Waterloo Dark

Got this from Bruges! Last one from the haul. Lovely dark colour and big off white fluffy head. Smell is dark fruits and a slight sweet Brady smell, probably yeast. Taste is of dark fruits but it is a bitter Belgian beer! The high ABV is apparent with a little booze warmth. I think it's a really good beer, awesome label too.

Mikkeller/To-Ol Coffee IPA

Yes, coffee IPA. Weird ain't it? Got it from Doncaster Beer Festival. Poured quite a hazy burnt orange colour, not much head. Smells of earthy hops, then with a strong coffee smell, sort of like Sainsbury's own brand instant coffee. Tasted quite sweet, then the coffee becomes quite prominent, instant black coffee is how I'd describe it. Not much of the hefty 10.8% ABV either. Probably not everyone's cup of tea (geddit?). But I liked it!

Mikkeller 1000IBU Ultramate

Got this from Doncaster beer festival. Pretty amber coloured, touch hazy. Uber hop smell, grapefruitage. Small head. All you can smell is the hops. The insane bitterness hits you immediately and lasts for ages. Slight touches of malt here and there, but it is mostly bitter with a bit of hop flavour.

If you don't like hoppy beer, steer clear of this one.

Williams Bros Alba

Got this from Trembling Madness, amber ish, not much head. Smells rather malty with a touch of tree. This is meant to be a spruce and pine beer which was introduced by the Vikings a few years ago... It tastes tree-ey like the pineage in some hops, there is also a fair amount of malt sweetness. I suppose a purely tree based beer wouldn't quite work. There is a fair bit of heft in the alcohol but it is not evident in the taste. Nice overall! To come, is a couple of Mikellers from the Doncaster Beer festival which was great. My favourites being Steel City Shakti Clag and Titanic Harry Senior. Non beer related, new blogger layout is rubbish.

Doncaster Beerfest!

Doncaster beer fest tonight looking very forward to it, will be great. Shall post about it once I've recovered! Some great looking ales on!

I haven't posted that much because I have been taking advantage of the nive weather and drinking a Cask from next door but one so not much to review.

Marston's Mocha

Marstons can often be a safe bet, with Pedigree and Old Empire being liked by pretty much every real ale drinker. But this can make those beers, as great as they are, a touch normal. Mocha is an exception. Being a brewer the 'crafterati' often scoff as being boring, this beer rivals the loudest advertised flashy coffee beer. This dark brown porter ish beer has a rocky off white head shouts dark chocolate and coffee. I.e. mocha and there is even more in the taste. If you do not like coffee, you shall not like this beer. I love it, it's great, a fair %6 though so would be a struggle to session.

Sam Smiths India Ale

Sorry I haven't blogged for a bit, been a touch busy. This is one from Trembling Madness, went again on Wednesday and got a few more interesting beers! Well firstly, I love the bottle it is all old fashioned, saving it for homebrew. The smell is a touch hoppy, with a hint of pine and citrus, but it is mostly a chewy malt aroma. The taste is rather malty, biscuity and chewy, very nice. Not particularly hoppy, but it isn't an IPA unlike some people think.

Minikeg of Lord Marples

I have bought a minikeg of one of my favourite session ales, Lord Marples from Thornbridge. It is settling now, very posh design on it. Deciding when I shall open it, when I do open it though it must be drunk in 3 days.... what a shame....

Great Divide Titan IPA

Another one from Trembling Madness. Pour a dark orangey colour, not much of a head. Uber hopiness, much piney and citrus and fuitage. The taste is very fruity, a touch sweet with a nice malt backbone then a whoompf of hop bitterness... The bitterness does however become overpowering as the beer warms up.

Thorne brewery closing.

Damn it. Their parent company is selling the brewery to 'a new venture in Norfolk'. It was a great brewery, Thorne Pale was one of those beers that as soon as it goes on, there is a queue for it. Hopefully someone else brews it!

Great Heck Slaughterhouse Porter

Was at Cask last night and they had a favourite of mine on, Slaughterhouse Porter, won the best porter prize at the Doncaster Beer Fest last year.

It is quite light coloured for a porter touch lighter than coke and it is clear, very dark red and smells of dark fruit, caramelly with a bit of roasted malt thrown in for good measure. And the taste is dark fruity with the coffeeness of the malt. Very nice beer! Even went back to it it was so nice.

In First Place: Raw Dark Peak Stout

Such a good beer I think. Smooth aromas of coffee, and roasted malt, Roasty and coffee taste. Great malt backbone with just enough bittering hops. Could session this easily, very drinkable.

The actual winners were:
1st - The Leveller
2nd - Heaven and Heck
3rd - Dark Peak Stout

Was meant to go to BrewDog Nottingham...

Decided against it for a few reasons, for some reason Nottingham is a pain to get to despite only being an hour away by car. Instead went to York.

Had a Dark Star Espresso at the Tap, a favourite of mine, the coffeeage is supreme, and goes well with rediscovered month old Oreos. After a taxi trip with a pervy taxi driver pointing out all short skirts within 100m of the taxi we set off for Trembling Madness. Everywhere was insanely busy (Totally forgot it was Saturday, my ipod even said it was Wednesday!). No chance at all of getting a seat upstair, bit gutting I wanted their pie. So bought a haul of beer instead. Got a Durham White Stout (looking for that one too), Sam Smiths India Ale, Titan IPA, Brooklyn Monster Ale, Oakham Hawse Buckler, Kernel Columbus Summit IPA and a Hollows Ginger beer for mummy.

We then set off to find a pub, stayed on the same street though. Yorkshire Terrier was packed, so we went to Ye Olde Star Inne, only outside seats available, luckily it wasn't cold but they didn't do food outside so we just had a beer. It was a good pub meant to be the oldest in York, dating to 1644(?) looked old with beams and what have you, would have liked it to be a Free House but I have a feeling it was a GK. We had a GK Tolly English Ale, one of the new 2.8% beers, it was alright had a nice fruitiness to it and the biscuity flavours but was rather watery, and more expensive than I would want a 2.8% beer, £2.85, the Dark Star at the Tap was 5p more.

It was then back to the Tap for pork pies and beer, Malt Shovel Mild, very nice a lot of roastiness, Cuthroat Porter, a very flavoursome porter, Jaipur, some bog standard Bitter and then home time. Nice trip!

In Second Place - Springhead the Leveller

This is a very nice beer from Springhead, deep dark brown with almost no head. Bring your nose to the glass and you get a barrage of coffee, coffee and a bit of nuttiness and toasty malt. This is my type of beer.

In Third Place - Great Heck Heck's Angel

Was at a Battle of the Brewers in Cask last night, the breweries were Raw, Great Heck and Springhead, chaps from the brewery popped round also. They had 2 beers each, I had them all and this post is the beer I felt came 3rd .

Looking on a few beer websites, this beer doesn't have good reviews, I disagree with every point (apart from the smell!). I may disagree because apparently they now use Cascade hops. Anyway, it is very pale with a nice fluffy head. Major citrus and fruit smell, lovely just how you want a summer beer to be (still alright on a dreary Febuary night in Doncaster). The flavour is very pleasant fruity hint sand hoppy flavour and a rather robust bitterness that I like but maybe not to everyones liking. Great session beer.

I shall post 2nd and 1st soon!

Government, why you tax my beer?!

Reading this article on the Beeb, yet another piece on binge drinking. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16466646

There is a good bit in there about encouraging drinking in pubs rather than letting people get rat arsed at home. However something that I don't get, is our tax on beer is 12 times higher on average than in Europe, yet to tackle our 'binge drinking culture' (apparently a binge is 3 pints in a day... oops!) they want to either increase tax AGAIN or judging from the comments on the article demonise drinking.

Aye the amount of binge (actual binge 7+ pints in my opinion) drinking is too high. But it is still a tiny minority who forget how their body works on a Friday night. Why should the rest of us have to pay for this? Why are these taxes blanketted across all beer, every brand, be it real, nitrowee or of wife beater ilk. Surely the problem lies with the big brands and cheap spirits in clubs and special brew, etc. No one really gets gazeboed on real ale or craft beer, drunk aye but not A&E worthy. Personally I feel full as if I've eaten a huge meal after 5 or 6 pints of ale on a night out to a nice pub and stop, my friends agree. So why not target tax? No one is binging on Chimay Blue yet that will be about £7 a bottle in a bar if new plans go through, and this is in the North, Lord knows what it'd be in the South. I was watching the Beer Hunter on youtube and Michael was at a Bateman's pub and a pint was 95p for good honest beer, I go to Cask (reasonably priced) and pay £2.30 after a 15% CAMRA discount, and for my lager drinking friends, will have a proper German Helles for £3.50 a pint. If the tax goes up, the young drinker who is constantly demonised no matter how responsible they are will have to save uo what little money we have to go out to a nice pub and enjoy eachother's company. This is not very English is it?

Furthermore, increasing the drinking age to 21 because it seems to have worked in the States.... Please be brief. Everytime I go to the States there is a constant sense of utter prohibition for under 21's, this never really works and can have bad consequences. For example there was a trend when I last went over there where teenagers at house parties got a big bowl filled it with booze and percription medicine and near enough killed themselves. They never get a taste or education so then just go mad. While in Europe where the drinking ages are generally 16, or even none existant or lower for alcohol strengths lower than wine. And the drink problem there isn't anywhere  near as much as here, infact the people who cause a lot of their drink related issues are drunken Brits!

When we compare cultures, in Europe children are introduced to alcohol at a younger age with watered down wine or weak beer at meals. Here, we do that, but at Christmas or birthdays, and maybe on holiday and a cheeky swig of Dad's beer at the pub. In the States, it's nothing until you are 21, in Walmart they had a challenge under 40 thing going on and people are at a risk of just going mad. However due to our increased Americanization (in the ivory towers at least) we seem to be moving more towards utter prohibition and lack of education, when we should be going back to the way our drinking culture used to be, not getting demonised, I'm 19 but remember going to the pub for a meal and having a shandy, no chance now is there! So bugger off Nanny State and let me have my good British product, not the eurourine which causes the supposed problem.

Needed a rant, apologies.

BrewDog 77 Lager

I don't usually drink lagers. they tend not to be flavourful enough for me (well macro brands anyway), but I saw BrewDog's 77 Lager on sale on their online shop, £15 for 24 cans so I bought a box, came in two days too!

It's a bit darker than your regular lager with a big rocky head that lasts a fair while. There was something in the smell that one rarely gets in a regular lager, hops! Actual hoppy smell, citrussy, from Moetoka and Amarillo hops, then a nice malty backbone from the pale malt, caramalt and Munich malts that are used in this beer. Not too fizzy either which is something that puts me off lager too. Really nice if you didn't know it was a lager you'd think it was an oddly crisp pale ale. It is also pretty easy drinking, not watery but the 4.7% ABV makes it a nice, easy to drink beer. Also, goes great with pepperoni pizza.

Staying on the BrewDog topic, BrewDog Nottingham opening on the 25th, can't wait!

Delerium le Guilotine

Got this along with the Kernel as a gift. Dark Amber hazy with loads of bubbles rising up with a ridiculous head which lasted ages. Smells very sweet, almost like sweet bread that you can get in America with the obligatory candyness from the Belgian yeast. This beer is 9% and I couldn't really notice the alcohol in the taste or smell.

As for the taste, mega sweet beer probably not to everyone's taste as with many Belgian beers the smellnis a fair indication of the taste. The malt comes through as the sweet bread you can smell, much fizz also. (once you get past the head anyway). I liked it but if you don't do sweet beer.... Probably not for you.

2 beers left, think I need a beer trip, BrewDog have an offer on their lager at the moment, £15 for 24 330ml cans. So of course 24 cans are on their way!

Oktoberfest

Thinking about going to Oktoberfest this year, oddly enough it is in September, and all together cheaper than the GBBF... They do beer by the litre, I very much hope there is Dunkel, not as fizzy.

Boerken

Wow, Belgian yeasty beer if I have ever had one. The bottle neck is so long it's like a handle for a small mace. Dark browny red, big head that lasts a fair while. Smells caramelly and Belgian. Tastes rather sweet with caramel and the Belgian Yeast sweet chewy taste. Can't really taste the 9% alcohol. Not quite as good as other Belgian beers but if you are in a rough bar, the bottle doubles as a weapon. Lovely beer.