The Beer Thread

[patiirc]

I've mentioned Innis & Gunn before, but I've just surpassed even my wildest expectations with them, their limited edition Bourbon Stout (7.4%), may actually be the finest drink I've ever had. It's dark, rich, warms the mouth and has a nice kick of bourbon coming through towards the end. Lovely stuff

[Statto]

Glad to see this thread bumped, as today is the beginning of the best week of the year, Norwich Beer Festival. At the end of the last one I said I would never go every day again, but I've changed my mind. The thought of sitting at home whilst it's going on kills me.

 

If anyone's interested in what I'll be drinking for the next 6 days, you can take a look here:

 

http://www.norwichcamra.org.uk/festival/beer13.htm

[patiirc]

Glad to see this thread bumped, as today is the beginning of the best week of the year, Norwich Beer Festival. At the end of the last one I said I would never go every day again, but I've changed my mind. The thought of sitting at home whilst it's going on kills me.

 

If anyone's interested in what I'll be drinking for the next 6 days, you can take a look here:

 

http://www.norwichcamra.org.uk/festival/beer13.htm

 

Oh man, you lucky sod! Riggwelter on cask, Worthington E (which Ive heard many people rave about who were there at the time, though never tried), Silent Night, looks heavenly as does Destiny from Lacons. The 'Witches' from Moor house can be good, can be soapy, depends on how they've travelled and the Green Jack brews look lovely as well. Git!

[Statto]

We are very lucky, in general.

 

In my previous job I used to correspond with a guy at one of my company's biggest customers who was a very early member of CAMRA (not exactly what you'd call a "founder member" but his membership number was <100) and each year I'd send him the beer list over. He was generally of the opinion that, whilst not in quantity, in terms of selection Norwich outstripped the GBBF each year.

 

We got the CAMRA AGM/Members' Weekend this year too, so I think the quality of the local branch is recognised.

[Baz Windham]

Also Birmingham beer festival this week for us Midlanders, It's usually top notch. Looking forward to the couple of times I'll be going including the opening Camra only night, which should be a good chance to have pick of all the beers which doesn't normally happen when we just go on the Saturday.

[dangerously420]

I have became quite the craft beer drinker in the last year or so. Found some amazing beers and feel I could really contribute to this thread really well.

 

My journey with craft beer began when my sisters boyfriend was going on about Brewdog and it's bar in Glasgow. He told me how he got a beer tasting on groupon and said it was just amazing. Got along and from there I was hooked.

 

My first craft beer I drank was Brewdog's flagship beer Punk IPA. A 5.4% ABV IPA. The one thing that stood out from this was the smell. It smelt different to Stella Artios and Budweiser in the fact it actually smelled of something. A strong hop aroma which is just wonderful and the bitterness of grapefruit just hits the spot.

 

I have tried just about all the Brewdog range and my favorites have to be Hardcore IPA which is a 9.2% ABV Double IPA and Libertine Black Ale which comes in at 7.2% ABV.

 

I've taken a liking to the American import ales as Brewdog takes a strong American influence in what it does. British ales tend to be not so great at using as much hops and I love hops in my beer. Brewdog use lots of hops.

 

My favorite American brewers are Oskar Blues, Flying Dog and Great Divide.

 

My favorite from Oskar Blues is the GKnight Imperial Red IPA. Comes in a pint can and is 8.7% ABV. It's a sticky sweet IPA and the hops and the malt are just amazing. Very malty for the sweetness and stickiness.

 

Flying Dog I have to say the Barleywine is my favorite of theirs in at 10.5% ABV.

 

Great Divide its a toss up between the Yeti Imperial stout 9.5% ABV and Hercules Double IPA which comes in at 10% ABV.

[SiMania]

Siphoning a brew today and we're going a bit experimental. I'm doing my "standard" customization, which is a Woodford Wherry kit, replacing the dried yeast with live yeast from a London ESB, steeping some Fuggles hops in the boiling water before mixing the kit in, then dry-hopping some Goldings once fermentation is finished and before kegging.

 

However, rather than keg it all, I'm going to fill a bottle as well, but rather than use priming sugar there, I'll use the equivalent amount of elderflower cordial. It's the missus's idea, and the logic is that it'll make it a bit like Badger Golden Glory. I'll see if it goes OK and might do a full batch that way next time.

 

How did the cordial priming work out? I did a wherry with 500g of dme added to the wort and some goldings added a few days into fermentation. It's been conditioning for 12 days and I had a bottle at 10 days, surprisingly very nice when it's nowhere near ready.

 

Thinking of an American IPA next. Something like a Sierra Navada.

[PowerButchi]

. British ales tend to be not so great at using as much hops and I love hops in my beer.

 

Bollocks. There's plenty of microbreweries that make great hoppy beer in the UK. Fuck Brewdog, get down to pubs selling from local microbreweries.

[Loki]

Dangerously will only drink a beer if the brewery opens a pub just round the corner from his house.

[SiMania]

There are plenty of hoppy IPAs brewed all over the UK.

[Dead Mike]

Bollocks. There's plenty of microbreweries that make great hoppy beer in the UK. Fuck Brewdog, get down to pubs selling from local microbreweries.

 

100% This. I love Brewdog (I'm a shareholder) but there's more local microbreweries opening up than ever. If I've got 3 near me in deepest darkest Crewe I'm sure in a major city like Glasgow there'll be about a dozen.

 

There's a craft beer shop 5 mins walk from my house now so I'll be stocking up my xmas beer this weekend. Quality over quantity this year I think.

[Rey_Piste]

Whilst Taste is very objective and there's only two types of beer, those you like and those you don't. You really don't seem to know what you're going on about, you keep mention hops all the time yet I don't think you understand what hops do in the brewing process. Hops generally add the bitterness to beer, but then it's all down to the type of hops used as well. Not more hops equals more flavour, for an example have a look at the Wikipedia list for types of hops. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_hop_varieties

Comes in a pint can and is 8.7% ABV. It's a sticky sweet IPA and the hops and the malt are just amazing. Very malty for the sweetness and stickiness.

To say something is sticky and sweet for the maltyness, is pretty much what malt does. Malt adds some of the sugars for the yeast to activate from and turn into alcohol during the brewing process. Even then it's down to how much the malts are roasted which effects the taste. It does also seem that you only like beers that have a strong alcoholic content, though saying that the Russian Imperial Stout that I've had was very nice, but definitely not a session beer with it's strong 11%. The red IPA that I quoted you talking about above really sounds like someone describing Tennants Super or Special Brew. Generally though it does sounds like you've heard hops and malt are involved in the brewing process, so you thought you would sound intelligent by using them to describe the taste of beer, but you come across as a bit of a twat.

 

Though if you do like very bitter hoppy beers then you'll love arrogant Bastard Ale, which is a a septic brew, that's famous for how strong it is in flavour. http://www.arrogantbastard.com/

[SiMania]

Whilst Taste is very objective and there's only two types of beer, those you like and those you don't. You really don't seem to know what you're going on about, you keep mention hops all the time yet I don't think you understand what hops do in the brewing process. Hops generally add the bitterness to beer, but then it's all down to the type of hops used as well. Not more hops equals more flavour, for an example have a look at the Wikipedia list for types of hops. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_hop_varieties

 

Hops do 3 things in the brewing process. First off they add bitterness when added early in the boil. Then they add flavour later on in the boil. Then the last additions are for aroma.

 

I don't see anything wrong with Tommy saying he likes hoppy tasting beers or high abv beers if that's what he likes. I like hoppy beers but stay away from anything with that's got an abv of over 6.

[Rey_Piste]

Whilst Taste is very objective and there's only two types of beer, those you like and those you don't. You really don't seem to know what you're going on about, you keep mention hops all the time yet I don't think you understand what hops do in the brewing process. Hops generally add the bitterness to beer, but then it's all down to the type of hops used as well. Not more hops equals more flavour, for an example have a look at the Wikipedia list for types of hops. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_hop_varieties

 

Hops do 3 things in the brewing process. First off they add bitterness when added early in the boil. Then they add flavour later on in the boil. Then the last additions are for aroma.

 

I don't see anything wrong with Tommy saying he likes hoppy tasting beers or high abv beers if that's what he likes. I like hoppy beers but stay away from anything with that's got an abv of over 6.

I like hoppy beers as well, but this quote is what stuck out for me.

I've taken a liking to the American import ales as Brewdog takes a strong American influence in what it does. British ales tend to be not so great at using as much hops and I love hops in my beer. Brewdog use lots of hops.

It seemed like there wasn't any real understanding of how the hops are used within the brewing process. Whilst I'm not a home brewer I am an ale fan and I do have a rudimentary understanding of brewing and the main usage of hops when added to the wort is to add bitterness, but as I said it does depend on the variety used and I forgot to mention when that when the hops are added to the boil makes a difference as well. It was just the fact that he seemed to equate more hops equals more flavour which certainly isn't true.

 

I am lucky to live close to a lot of very good breweries and a lot of the pubs in my town have some nice ales on tap. I'm also lucky to have some good beer festivals that are local to me. My favourite for just beer tasting is the Tucker's maltings beer festival http://edwintucker.co.uk/beer-festival/#.UrQefPRdUrU. Though http://www.abbfest.org/ tends to be much more lively and has a party atmosphere. Then there's the Occombe beer festival which would be really good if it wasn't so poorly ran. They only have one bar and it's under staffed for the amount of people who turn up. This video

shows the size of it and that barn area near the back is the bar and with how many people turn up 6 or so people serving isn't enough. Last year they pretty much ran out of beer on the first evening, so it's so badly organised that they can't run a piss up with the help of a dozen breweries.

[patiirc]

I have became quite the craft beer drinker in the last year or so. Found some amazing beers and feel I could really contribute to this thread really well. [snip]

 

Welcome to the world of Real Ales and Micro Breweries. There is much more to beer than Brewdog, and plenty of places have microbreweries these days. 'Craft' sounds so small time, especially when Microbrewery stuff goes all over the shop these days if its good enough, though it seems to be the prevalent term these days.

 

If you really want to expand your mind in terms of taste and differing ales, then get to your next local beer festival. not held at Brewdog . Be prepared to have your taste buds amazed and try a sample of the best that Britain, Europe and most likely the world can offer, rather than get caught in the zeitgeist of N American Beer. Dont get me wrong there are plenty of decent brews coming from that part of the world, it's just not the only place that is currently excelling and it would be churlish to narrow your options.

 

May be worth going to Bon something, Bon Accord? (and picking up the local CAMRA mag, or becoming a member even.) Which is always mentioned as a decent ale pub whenever Glasgow is mentioned, think they usually have around 6-10 on tap at any one point.