I Was Right Then

Did you know that Cask Marque has an area on their website where you can report beer quality problems directly to them? Well, it has. To the point, it is called "Bad Beer Reporting Tool". That's what you need - something that tells it as it is.

I once used it a while ago and can't exactly remember when, where or why, but I was moved to do so again after a recent experience in London, which, as part of a piece about a recent Belgian Trip, I mentioned here.  To recap, I paid £7 for an extremely lacklustre pint of Landlord in the Cask Marque listed Hoop and Grapes in Aldgate, which is a Nicolson's pub.

Now I have had many a pint in Nicolson's pubs and while they aren't always brilliant, they are usually dependable, though often a bit unadventurous. In fact, I praised them here, for great pints in the Lord Aberconwy adjacent to Liverpool Street Station and I don't think that is untypical.  Of course, it is a truism that the pub is only as good as the boss that runs it and sets the standards, a fact that is rather unwisely overlooked.  Check out the person in charge if you can, and watch how they operate to get a feel for the pub. If the boss is slovenly, it is likely that the pubs will be the same. The best managers are always keeping a darting sideways eye on things, even when doing something else.

But I digress. What of my complaint about the Hoop and Grapes? In a reply to me, Cask Marque advised me that they failed their recent Cask Marque inspection visit  - hopefully after my complaint - and they will be inspected again, after which they will let me know the outcome. 

Well, I at least am not at all surprised to learn that, but it is good to know. It clearly wasn't just a duff pint on the night, but a general failure which presumably resulted in countless substandard pints.

So, it is worth a complaint to Cask Marque, particularly if you feel the problem is likely systemic rather than a one-off?   You can easily look up a pub's inclusion or otherwise on the internet. They sign up to all this, so you aren't grassing them up, rather, you are holding them to their side of the bargain. 

And what can be fairer than that? After all, it is your money and experience that is immediately at stake, and in the wider sense, the reputation of cask ale.

Incidentally, Nicolson's were included in my original and subsequent complaints on X. Either they chose to ignore it - surely they have meedja persons employed for such things? - or they didn't notice it, which is poor

Next, they should actually put prices on their beer, so you can decide or not whether to pay the ransom for a pint in the quality lottery.  Given price inflation, that is something all pubs need to do. Where else do you buy something without knowing the price first?

Drinking Cask in London

Those of you that follow me on Twitter know that I don't drink cask conditioned real ale in London all that often. Let's get a couple of things straight. I love London pubs, not least of all because they very much remind me of how pubs used to be. They are lively and busy, many are unspoilt and haven't had their innards pulled apart in the same way as has happened almost everywhere else - there are exceptions, of course - and they are perhaps surprisingly pretty friendly and generally nice places to be. They have a very mixed clientele, and a general buzz and jolliness which I find attractive. Furthermore, they usually offer a pretty good choice of beer generally, and most tend to sell real ale. What, then, is not to like then, for us casketeeers?  Well, our old friend quality of beer at point of dispense. Many real ales sold are simply not up to my standards, quality wise.

Even allowing for differing dispense preferences - unsparkled beer is the norm - cask beer is often warm, flabby, over vented, under conditioned and served badly by untrained staff. Or a combination of aforementioned serving issues. Despite these obvious shortcomings, the product is still usually sold at over five pounds a pint.  Over the 20 or so years we have owned a flat in London, I have realised that to buy cask beers in random pubs, no matter how attractive they otherwise might be, is often just throwing money away. As an aside, drinking cask in the centre of Manchester, Leeds or Liverpool, Sheffield, York and many more places, is likely going to reward you with a decent price and a reasonable price.  Don't blame me for stating this point. It is just a matter of fact. The downside is that you may well be drinking your splendid pint in less than glorious surroundings, so in some ways, it is a kind of place versus quality thing, though as in London there are exceptions.

I'm not going to list all the places where you get an excellent pint of cask in London - the Good Beer Guide "should" do that, and often does - but even as a CAMRA veteran of 40 odd years, I don't tend to lug the guide about with me, and, secondly, when I am out and about in London, I may not know exactly where I might end up and therefore pop into somewhere pubwise I, or we, like the look of.  That has led to a great few disappointing beers - and I am being kind here - so I tend to drink lager or stout on such occasions, unless I see the wickets being pulled for fun.

Let me give you a recent example.  A couple of weeks ago, I had been out for a wander as E performed her last-ever day of paid work.  After a pint of Anspach and Hobday's excellent nitro porter at Craft Beer - I'm never keen on the cask there - I went to the Sutton Arms in Great Sutton Street (where one can drink cask beer with confidence) and hence via a wondrously confusing Old St - renovations have made this an unsigned maze - towards Commercial Road where I was to meet E.  After a lager in one of our favourites, the Commercial Tavern, I persuaded E to try the Golden Heart, which still bears a large Trumans neon advert and some other external Truman's signage.  We often pass it in summer, when it is usually rammed in and out. It seemed to have been recently cut in half though, with a wine bar being added, but anyway, in we went.

It was moderately busy and had a Heineken bias on the pumps, which meant there was nothing I was keen to drink, but they did have Landlord.  So, against my better judgement, I took the plunge.  Firstly, the barperson filled the glasses via the swan neck from above the glass, resulting in much loose foam. My three-quarter pint was handed to me. I requested a top-up, which again was attempted by filling from above, and the beer (pictured) looked grim.  What could I do?  The lasses behind the bar clearly knew nothing about the beer or how it should be presented, equally clearly nobody had taught them how to pour it. The Landlord wasn't fit for service either, being as green as Ireland on St Patrick's Day. To add insult to injury, the beer was well north of £5 a pint.

This or similar nonsense is still going on all over London, so my friends, that is why I only drink cask beer from trusted venues in the capital. And why premiumisation of cask beer in what is effectively a cask lottery, is a bonkers distraction that should be shunned.

It would have been the work of seconds to show the bar staff how to use a swan neck to dispense beer, and equally the work of seconds to know that the beer wasn't yet ready to be served. If anyone cared, that is - which clearly they did not. (Tip. Landlord needs more time to settle a clear and reach its peak than most cask beers.)

As a matter of interest, I am always wary of Star Inns and Bars (Heineken). Very rarely do they have much worth drinking in my personal opinion.

Good or Shite?

Back in the old days of Usenet and rec.food.drink.beer (a discussion group on all things beery, mostly involving Americans, but a healthy smattering of Brits and others) the merits of beer were, tongue in cheek, boiled down to is "Is good or is it shite?" That sort of still works today if you put aside all caveats, qualifications and ifs and buts.

A few short weeks ago I had the pleasure of presenting our Club of the Year Award to Dobcross Band and Social Club.  We enjoyed a most convivial afternoon there. Beers on sale were Lees Bitter, Bradfield Farmer's Blonde and Morland Original Bitter. All were in splendid form.  Now Morland used to brew in Abingdon in Oxfordshire and were famous for Old Speckled Hen and Hen's Tooth, now of course brewed by Greene King who took them over in 1999 and closed them in 2000.  I hadn't seen Morland Original Bitter in this neck of the woods - or in fact, anywhere else - and it seems possible that the beer has been recently resurrected by GK. If you know more, do tell me.

Of course I commented on this on Twitter with a rather provocative comment, just to see if I could raise a Pavlovian reaction to this Greene King brewed beer:

Not shite at all. Unless you are in the beerbubble. Then it is shite. pic.twitter.com/Vq9kjwFxyo

— Tandleman (@tandleman) July 20, 2019

Now it seems that GK are not exactly loved on Twitter. Is this fair?  I rather like their beers when they are served in the peak of condition. With the demise of Tetley Bitter, I rather miss the lactic finish that beer had and the nearest thing to it is GKIPA though admittedly I rarely see it up here. That beer is often despised by what I decribed as the "Beer Bubble" but actually by many more sensible people too.  This new version of Morland Original Bitter wasn't a million miles from its orginal taste, described in the 2000 Good Beer Guide as "Copper coloured with plenty of bittering hops and hints of fruit. Subtle aroma and a short, dry, bitter finish."  OK it didn't have a subtle aroma, but rather, the lactic tang of GKIPA. Nonetheless, I liked it. It was well made, very well kept and at a sensible 4% abv, suitable to be rattled down by the pint. Most certainly not shite.

I wonder too if Greene King, now that they have outlets all over the UK, including many in the North, are looking for something that can be readily drunk in those parts of the country where their core beers aren't well received?  I know of one local licensee in my neck of the woods, a former Spirit Group pub with "reserved rights" to guest beers, had a strict admonishment from the Area Manager asking why sales of Greene King are so poor.  He was able to answer honestly, that it was because nobody liked them.  Oh and the result of my provocation?  Well I didn't get a lot to be honest, but I liked the one that simply said "I like my beer bubble where Greene King beers are shite"

So do GK get a fair crack of the whip beerwise?   Let me know what you think.  

If you want to see some of the orginal good or shite debate here is some of the original argument back in the dog days of the group in 2001. One or two well known names there too. 

 Sparkling the Morland beer didn't do it any harm either.  Yet another case to be made for God's chosen method of dispense.

Peak Murky?

What does everyone think? https://t.co/Du7YavEXW5

— AffinityBrewCoSteve (@Affinity_Steve) July 28, 2019

We started off, quite a while ago now, with the odd opaque pint being presented to drinkers. These were usually from new breweries in London and the south, following the then American tradition of cask conditioned beers being presented with what was termed "opalescence". As explained to me by a brewing friend of some substance, Jaime Jurado, this was how American brewers and the American public, back in these relatively uninformed days, perceived as the way that sort of beer was meant to be.  (You could probably take the meaning to be a sort of milky/hazy sheen.)  Then though - and I'm talking early noughties, most American beer was presented in the usual crystal clear way. West Coast IPA was a clear beer then as were most American "craft" beers.

I think it was Robbie Pickering who first coined the term "London Murky" and then it was rather unusual to see deliberately hazy beers, championed by a few and regarded with a mixture of indifference and horror by most of us "traditionalists", but the beer itself was well enough brewed, with my main objection being that it - pun intended - muddied the cask conditioned waters and undermined the convention built up over many years, that a problem pint was identified by sight first of all, if it was presented as less than clear.  There was more or less a nationwide acceptance on both sides of the bar that this was a starting point about a case to answer on a beer's saleability. In short the increase in hazy beers eroded the customer's position and allowed barstaff to say something that had largely been eliminated; "It's meant to be like that."  My own view was that this was the thin end of the wedge and that sooner or later there would be no line that could confidently be drawn.

Fast forward a few years. Small breweries have multiplied and tastes and fashions in beer have changed. Craft has pushed the perception envelope to the extent that anything goes, with some beers being indistinguishable from fruit juice in appearance.  Indeed many have fruit juice added to them.  This was always going to be a problem in so much as experimental beers are chucked out to trade and nobody has any real idea of what they really were drinking in terms of what the beer should actually taste like. This is of course very convenient to the brewer, but not for the customer, who often has to pay a premium price for something that may not be to his or her liking, or, more importantly one that he or she suspects is faulty. Now there is little recourse to changing such a beer for something more acceptable. The answer is likely to be "It's meant to be like that!"

Yesterday this was raised on Twitter by a peeved customer, Seth Bradley, who had received over the bar the samples shown in the photo.  I leave them to speak for themselves.  Follow up tweets  such as this illustrate my point:

It gets us nowhere though. Breweries dump out beer and advertise that they have dumped it out, to what end? I've raised issues before and been told "yeah we were unsure about that beer" or "we weren't happy with that one". Pressure to make ends meet Vs economising on quality.

— Mark (@millionbevs) July 28, 2019

Are these really well designed, properly brewed beers with a profile and recipe that is planned and brewed for?  You'd kind of doubt it wouldn't you?

What's the answer to these colloidal solutions when the rule book has been thrown away? I don't know for you, but for me? Avoid them like the plague.

You can read Jaime's credentials here.

I once asked Charlie Bamforth about cases less bad than this. He said the line has to be drawn before a beer looks like chicken soup. Too late.

Why Bother?

That awkward sod Cooking Lager is pretty good at reminding us of the futility and foolishness of pub going and cask ale worship. Both too dear and if you do go to the pub for a real ale or two, it is likely to be manky.  In fairness he does give some stick to the crafties as well. He is nothing if not unfair to all is Cookie. Good on him.  He did give me pause for thought with this tweet the other day, when I was moaning about poor beer in Scotland.

he drinks in pubs, so you don't have to https://t.co/ktbM3Z26Om

— Cooking Lager (@CarpeZytha) September 11, 2017

Now there is a semblance of truth to this, but in reality, I rarely get a bad pint because sensibly, since I'm not a charity, I don't drink in random pubs as a rule. In London I avoid cask beer unless I'm confident in the pub, though of course I do get caught out at times, but as compensation, while the beer may be dodgy, the pubs are usually well worth a visit. Like many others though, normally, I mainly in pubs that I know and I go there because I like the pub and I know the beer will be good. Mudgie wrote about the subject here and I agree within this particular phrase in particular "the point about cask beer is that, when it’s good, it’s much superior to kegs and lagers, and the occasional duff pint is a price worth paying for that. If you stick to pubs in the Good Beer Guide, or ones with a decent reputation locally, you’re unlikely to have much problem." 

This brings me on to another point. Most CAMRA members don't spend all their time crawling from random pub to random pub either, but as I do, go to pubs they can depend on. Naturally a lot of us pub goers will go on holiday or have a jaunt to another beer drinking town. In most cases it will be Good Beer Guide pubs we go to. It is the very existence of poor pubs and beer that makes the Good Beer Guide while not infallible, invaluable.  These entries are likely to be best of breed in the area concerned. It is CAMRA people that select them and we tend not to drink or vote for inclusion in the Guide, pubs that routinely serve sub standard beer. Local knowledge helps too, because in good drinking towns, not being included in the GBG, does not mean beer will be bad elsewhere. Sheffield is a good example of this, but sadly, in areas where there is little real ale, scan the description carefully. Read between the lines. It should sing about beer quality. If it doesn't, beware.

So is pub going and real ale drinking futile? Well what isn't in this vale of tears, but hit a good pub and a cask at its sweet spot and for the beer man or woman, there isn't much better.  Still worth a punt then I'd say, but hedge your bets and make enquiries if possible.

Sadly, like most things in life, the quality of pubs and beer cannot be taken for granted or assumed.

That Quality Thing Again

I have a lot of sympathy for my CAMRA colleagues in the South West of Scotland. Real ale is rather thin on the ground around these parts and it must be difficult, in a sea of Tennents, to keep the cask beer flag flying.

I was in Dumfries and Galloway a couple of weeks ago and though my friends and I didn't try all the pubs that sold real ale, we had a go at quite a few of them.  Some, it has to be said, even though they were listed in the Good Beer Guide were less than enthralling quality wise.  The most common fault being tired beer and warm beer, probably  indicating turnover wasn't all it could be. There was exceptions though and hats off to the  Cavens Arms in Dumfries for spot on beer - though dining pushes drinkers rather to the side here - and the Selkirk Arms in Kirkcudbright whose beer was immaculate and, as we were the first customers of the day, was carefully pulled through to ensure quality. The resulting pints of Kelburn Pivo Estivo were well up to snuff and the beer garden, in unscheduled sunshine, was quite a bonus too.  So it can be done.

One thing we did notice was the dominance of beers from Greene King, supplied no doubt through their Scottish subsidiary, Belhaven. Fair enough, but not once in the half dozen or so pubs that sold Greene King, was a single cask ale from Belhaven available. Shame that.  It was sad too to see that beers in the local Wetherspoon in Dumfries were dominated overwhelmingly by Greene King and Marstons, though in fairness here, quality of what we had was good.

Now of course where there is a brewery tap, one can breathe a sigh of relief and relax in the knowledge that here at least will be a friendly welcome and beer as the brewer intended. Well you'd like to fondly imagine so wouldn't you? Sadly in the visit to the local brewery and tap, in my second Scottish home town of my youth, Castle Douglas - my grandparents lived there - that wasn't to be.  The beers were lifeless and warm and frankly near enough undrinkable. A quick look under the bar showed that the casks were not temperature controlled in any way and when this was mentioned to the barman, we were advised that real ale was meant to be served at room temperature. 

We made our excuses and left.

Yes, I will be dropping a note to my CAMRA colleagues in South West Scotland about the brewery tap. Brewery taps should be a beacon of real ale excellence. After all if you can't get cask beer there in the best form possible, then where can you? The only other bar in Castle Douglas purporting to have real ale, didn't have. We beat a hasty reteat to Dumfries for liquid sustenance.

The photo isn't beery, but shows Dumfries railway station at night. I spent many a time there with my Mum and sister waiting for the train to CD. Alas the line was axed by Beeching.

Losing Confidence in Cask?

I was in Scotland week before last and as usual, in the land of Tennents Lager, was wary about choosing cask beer where there was any. My experience, even in high turnover places like Wetherspoons, is that it can be hit or miss and more often than not, it misses.  As it happens, my first opportunity, fresh off the train was in the Counting House off George Square and it was hot, so looking at the pump clips with an array of dark Scottish beers, I decided, given the heat, that I wasn't chancing it and enjoyed instead - and I did - a couple of pints of keg. More of that later.

That night in the Captain James Lang, another JDW house, I thought, having spotted that Loch Lomond Brewery's Southern Summit was on the pumps, that I'd give it a go. It was only £1.79 and actually fairly good.  Alas when I returned to the bar, it had gone. I chose Skye Blonde and was immediately, before I'd go it to my mouth, assailed by a distinct whiff of vinegar.  I pointed this out to the barperson who had obviously read the Book of Barkeep Excuses.  "I think" she posited "it's meant to taste like that". Moving on to page 2 of the tome she added "I don't drink beer myself".   I was though given an exchange and turned down the offer of a whisky flavoured 7.8% beer from Strathven - despite it also being £1.79 a pint - in favour of a bottle. Minimum pricing? Take that Scottish Government.

I was in Helensburgh next day meeting an old pal. Alas in the Henry Bell, there was no cask I wanted to drink. All were around 4.8% and brown. As the barmaid herself, a Northern Irish lass of some character, noted "They could do with something pale and hoppy on, that's what I drink". Put her in charge of the cellar I say.  I did take her wise words on board as I stood wondering what to have. "Don't have the Tennents" my sage advised, "it's really shite."  This lass will go far or at least, ought to.

The day after my sister took me out for an hour. We went to the Balloch Hotel on Loch Lomondside, me having noted that it has a wide choice of real ales.  Of course it wouldn't be a Tandleman day out if some idiocy hadn't occurred.  The bar as you enter is L shaped with a bank of five handpumps immediately on your left. On the wall facing is the sign in the photo. My sister sat and I surveyed the wickets. "I'll have the Adnams" I thought. A few moments passed and I looked up the bar to the corner of the L. No barperson appeared but an old soak on a barstool shouted along the other angle of the bar and after a while a barmaid appeared. She seemed annoyed. "You should have come up to where the tills are quoth she."  "Are there more cask beers there then? I enquired. "No" she said "but I stand up there." This was getting interesting, but she had the last laugh. Only two handpumps were on. I chose London Pride which was a little tired but OK. This place is owned by Mitchell's and Butlers as a matter of interest.

On my return to Glasgow Central I had a pint in the Counting House again. This time I went for cask in the shape of Oakham JHB. That distinct whiff and then taste of vinegar again.  On pointing this out the server called a colleague, presumably the cask beer champion or something along these lines.  He took a straw out, dipped it in my beer and allowed a drop to roll onto his tongue."Hops" he pronounced. "And something else."  I agreed and pointed out the something else was vinegar.  My duff pint was exchanged for, yes you've guessed it. Keg.

Right I'm getting a bit fed up of reading this myself, but I am sure you get my drift by now.  Dodgy beer and dodgy bar staff don't make for a great combination.  It's the offer Stupid. If that isn't up to snuff, then you are on a loser.

I rather liked the beer pictured above from Jaw Brew whom I haven't even heard of. Really decent, though you do have to knock a bit of the CO2 out. I had it both visits and despite the murk, it didn't disappoint. Oh and I'm not losing confidence in cask really, but rubbish cask makes others do so.

For those that know Glasgow, I understand, Camperdown Place, another JDW just 50 yards away from the Counting House, has now closed due to Queen St Station redevelopment. Shame, as for the traveller with a suitcase, its ground floor toilets were a boon even if the beer choice was less extensive.

Think About This

There's a tendency among, shall we call them for talking's sake, "new wave" brewers to push the envelope, discard the tried and tested, do things just because they can and to generally cock a snook at those old fashioned enough to produce beer by the pint that the large majority actually want to drink. Indeed, in some cases, to be plain, downright insulting about those that travel roads more traditional.  I can think of one or two like that, though clearly they are the minority. 

On a similar tack I noted today in Phil's blog a bit of the same concern about the direction of travel, concentrating in this case on the tendency to lump odd things into beer - peanut butter and biscuit anyone? - and positing that the main point seems to be to chuck into the brew, things you wouldn't expect to find generally speaking. So, experiment with off the wall ingredients and flog it to the (admittedly) willing for £8 a pop. Nice work if you can get it. After all, who can complain that is is "off".  "You just don't get it Man".  Now Phil's not making the same point as me actually - wait I'll get there in a minute - but it's a digression that I happen to agree with by and large and not unconnected with another point that Phil makes and leads me on to mine.

I tweeted an interesting article in the Morning Advertiser, sadly to no response, by one of these pesky traditional brewers, this time Marston's MD, Richard Westwood.  In a fairly wide ranging interview Richard made the point, as I often do, about excellent cask beer being ruined at the point of dispense by too many beers and poor cellar practice.  I agree with his contention that there is a need to balance the customer requirement for choice with resulting (lack of) quality issues.  What caught my eye though was his contention that keg doesn't really solve that problem, as it only keeps at its best when opened, "one or two days extra".

Now of course you can regard Richard as a craft knocking dinosaur despite his 40 years in the industry - he isn't at all by the way - read the article - but he makes a point, often overlooked by most of us, that keg beer goes off too and maybe goes off a lot sooner than we'd like to think. The answer of course is to ensure, keg or cask,  that you only sell what your turnover justifies. Does that always happen in the craft world? It doesn't in the cask one.

Mind you, if having just paid £8 a pint, you have no idea at all whether your beer contains odd tasting exotica, or is just plain "off", for peace of mind, best convince yourself it is the former.

Have a go at working out the GSP on Phil's blog. Some dodgy arithmetic methinks

I like @Robsterowski's wine analogy too, though I reckon that most wine makers don't make it up as they go along and charge their customers top dollar for their experiments.

 

What's the Point?

I'm quite a fan of JD Wetherspoon though I'll readily admit its many faults, but on the whole, I quite like what they do.  People do call it a vast monolith that sucks the life out of other pubs, but I for one never forget that not so many years ago, there wasn't a single one. They have been built by one man and who can grudge such business flair that consistently gives a lot of people what they want? Not me.

Now back to these faults which can manifest themselves differently in different places. I'm not expert on the JDW pubs in Scotland outside the centres of Glasgow and Edinburgh,  but like their pubs in England, they vary and usually vary down to the competence or otherwise of the manager. As in all businesses, good managers bring flair, direction, purpose and enthusiasm. Take these away and you have a bad pub. Recently I was visiting my old mother in my home town of Dumbarton. Now Dumbarton isn't a wealthy town. The Wetherspoons there,theCaptain James Lang, only opened just over three years ago and it has added a lot to the town. Mothers and old ladies love it for coffee in the mornings. Old soaks like the prices, though I don't detect the same hard cadre of  9 a.m. John Smith's drinkers we get here in Middleton. It sells cask ale for the first time in Dumbarton since I left over 30 years ago and here's the point. No bugger drinks it.  I have tried when I visit and every time I have ordered a pint, I'm assailed by vinegar and the beer is "taken off". I'm offered a replacement with the same results.  Frankly if you don't drink Tennents Lager, get out of town  I shudder to think of the wastage rates.

On the following night I took the family for something to eat - no, not at the Captain James Lang despite the fact that there is less choice to eat in Dumbarton than you'd get in a Welsh Chip Shop - but to a carvery run by Crown Carveries, a subsidiary of Mitchells and Butlers.  The venue displays a Cask Marque sign outside, so all will be well? No, it won't. This time I asked for a taster. The Deuchars IPA was vinegar. The barmaid offered to pour some off as no-one had had any for "a few days". I declined and looking at the pumps, ordered a Heineken. No dice - "that's just for show".  So, a pint of Tennents was ordered.  The chatty barmaid explained that only Tennents and Guinness sell and that they have told M&B repeatedly that no-one drinks real ale, or Coors, or Heineken, but it seems it is a standard offer, so no changes. The barmaid said disparagingly "They are English - they don't get here. Just wasting their money."

The Pub Curmudgeon recently wrote about this subject here. I agree. What is the point of selling real ale where clearly there is no demand? There is none.  You have to grow a cask market and you won't do it by selling them vinegar and cask, in what is already stony ground for it, will get an even worse reputation. A downward circle of death.  That is not to say that you can't do something - you can - but you need to start off slowly, have offers and tastings, educate and encourage. If you don't do that you are lost.  Maybe M&B and Timbo should take a good look at their Scottish outlets. The market is different there and they should cut their cloth accordingly. 

As always, "It's the offer Stupid."

Why didn't I eat with the family in JDW?  Because I had an atrocious meal there when I had the duff beer. No prizes for saying which eggs were cooked by my 84 year old mother and which by JDW.
 
And no, I'm not saying either company should give up on real ale in Scotland, but apply a bit more individual thought and intelligence according to location. 

The carvery was really rather good and great value.

Microbrewing Bad Beer?

Boak and Bailey had an interesting thread a week or so ago about breweries that get more than their fair share of plaudits and those that don't and perhaps deserve to.  I did contribute to that but found that two of my key comments have vanished into the ether.  It has a habit of doing that to me has WordPress.  So, I'll continue what I was going to say here instead.

Buried in all the comments and unremarked was this "I am not concerned about brewers receiving too much, deserved, praise or others not gaining recognition. I would like to see a large number of micro brewers driven out of business and writers must tell the truth about the bad brewers and to metaphorically put the boot in. (For Northeners this would be just about any Dave Porter 3 day training course brewers)".  I think the writer of this - someone called Marwood that I don't know - is right about the number of poor microbrewers out there and also right about calling them out, though why he didn't take the opportunity to do so himself is a moot point. What caused me to respond though was the second bit about Dave Porter, which I suspect was not commented on because few understood it.

Dave Porter runs PBC who are the biggest supplier of microbreweries in the UK though they also supply worldwide.  (275 to date overall according to their website). They are based in Bury and Dave Porter, the owner used to run pubs in this area and supply them from his own microbrewery in Lancashire.  He is involved with Outstanding Brewing, is anything but modest,  but as sharp a businessman as you'll come across. He happens to be one of my CAMRA Branch members. He also brews good beer and teaches others how to brew.  What the commentator seems to be saying though is that Dave's plant and training produces bad beers. Now, were that so we wouldn't  be enjoying beers from, among others, Arbor, Bad Seed, First Chop, Ilkley, Kernal, Mallinson, Offbeat, Redchurch, Wilson Potter and Stringers to name but a few. Many of his other breweries aren't known to me, though plenty are. Far from all being in the North, they are nationwide and indeed worldwide. I don't of course know if all the brewers attended his training courses, but I do know the vast majority of his customers have done and acquired sufficient skills to produce excellent beers.  I don't doubt either that some produce a load of old rubbish.  That's the way of the brewing world.

Bad microbreweries exist because they have bad brewers, bad brewing practice and duff palates. Trust me Dave Porter has none of these.

In case you think this is inspired by Dave, it isn't. If he knew he wouldn't care and would probably tell me to eff off.  He has done so plenty times before in beery discourse.

Not A Fan

London Murky may well be my favourite beer descriptor of 2013, so well done to Robsterowski who I think can safely be said to have first coined it.  I don't care for murky cask beer myself, though I am a little more inclined to forgive it from bottle. (Well I might be in certain circumstances, but that's a separate post.)  My reasons for my dislike of cloudy cask beer are twofold.  OK. Maybe more than twofold, as my mind is racing into three plus reasons.  Firstly, to me at least, it doesn't look right.  Secondly, again to me at least, it doesn't always taste right.  This I admit may be in my mind (though not always), as I remain unconvinced that there are more good things than bad things floating around in the gloom. While mostly these are spent yeast cells and  proteins, I don't feel comforted by that, as I don't care for yeasty tasting beer. There are other by products of the brewing process that can remain in suspension too, such as tannins, starch, oxalic acid and more, that may well account for some of the haze.  These are just some of the bad boys.

My third reason is confusion.  I have already written about this and would add that there is something else. A fourth reason if you like. There is a temptation, which I think I have seen in action, for bar staff to attribute to any beer which is hazy or cloudy, the phrase "It is meant to look like that."  Now this may be just a guess, or they may be being disingenuous, but it all adds to the confusion. How do I know whether what I am being sold is working beer that hasn't finished its secondary fermentation, rather than one that is meant to be cloudy?  Nor do I know if the brewer is just incompetent. Truth is, I don't know other than by my taste and experience why it might be cloudy.  And I could well be wrong and on dodgy grounds for complaint if I'm not happy. To my mind, this all adds an unwelcome variable to me as a cask beer consumer and one that I didn't have to take into account before.  Before if the beer was cloudy, I took it back. What we are getting now isn't nearly as straightforward. Of course you can just dismiss me as an old fuddy duddy and say that I should learn to live with it.  Well I'm not so sure about that and am minded to do something about it.

The CAMRA AGM isn't a million miles away and I might just put forward a motion about how this confusion, which I see as (in the main) detrimental to cask beer, should be addressed.

Visual stimuli are very important to beer. Yes we do drink with our eyes.  We decide a lot about a beer before we even taste it.

What Do You Make of This?

A few weeks ago I wrote about the nearest JDW to my flat in London and remarked on how much it had improved.  Seems I may have spoken too soon about the Goodmans Field.

A couple of weeks ago we popped in on the way home and though I can't remember the beer names, I ordered pint of whatever this guest beer was.  It was extremely murky.  I queried it and asked for a replacement.  The next guest beer was identically murky, as was the beer from a third pump.  The poor barman obviously had no idea what was going on and asked if I'd like to see the manager.  I would.  I was assured that I had just struck an unlucky co-incidence and that they had all reached the end of the barrel at the same time.  I may just have looked doubtful.  "Hmm" I thought. "OK. I'll have a London Pride".  You are probably way ahead of me.  It was like electric soup.  Another co-incidence I was advised.  So I had a pint of the cruel Heineken.

A couple of days later I called in again, reasoning that it would all be new beers by then.  My ordered pint of Vale Misty Hop was cloudy.  I wasn't going through all that again, so tasting it gingerly, it wasn't that bad.  "Misty Hop" I thought. "Wonder if it is meant to be cloudy?"  The Blogosphere didn't know, so I emailed the brewery. This what they said "Misty Mountain Hop should be served crystal clear."  Now my first thought was to bubble this mob to Cask Marque and I will if next week when I'm in London, I call in and there is the slightest doubt about the beer.  But it may just be they had a disastrous weekend in the cellar and its a one off. I'm a kind sort underneath, though there is no excuse for selling under par beer, which they were quite blatantly doing. My second thought was about the Misty Hop.  I had thought that this might have been one of those daft beers that are meant to be served cloudy?  I didn't know and the name hinted that it might.

Nonetheless when an old hand like me can be well and truly fooled by the possibility of badly kept beer being this new fangled "unfined beer" or whatever they call it, what's happening to other poor innocents?  Are they being fooled too?

I'm not a fan of unfined beer as you can probably tell. 

All Quiet on the Portmadog Front

 What's not to like when you have a couple of nights away with old friends as we have done once a year for more than the last twenty?  Perhaps when you decide to stay in a run down seaside town like Portmadog that's what.  It all seemed fine when we decided on it. A nice run through Snowdonia and then a night in a pretty town with three Good Beer Guide pubs in it, then up to Chester and a night there. What could possibly go wrong?

Of course history of such events tells us we usually - or at least it seems so - have one day where nothing goes wrong beer wise and one where, disappointment rolls in repeatedly, like breakers on the Irish Sea.  It started promisingly enough in Llangollen where the sun shone and our lunch stop was at the excellent though very run down Ponsonby Arms.  A very pleasant barmaid told us of planned renovations as evidenced by scaffolding outside and the beer, in my case Diawl Bach from Heavy Industry Brewery, had enough hops about it at 3.8% to be very enjoyable.  It was in good nick too, despite us four being the only lunchtime customers.  A wander down to watch the steam locomotives at the preserved railway then took us to the posh Corn Mill owned by Brunning and Price.  Overlooking the railway and the River Dee, this was a beautifully renovated building  with among others,  Dave's Hoppy Beer from Facers, which was maybe just off the mark. A sign of things to come.

Now I hadn't been to Portmadog before and it wasn't quite what I was expecting. The Welsh Highland Railway was nice, as was the harbour, but the town had an ominously deserted feel to it.  We started off with a trip to nearby Tremadog where the busy Union Inn (GBG) offered Purple Moose beers that just weren't anything other than adequate and opposite, the Golden Fleece, built into the hillside and festooned with hops, offered more of the same.  Not bad beer you understand, but a bit tired and flabby.

All Good Beer Guide pubs next.  The best bet beer wise in the Station Inn (a bit of a basic boozer) was Adnams Ghost Ship and that wasn't great.  Our earlier experiences of Purple Moose Snowdonia had warned us off that, so after one, we supped up and plodded along to the Ship Inn which offered mainly national brands. It wasn't that busy at all. Our more exotic choice, Lancaster Blonde had that same midweek feel to it.  Last up was the working men's club-like Spooner's Bar, at the narrow gauge railway terminus.  We were persuaded by the barman to try a brand new cask of Snowdonia but it did little to convince us of its inherent qualities and after a couple we left, the boys to seek a curry and me to seek an early night.

It was eerily quiet as I made my way back to our rather nice B&B.  I saw no-one and walking past at 10.15 pm,  I noticed that the kebab house was firmly closed, as was the Chinese Chippy. Can't say I was shocked.

Conclusion?  Take the GBG with a pinch of salt if the pubs are empty and it is midweek.  Quality still cask's Achilles heel.

Nothing Wrong With It?

After a busy weekend in London, we wound down with a long walk on Bank Holiday Monday and for me, a determination that my last few pints of the weekend would be guaranteed to be good ones.  Thus it was that we headed over Waterloo Bridge and into Maiden Lane for some non cask stout at the Porterhouse Brewing Company.  As always I ordered Wrasslers 4X and as always the uncompromising bitterness delighted.  We sat outside watching disappointed antipodeans gazing forlornly into the closed Australian.New Zealand/ South African shop opposite, with me wondering as I always do, whether I shouldn't have had a pint of Plain Porter first,  but deciding the step down in flavour and gravity would be unwise. E wasn't nagged by any such doubts, sticking happily with Oyster Stout.

The RV1 bus leaves from just around the corner and goes, via Tower Bridge to Tower Gateway, a mere cockstride from our flat.  Temptingly, it passes very near to several well known craft outlets and we nipped in to one and despite my promises to myself, I ordered cask, which was a bit warm and tired.  "Listen to yourself " I said grimly, but letting myself off, as the search for top quality cask in London is usually experienced best in hope rather than expectation. E smugly said her (bloody expensive) Kernel was rather good.

Not wishing to be caught out twice, keg was acquired in the next and last pub.  It was from Camden and was Pale.  Nice enough, but not a patch on their late, lamented, cask Inner City Green .  E had a half of Paulaner and as we sat outside people watching, she took her first sip and grimaced.  "This is off" she said.  I looked at it.  It was a touch cloudy and smelt stale and cidery.  It certainly tasted awful. Hmm. I took it back. The barman expressed surprise, poured himself a little and said "It's fine - that's how it's meant to taste, but I'll change it if you want."  Now this of course implies that the customer is wrong, but in a nicer way.  I asked him if he was sure that it was Paulaner Helles and was advised it was.  "So that's meant to be cloudy and taste cidery?" He looked nonplussed. A colleague was called who confirmed it was fine and I was given a half of something else.

From our vantage point at the door, I could see we'd generated a discussion among the bar staff.  When I went in for a refill, the original barman said "I think you might be right about that beer - we've taken it off."  What I do wonder though is how many other poor sods had had off beer and said nothing and how it came to be off without anyone knowing.  Don't they taste all the beers first?  It isn't the first time I've had imported keg beer which has tasted stale. Is this common?  It is certainly a dear do to buy in the first place and even worse when it isn't right. It also makes me wonder about some of the folks behind the bar in some of these destination craft places.  Do they really know what they are talking about?

At least Sam Smith's Pure Brewed Lager doesn't suffer from staleness. I'll be mostly sticking to that in summer visits to the capital. Damn sight cheaper too.

Yes this is another London moan.  I'll happily (unhappily) moan about bad beer anywhere though.

Bottling It Up

I don't buy expensive bottles of beer by and large. It's a risky investment, even from those you think might know what they are doing.* Most small brewer's bottling operations are wing and a prayer stuff, so you might be lucky and get the beer exactly as the brewer intended and then again, hopefully on far, far fewer occasions, you might not. If you buy a beer from a supermarket, you could take it back and argue the toss. They'll likely exchange it anyway, as it isn't in their interests to piss you off over a bottle of beer, when you might be next spending £100 on your shopping.  If you buy it elsewhere, then you may be on far more uncertain ground.

Now when it comes to buying it from t'internet,  I'm guessing if a beer is bad and lots complain, you'll get a replacement, but often expensive beers are bought from sources that aren't exactly easy to take it back to, such as shops in strange towns, brewery shops, over the counter in a brewpub or brewery tap, beer festival and so on.  Anyway,  there is always the old "It's meant to taste that way, you wooden palated dolt" excuse to fall back on, which can be a difficult one to argue, when it might be something matured in old feta cheese drums or whatever.  Shaky ground indeed.

Why do I bring this up?  When I was away I read a thread on Twitter, where several people complained severely about the undrinkability of a beer that had set them back £10.99.  In fact more than one beer from the brewery was complained about.  I won't name the brewery as it is the general point I'm addressing and apart from the fact I wasn't affected, for all I know, those complaining may have taste buds with the sophistication of the average meths drinker.  Either way though, it is a bit of a bummer to pay so much for a drain pour.

I really don't know the answer, but those that produce expensive beers have a duty, no matter how "challenging" it may taste, to convince assure the buyer of a beer, that it is indeed "meant to be like that".  Hiding behind cutting edge and experimental isn't good enough. Especially at top dollar.

Maybe this is a what might be termed an "occupational hazard" for the adventurous drinker and can be shrugged off as such?

*Belgians excepted. By and large they know how to do it.

Bad Times, Good Times.

The lot of the beer drinker isn't always a happy one. While looking for the princess, you have to kiss a lot of frogs. Unfortunately it is the nature of the beast in beer drinking, as in life, that you have a lot of lows which make the highs so much more satisfying. In beer though, I doubt that it should be like this. Some beer is just out and out poor and a lot of beer is just poorly presented. An insult to both brewer and customer.

My trip to Scotland a couple of weeks ago was a case in point. There was highs in my first two beers. The Drum and Monkey offered St Peter's Mild and Roosters Welsummer. Both were splendid, with St Peter's Mild a superb example of the style. The Roosters surprised by being particularly good. As Tyson has pointed out, this isn't always so these days, though I have a feeling things are getting better there. Top marks to both.  Alas that ended the short run of success as in the Counting House, Salopian Lemon Dream was a vinegary nightmare and Bateman's Summer Swallow a dumper, which was a surprise, as despite their similarity, I quite like Bateman's beers. Sometimes things go from bad to worse of course.  In the Camperdown, Harviestoun Bitter & Twisted was actively horrid. and Kelburn Pivo Estimo tasted mostly of unfermented wort. The highs and lows of cask, all in an hour and a half.  And I did note grimly that it was the English beers that shone.  I won't even bother mentioning some of the other awful Scottish tasters, mostly dark, mostly appallingly malty and all poor.  Things did very much look up the next day in the Henry Bell as reported here. but this was a reminder that you should be wary of those that suggest - and I have seen it suggested - that there is a wonderful, faultless Scottish Brewing scene.  There is indeed a revival, but some breweries have yet to find their way.

On the positive side, back in Manchester, a Saturday CAMRA meeting saw a cracker of a beer though. Allgates Ostrava on first tasting was a touch dry, but boy did it develop into a beer of great drinkability and I like drinkability. I'm hearing good things about Allgates and  thinking of trusted palates here, Tyson says good things about them and that makes me sit up and take notice.

There is a serious point to this unfortunate tale of woe.  Now I know there are many that don't like negative comments and naming names, but I wasted a fair bit of money on duff beers, had that sneaking feeling that I should limit my drinking to places and breweries I know and trust - and that isn't a good thing - and overall was hardly uplifted by my beer drinking.  On the whole, I felt badly let down and wondered what a less experienced drinker would have done.  Ordered a pint of Carling probably.

I keep banging on about quality at both breweries and in pubs and make no apologies for doing so.  Bad beer does no-one any favours. At least at the end though I did snog a couple of princesses, but why on earth were there so many frogs?

There is an optimistic side to this. It is still fantastic to discover a great beer. You then forget all the negatives.

Stale Keg

The post preceding this and some comments on Boak and Bailey's blog have mentioned stale keg beers. It got me wondering. Now I know a little about why this should occur, but very little about how often it occurs, or even, if and when it does occur, whether anyone actually notices it.

It must be difficult, even with the best will in the world, to transport kegs of beer from the farthest corners of, say, the USA, without the beer suffering some deterioration in the process. Nor am I sure if such exports are in the main pasteurised or not. Given the number of stale or staling beers I've had in the US, I suspect most are not.  There is also I believe, a wide spread belief that keg beer is somewhat immune to deterioration and I wonder whether that, combined with unfamiliarity with the same product drunk fresh, allows or even encourages palates to be fooled.

I drink almost no keg imports here, so am not really qualified to do other than speculate. What do people that do think?

The little diagram is interesting and informative, though hardly conclusive. It should keep some folks (guess who) happy for a bit. Click on it to read properly.

Bottom of the Barrel

You know how it is. The pint you have just ordered doesn't seem quite the same, or as good as your previous one from the same handpump. You'd enjoyed the last one and this purchase somehow doesn't seem to measure up. It isn't as clean or satisfying. It's flatter and just, well, just inferior. You can't quite put your finger on it, but it leapt out at you on your first sip. What could have gone wrong?

Now of course I am talking about cask beer here. Real Ale if you like. The live stuff. Because it is live, you need a little more care in both serving and drinking it. So hopefully this will help when you get the experience desribed above. There are a few possible causes: you may have got a dirty glass. Not so common and it usually doesn't get as far as taste. Usually you can smell a dirty glass, but in bad cases it can taint the beer in some way. Most often it just smells bad. A much more likely cause is that the beer is reaching the bottom of the cask. After all, all good things come to an end and it is a living product. Now my experience tells me that with some beers, particularly if they are fast moving, you can squeeze almost every last drop out of a cask with little loss of condition, though there will always be some. Some beers pick up taint from the sediment (aka trub or lees - deposits of dead yeast or residual yeast and other particles that precipitate in cask conditioned beer at the bottom of the cask) more quickly than others too and some sediment is just heavier and stronger tasting and more likely to affect the last few pints of liquid.

In the case of the "not quite the same" pint there are one or two tell tale signs to look for. The first is that the pint will take a bit longer to clear and secondly, it will not have the same condition. It may well have a cloudiness or haze that was not apparent before.  In the worst case you will get a tell tale sign of "bottoms" - the sediment at the bottom of the cask, which will often taste very yeasty, but not in a good way. A faint (or not so faint) whiff of vinegar will sometimes be evident. These are signs that you should hot foot it to the bar and say in your best apologetic manner "I think this might be getting near the bottom."

Good luck with that. Perhaps I'll do a tutorial on that too.

The apologetic bit is most important. You are British for God's sake, so it is your fault.

The Circle of Trust

The Beer Nut set me thinking a little while ago, when he asked how I knew in advance that Mallinsons Chinook was any good. My answer was along the lines of since I trusted them, it was likely to be good.

You may have read me saying over the years about a black list of breweries that I have in my mind.  I mentally check through this list when looking at the wickets and add to it from time to time. Far too often actually. It is my way of avoiding chucking my money down the drain and of limiting my chances of getting a really bad beer.  It isn't written down though and I'm not anal enough to trawl through the GBG to produce one. But it is there in my mind's eye. It changes sometimes. Breweries go in and out of the list and of course there are breweries that I simply don't like because of a house style or flavour that just doesn't appeal to me.  Your mileage may therefore vary. To add to that there are of course breweries that I don't know at all. I don't always try unknown breweries, but will usually have a taste if offered. It all contributes to the mix and that's how discoveries are made. Good or bad.

To go along with this mental list, there is a list of those breweries that will never reach the heights, either though intention to appeal to the mainstream, or the simple fact that they produce beers that while they will rarely delight, will equally be unlikely to offend. These are the sort of beers you drink when you seek familiarity or comfort.  They may not make you swoon, but you enjoy them if the circumstances and the company is right. It includes most of the Family Brewers and the Regionals.  It also includes that frustrating group, the breweries that produce great stuff and not such great stuff, or have consistency problems. Even within these, there are beers I am happy to drink depending on circumstance. I think that list though is much more personal and you probably have your own.

For every down, there is an up. The list here is fortunately reasonably large and in the best traditions of cheery beeriness, I'll share some with you. It doesn't mean they are always brilliant, just a lot more likely to be so. Mallinsons, Phoenix, Ossett, Pictish, Hawkshead, Castle Rock, Ilkley, Fyne, Acorn, Brodies, Buxton, Liverpool Organic, Thornbridge, Crouch Vale, Magic Rock, Dark Star, Stringers, Oakham and quite a few others if I could manage to think of  them. For the avoidance of doubt, I am talking here about cask beer - beer you can only buy in the pub.

Some of this is personal taste, but these all operate pretty well across a variety of styles and in my view can be bought with a fair degree of confidence.  Trust me on that one?

Of course many breweries do mainly non cask well and I wouldn't find Kernel or Camden a great hardship in most circumstances.

It Was ****** Brewery

Boak and Bailey were considering the issue of "naming and shaming" the other day - firstly on their blog following some duff bottles of Norfolk beer and yesterday (I think) on twitter on the same subject. I sometimes do and sometimes don't, but was surprised yesterday to find myself in the same dilemma.

In the Marble Arch, swooping down some very drinkable "Craft", I decided I'd blog today about two 5% guest beers from different breweries. I thought they'd make a nice subject and contrast. So for my last drink, two halves were ordered, with very different results. First up was one of the whizz kids of British Brewing, Summer Wine Brewery with Rouge Hop Ale, which was a quite lovely beer.  Bursting with condition, full bodied and a very resinous hop presence throughout made for a beer I wished I'd had a pint of.  The other beer was billed as an IPA and was from a very respected Northern brewer. But all was not well. The beer was sharp, sour and undrinkable.  We were chatting to James Campbell, the Marble brewer at the time and I passed the beer to him for an opinion. He agreed, had a quiet word with the manager and the beer was taken off.  I had another half of the marvellous Rouge Red.  Then another. It was that good.

Now it wasn't the end of the cask, just beer that wasn't right.  I won't name the beer this time, as everyone can make a mistake, though where and when can't be readily determined in this case. In any event,  I know the brewer and his beers of old.  He knows what he is doing, so unless this happens more times to me, it wouldn't be right.

Pity about this example though.

Saltaire Blond in the Angel was also drinking well yesterday.