http://www.equityforpunks.com/">Equity for Punks</a>.<br /><br />While I still rate the valuation too high in and of itself (it puts BrewDog at £25.56m) and the entry level rich at £230 per share, help is at hand for us paupers.<br /><br />Up to four people can sign up for one share and <span style="font-weight: bold;">all four</span> would be 'eligible for the [20% off beer on the website for life] discount!' - </span></span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">as I say, this is from the horse's mouth.<br /><br />This makes investment a far more compelling proposition indeed and, assuming I can find willing partners - I have feelers out, an investment will come BrewDog's way.<br /><br />Good job, lads.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">Apologies to those bored to horrible tears by all word, deed, act, suggestion, marketing, press-baiting - indeed <span style="font-weight: bold;">anything</span> - BrewDog. Normal service will henceforth be resumed.</span></span></span></span><span style="color: rgb(31, 73, 125);font-size:11;" ></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-7466194480546276202009-10-22T12:44:00.008+01:002009-10-22T16:52:43.626+01:00Dogging with bloggers...<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Apologies to those who've reached this expecting hot geek-on-geek in car park action. My headline refers, of course, to Tuesday's BrewDog shindig launching <a href="http://www.equityforpunks.com/">Equity for Punks</a>. Through the scheme, you can buy a share in the brewery for £230, with the capital raised to be chanelled into a Bond villain-esque new brewplant project with environmental sustainability a key feature. The plans impress.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.brewdog.com/index.php">BrewDog</a> is arguably Britain's most exciting brewer, so I toyed seriously with signing up. And I certainly don't wish to dissuade others from doing so. The key perk is considerable, namely a 20% discount on the BrewDog website for life - effectively a guaranteed dividend in addition to the discretionary dividends they hope to pay from 2012.<br /><br />But the valuation is a little crazy (£230 gets you 1 share of 10,000 being sold, with the 10,000 shares accounting for 9% - that values BrewDog at £25.56m), all the more so given the fact the shares will not be publicly listed. Those who've signed up say they're supporting the brand, while the brewery itself mentions the intangible assets (brand, essentially, but also the vision of founders James Watt and Martin Dickie) and the support of gazillionaire US booze investors <a href="http://www.brewdog.com/news.php?id=82">Keith Greggor and Tony Foglio</a>.<br /><br />With my financial journalist's hat on (for that is the day job), I'd say if they're wedded to the valuation, they could at least have made the share offer more liquid. If the shares had been, say, £50 a pop with a 5% web discount, or £100 with a 10% discount, I suspect uptake would be higher and thus the capital raising more successful.**<br /><br />Known for their brash marketing, James and Martin are admirably approachable and charming face-to-face and it was a pleasure to be introduced to them - a point also picked up by fellow blogger <a href="http://hardknott.blogspot.com/2009/10/dog-tired.html">Woolpack Dave</a>.<br /><br />One slightly sour note - they have struck the wrong tone by employing the use of eye-candy at the party and in promo material, a point raised by <a href="http://impymalting.wordpress.com/2009/10/22/no-futures/">Impy Malting</a> who hits the nail on the head with her realisation the scantily-clad goth/emo girls at the launch were 'BrewDog's answer to the Bud Girl'. Ouch.<br /><br />But having drunk their beer (Punk Monk, a stunning IPA made with Belgian yeast stood out), I can only salute what they're doing. The brand <span style="font-style: italic;">is </span>terrific and I am sure they will achieve the astonishing growth they forecast.<br /><br />Detractors say BrewDog's all spin and flash media savvy but the beer lives up to the hype. Given the choice of style or substance, I take both. So does BrewDog.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">STOP PRESS: </span>Impy Malting points out in the thread on her blog that BrewDog would've seen investors' cash go up in smoke courtesy of a range of fees if they'd set the entry price lower. I well believe this - banks make a huge amount of dosh for simple transactions. But it's a shame nevertheless that a way could not be found to spread the Punk ethos slightly further down the food chain.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">**STOP PRESS II: </span>James from BrewDog has commented below, linking to <a href="http://www.brewdog.com/blog-article.php?id=184">their rationale</a> behind the £230 per share price tag.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;">I should add it was a real pleasure to meet Impy, Woolpack Dave, Pete Brown and others at the launch, all of whom were delightful.</span></span><br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-67495007551919235642009-08-31T19:43:00.002+01:002009-08-31T19:56:08.058+01:00Studied hiatus<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Well folks, I'm signing off until the end of September to get hitched and try to catch some Italian sunshine.<br /><br />Rome, then Umbria, namely Spoleto, Assisi and Perugia. Beer tips, of course, welcome. <a href="http://stonch.blogspot.com/2007/03/birra-in-roma-ma-che-siete-venuti-fa.html">This place</a> in Rome comes highly recommended and, would you believe it, is just a stone's throw from our hotel. What a stroke of luck!<br /><br />Meanwhile, enjoy what's left of the summer, golden ales and hop monsters. Beer-wise, I'm ripe for thick, black malty stouts again...<br /><br />Ciao for now.<br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-38984858122058811012009-08-20T12:33:00.007+01:002009-08-20T13:00:02.925+01:00Don't lose your bottle in facing the flu!<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Many thanks to those who suggested Manchester watering holes; alas, the Marble Arch and suchlike will be for another trip. No sooner did I arrive for my beery weekend than I contracted the dreaded swine flu. Not to be recommended. Match abandoned.<br /><br />Thankfully, the good friend with whom I was kipping looked after me (indeed, long after I was meant to have left), securing Tamiflu, discussing the world athletics hoo-hah and in countless other ways making a bad situation tolerable. Hats off to the lad.<br /><br />By way of thanks, having returned to the land of the living and made it back to sunny Cambridge, I logged on to <a href="http://www.beersofeurope.co.uk/">Beers of Europe</a> to send up a thank you pack. My friend received, by country:<br /><br />Belgium: </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">St Bernadus Abt 12 (10.5%) - a gorgeous, rich, thick, dark glugging, boozy Christmas pud of an ale; </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Gouden Carolus Classic (8.5%) - in the same ball park as the Bernadus;</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Girardin Kriek (5%) - a lambic and the best kriek bar none</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Germany:</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> Augustiner Lagerbier Hell (5.2%) - a fantastically clean lager, fresh, pale and with hay, grassy hop tones.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">USA:</span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> Flying Dog Snake Dog IPA (7.1%) - a textbook US-style IPA with ballsy American hops; </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Stone Brewing Co. Arrogant Bastard Ale (7.2%) - a real treat for the boy, as I've never tried it (nor any Stone beer for that matter - I'm keen for him to test it out).<br /><br />Generous to a fault, I'm sure you'll agree. But what would you have sent? Do you, like me generally, go foreign with bottled beers (with the obvious exceptions of <a href="http://www.brewdog.com/">BrewDog</a> and <a href="http://www.thornbridgebrewery.co.uk/">Thornbridge</a>), or do bottle conditioned UK ales tickle your fancy?<br /><br />And which ones work - any guaranteed UK bottle conditioned gems (I'll start the list with <a href="http://www.worthingtons-whiteshield.com/frontpage.html">Worthie's White Shield</a>)? And perhaps someone can answer this age old question - why does UK bottle conditioned sediment ruin a beer when Belgian/Dutch sediment, while offering a different experience, can be a positive addition?<br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-46953334889661985612009-08-14T11:32:00.004+01:002009-08-14T12:03:22.599+01:00As he opened a crate of ale...<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">A quickie this - will be in (central) Manchester this weekend catching up with an old friend and am looking for tips from my merry, if few, readers. Naturally, I have CAMRA's reliable <a href="http://www.camra.org.uk/page.aspx?o=192602">Good Beer Guide</a>, but your thoughts on, say, a top three unmissable pubs would be welcome, as would beer guidance.</span><br /><span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS;">Cheers - and have a great weekend.</span><br /><span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS;"></span><br /><em><span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS;font-size:85%;">Looking for pubs that blend beer choice/quality with decent pub atmosphere, I need hardly add.</span></em><br /><em><span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS;font-size:85%;"></span></em><br /><em><span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS;font-size:85%;">I feel the need to stress that, while the GBG is not perfect (too much focus on whether beer is good than the atmosphere convivial is a criticism I've often heard and have some sympathy with), I do feel it cannot be beaten as a pub guide and it is a credit to CAMRA. For the traveller entering completely unknown territory, it is essential. Buy it <a href="http://shop.camra.org.uk/DisplayDetail.aspx?prodid=254">here</a> (er...or don't, wait a couple of months and buy the 2010 edition, but you catch my drift).</span></em><br /><em><span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS;font-size:85%;"></span></em><br /><br /><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/VWsezDqn2lk&hl=" fs="1&" width="425" height="344" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always"></embed>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-9286841317095872722009-08-13T09:57:00.009+01:002009-08-13T10:36:09.155+01:00Old Hooky, Amsterdam stylee<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SoPbz9-NApI/AAAAAAAAADg/pwFV2FVH21g/s1600-h/x%26jj.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tVYEuOnRzX4/SoPbz9-NApI/AAAAAAAAADg/pwFV2FVH21g/s320/x%26jj.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5369376866611036818" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">A recent Benelux trip yielded bizarre experiences and happy (moreover, it has to be said, boozy) memories. Not many weekends involve dinner with a notorious call girl and madam, but <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0O-2oAvNTo">Van der Valk</a>'s stomping ground is a city of many delights.<br /><br />'Happy Hooker' <a href="http://www.xavierahollander.com/">Xaviera Hollander</a>, a publishing sensation in the early 1970s with her vivid account of days and nights spent turning tricks in the 60s, used to sell her body but now sells her image, running a B&B (self-styled 'bed and brothel', though it is thankfully nothing of the sort with regard to the latter) from her leafy south-Amsterdam pad. Her dinner parties are studied affairs in the art of hosting; Hollander regales guests with blue anecdotes in the manner of an XXX-rated <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDi4nH9mpZI&feature=related">Peter Ustinov</a>. I owe my dear friends who organised this most postmodern of stag dos (ahead of my imminent nuptials) a great many thanks. It was an astonishingly executed and brilliantly conceived night out.<br /><br />What's this to do with beer? Very little in and of itself, but the incident does strike me as a rich source of banter for pub-going sessions and should remind us all (as we wax lyrical over 18% hop monsters and the pant-wettingly arcane selection of beers at <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_British_Beer_Festival">GBBF</a>'s BSF) that beer is a social drink over which to share tall tales and create new ones. Amen to that, reverend.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">A round-up of the trip from a beer perspective would bore terribly. Suffice it to say anyone visiting Leiden should make their way to <a href="http://www.deww.nl/">WW</a>, an excellent and friendly locals/beer pub,</span></span> <span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;">and the terrific</span></span> <span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size:85%;">offie <a href="http://www.bierwinkel-leiden.nl/">Bierwinkel</a>.</span></span></span><a href="http://www.xavierahollander.com/"><br /></a>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1915546925885993140.post-60086878835028826472009-08-05T00:16:00.006+01:002009-08-13T10:51:00.620+01:00Raking over the coals<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">As those following my Twitterpub wall will know, I did a non-GBBF pub crawl around <a href="http://lovebeeratborough.ning.com/">Borough</a>, London, last night. All in all, it was a splendid affair, made all the better by being chaperoned by an old friend.<br /><br />There is, of course, nothing wrong at all with this - call a mate, arrange a rendezvous, and get some beers in. But I think there is a question raised by such a plan. After all, when many of us bemoan the dearth of 'real' pubs, I suspect we mean 'pubs where, if we went often enough on our own, spoke to regulars and didn't make a tit of ourselves, we'd become regulars, too'.<br /><br />This kind of pub is becoming rarer and rarer.<br /><br />The reason, simply, is that folk (especially young folk) these days don't have to rely on the pub for social interaction. School creates friendship networks, university or work enhances those. Facebook, Twitter and even the positively jurassic mobile telephone by itself facilitate easy communication - and pint-ahol sorties follow. The idea of nipping into a nearby pub with the paper and a pencil looking for a quiet pint and, perhaps, a chat with Bert on the off-chance, is not <span style="font-style: italic;">anathema</span> to a young person - indeed, when I introduce friends to my local and exchange greetings with men and women of all types and ages, they often bemoan the lack of such an institution in their own lives. But the following is certainly true: while not anathema, it is totally alien.<br /><br />There are, of course, exceptions. Without wishing to seem like a brown-nosing fanboy, <a href="http://stonch.blogspot.com/">Jeff Bell</a> at the <a href="http://thegunmakers.co.uk/">Gunmakers</a>, Clerkenwell, heads up a pub facing forwards, with a genuinely mixed clientele that aims to foster a sense of identity for the pub and its drinkers. Similarly, my local, the <a href="http://www.radegund.org.uk/">St Radegund</a>, Cambridge, while steadfast in its traditions, is the most welcoming place I've ever stepped foot into and many fast friendships have been made there and good times had. Students and old-time residents alike feel most at home.<br /><br />But other great pubs such as the <a href="http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/22/2208/Pickerel_Inn/Cambridge">Pickerel</a>, Cambridge, or the <a href="http://www.markettaverns.co.uk/The-Market-Porter/">Market Porter</a>, Borough, while superb and serving a wide-ranging crowd, never feel like places you could enter alone and finish the evening sharing laughs with strangers in.<br /><br />Some will see this as not necessarily bad in itself. I disagree. <a href="http://impymalting.wordpress.com/2008/12/01/waiting-at-the-rake/">The Rake</a>, Borough, has a beer list worthy of the gods, but the hip young trendies working there, who can't even price a beer at the same level twice and look through you if you're not Bat for Lashes-cool, don't figure warm service among their job requirements. They don't care for convivial bar-stewarding when they're out and about; they don't want a chat with the barkeep, they want a round and back off to their chums. As long as they're with friends, all is well.<br /><br />Maybe I'm a sad old fart long before my time. But I think the magic of the pub, for a punter, is its ability to surprise and create social bonds. Yes take your friends down the boozer - it's brilliant. Perhaps, though, a pint and the paper and a few words with Sally about her son's ballet class wouldn't go a miss, too, from time to time.<br /></span>John Westhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15471796457374078158noreply@blogger.com8