To Cornwall and back again

Last week was our annual trip to Cornwall, we join our friends and their families for fun, food, sun (sometimes) and yes drinking.
The boys see it as a great opportunity to get reacquainted with breweries we have discovered over the last five years, local beers and have done a pub crawl around a new town each year, Padstow, Wadbridge and Bodmin being the last ones. This year we thought about doing a brewery tour and plumped for Skinners in Truro, who were very helpful when contacted, more on that later.
Due to the general poor mobile reception in Cornwall, really bad in so many places, and the ultra slow wifi at the farmhouse I didn't check into Untappd as many of the beers as I could have, but as usual I bought a few bottles home to blog about.


The first cask beer of holiday for me however was from a more well known company, namely Sharp's brewery from Rock nr Padstow.
A lot of people are down on them since their acquisition by Molson Coors a few years ago, but I still like their beers, and from what I've read about Stuart Howe, chief overlord or some such similar title, he seems a bloke who hold very high ideals and integrity, certainly someone who knows his own opinions.
Whatever, judge them on the beers.

We stopped for lunch on the way from South Wales to Cornwall just of the A30 past Exeter into a village called Ide for a pub called the Poachers Inn.

Sitting in the sun in the lovely beer garden we enjoyed a well prepared and reasonable lunch, my daughter (and the rest of us) loving the huge whitebait she had ordered. I went for a classic lunch, and got large slices of ham and beautiful fresh eggs with chips.
To drink they had several south west breweries on but I went for the Sharp's Six Hop IPA, which at 3.8% you could put it into this new 'sessionable IPA' category that seems to be mentioned more and more.
Light golden yellow, good carbonation. Minimal head retention. Light citrus aroma, which on taste seems a little light also, nice balance with the malts. Subtle bitterness afterwards. With the six hops I was expecting something a little more upfront and punchy in the mouth, this was gentle but refreshing and certainly sessionable.

Then it was onto Cornwall.

SainsburysTap Room Brewing Co. beers

Two beers bought from Sainsbury's recently when in London, both in the 'Taste the Difference' range and made for them by the Tap Room Brewing Co. from Rochester, New York.

First up was the American Pale Ale, 5.3%  355mls, 'pale Ale US craft beer' described as having a ' complex hop aroma with deep flavours'.
Mmm, think I would have to question that.
There was little hop aroma, it was more malty toffee sweetness, very little bitterness. On plus side, good carbonation, nice head, but far too easy to drink, there was nothing in it to savour and hold in the mouth or contemplate.

When I logged into my Untappd feed I commented 'Rather dull, where's the hops?' so obviously that was my immediate impression. Tellingly someone commented back 'Exactly what I thought'.




 
Onto the second from the range, the IPA. Must admit at this point I was not hopeful.

Its 6.3%, 355mls, had an aroma that was cream, toffee and some spice to it.
 Again good carbonation and good head, this was a bit better although thin in the mouth. It had a better balance of the malt, some fruitness and spice, but rather light on the bitterness, at least there was some in this beer though.



When I bought these I also picked up a Brewdog Dead Pony Club which is 3.8% American Pale Ale which kicks this two beers all over the park, in every aspect.

Brains Barry Island IPA

Quick review, drinking as typing.

This is from the 'craft brewery' of Brains, run alongside their main South Wales brewery. This beer was brewed in conjunction with Simon from the You Tube 'Real Ale guide'. Described as an 'American Style IPA' it is 6%, 330mls, and available currently in Tesco's across South Wales.

Marmalade orange body, very small head that soon goes. Nice but light aroma, some orange, a little pine, tropical fruits. Taste is on a medium body, obvious malt backbone, toffee sweetness, with gentle citrus bitterness that takes a while to come on, it needs time to break through but its nice when it does.

Overall its a nice beer, I wouldn't go so far as to say its an American style IPA, the malt and sweetness is too forward while the clean hop punch in the face bitterness you would expect is lacking, but I certainly enjoyed it.
Nice labelling too for the 'craft brewery' beers so far also.

Bear Republic Racer 5

Bear Republic Racer 5 is certainly what you would call a modern classic, an American IPA (7% abv).

Loaded with Chinook, Cascade, Columbus and Centennial hops this is a beer you see mentioned in books and across the internet as a favourite of many, one I had to buy when I saw it on the shelf.

It was more orange than the photo shows, nice tight head. Aroma was mango, orange and quite floral.
It has a good body on it, again mango, tropical fruits, sticky, moderate amount of bitterness.

When drinking its hard to believe its as strong as 7%, if you bought a six bottle pack as they sell it in the US, you'd probably sink half of those very easily. A very good beer, perhaps not as stunning as I'd anticipated but great none the less.

Plus - Like the new glass? I picked it up recently, a ten sided 'fluted' half pint mug. For those interested, read a little history from Zythophile.

Light and Dark

I've been busy recently, lots of decorating, assembling furniture and a first turn at wallpapering hence the lack of recent posts. All good fun, not,  and now I have a weeks holiday just when its half term holiday.

I certainly though have not been denying myself some decent beers, including another trip to the Cardiff beer shop to pick up some new bottles. I did tend to hit the more well known names this time, Thronbridge and Kernel bottles, Mikkeller and Anchor again. I could have gone for some breweries I've not experienced before but the above mentioned when on the shelf I really felt I couldn't pass over.

Tonight however I drank one from my last shopping trip pre xmas, Orkney Brewery's Dragonhead stout, and then followed it with another bottle from the Mikkeller Single Hop IPA series, this time the Nelson Sauvin.

Obviously 2 very different styles of beer, but at the end of the day its still malts, water and hops.


 Orkney's Dragonhead, a surprisingly low 4% considering how it tastes, 500ml bottle.



On the other side is a Mikkeller Single Hop Nelson Sauvin IPA, a much bigger 6.9% abv, 330ml bottle.





 Both in excellent condition when opened, aroma's flowing free from the pour. One was chocolate, earthy notes and wood, the other bountiful exotic fruit, which was which??!!

The taste couldn't live up to the aroma's surely?
Oh yes, but first the look - black as a stout should be, with a head that clings on throughout being respectable to the image, and the colour of light melted chocolate, which I'm convinced got darker as I drank more. Oily in texture, good mouthful, you just keep swirling the glass to see how it looks and settles. Dark chocolate, light coffee on the tongue, woody and a little smoke. Total joy. Within the creamy sensation you get some vanilla, and then a good roasted end.

Why did i follow a stout with this IPA, I'm not totally sure. I know I wanted to continue the high qualitity I had just had had, I didn't want to be let down with a lacklustre beer and the last Mikkeller was a pretty good bottle. And I'd recently re-discovered Brewdog's 5am Saint and fancied another similar hit of hops, so hoped this would provide it.

Wonderful colour, sort of a bright copper, the citrus and passion fruit aroma. Great freshness again with this bottle like the last, the bitterness creeps back in your mouth and hits the back nicely, fades a little early but by then your going for another sip so it's a moot point. Crisp sharp orange that should be left in the fruit bowl a little longer, and a wonderful hop dryness.


Good choices.

Mikkeller Tomahawk Single Hop IPA

Mikkeller Tomahawk IPA, from their single hop series, one of a number of breweries running with this concept, their occasional collaborators Brewdog being another.
I did look for tomahawk on Wikipeadia to learn that its a trade name for Columbus, a well known American hop.

Really good hazy orange colouring , with a massive head that reduces to frothy white covering.

An amazing hoppy aroma of grapefruit, pine, dilute orange juice.
Its oily, has pine and citrus, obviously the bitterness is foremost,  The flavours dont quite live up to the aroma though.
The bitterness lingers at the upper back palate, its quite intense but not harshly so.
Fresh, spiky, very enjoyable.
330mls, 6.9% abv.

Isle of Purbeck 'Purbeck IPA'

This is a bottle I bought during our July holiday in Dorset, and although I have been to the Bankes Arms many times which is now the home of the brewery, I got this on the farm shop at the camp site we stayed at.

When I last visited the Bankes Arms, (one of the most beautiful pubs you'll ever see, click the link) my mum and I tried a few of their beers on cask, and whilst nice enough they were all a little too similar to each other.

This IPA is 500mls, 4.8% abv, and bottle conditioned.
Lightly carbonated, minimal white head upon pouring. The yeast stayed firmly in the bottle also.
Bronze in colour, light woody aroma firstly, some dark fruit also.
First mouthful and i'm getting alot of woody burnt ash, not totally pleasant to be honest. Medium body, some malt sweetness, dryness but little hop bitterness.
Overall it was not a great drink unfortunately, perhaps this was a duff batch, but the tobacco and wood dominating was not nice.

I'm pretty sure I tasted their IPA when I lasted visited, and I'm sure I would have remembered it if it had tasted like this back then, which I don't think it did so I'm not sure what to make of this.

a few beers in Cardiff

I mentioned in a recent post my friend at work leaving for a new post, so on Friday it was the works meal for him, in Cardiff Bay.
Three of us meet up early to get a few pints in before the meal as we didn't anticipate getting any decent beer in the restaurant or bar we were expected to visit later that night.

Harviestoun's American IPA

We first headed to The Packet but I was diverted by a sign for Marston's EPA at the Eli Jenkins, a M&B pub. In the rare sunshine the grass free beer garden was packed, mostly office workers it seemed. I was then diverted from the EPA to a pump displaying Harviestoun's American IPA, and my friends plumped for the same.
Wonderfully aroma, lemon, peaches and cream. Taste was fresh, zingy, sherbet and citrus.
Grapefruit bitterness and background sweet malt, this was a perfect first pint, set us up for the night.
Why its an American IPA i'm not sure, perhaps its the hops they have used, as its taste profile whilst very nice, is not has hoppy as most US IPA's i've had.



 
We then moved onto the Marston's EPA. My soon to be departed colleagues first impression was not favourably, far to sickly sweet for him. A light golden brown with nice creamy tight head, medium body. Aroma - caramel, as was the taste. All three of us found it like drinking a Caramac bar, the first half was manageable but we struggled further down the glass. Not great, thumbs down from us all.

We headed over to The Packet, an older style Brains pub stained glass windows, open style interior which seemed quite retro with the old disco LED lights flashing everywhere. Very limited cask option i remember, so we plumped for the keg Brains Black as it was the first chance I've had to sample it not out of a can.

As we settled down we all exclaimed about the frostbite we just received from the glass! Served ridiculously cold, flavour was suppressed for about 20 minutes before any bitterness and chocolate came on. Hugely disappointing, we soon had to leave and couldn't wait any longer for it to warm up.

On to the meal, at Cosmo, not somewhere I'd been before, but my wife has and said I'd enjoy it. And she was right, not a style of restaurant I have been in before, very open plan, long tables and buffet stations of different Asian food styles. The sushi and Thai were excellent, not so keen on the dim sum though. Very enjoyable overall.
Beer wise we were quite surprised to find Spitfire on the list amongst the usual lager options. Served at a reasonable temperature (!) and also reasonable price of £3.10 for a restaurant. Seeing as you are normally offered 330ml bottles and higher prices this was a pleasing option to have.

a few new bottles

Managed a beer run early this week in Cardiff, and now i'm tingling with excitement at my purchases.
On my last visit i chatted with the owner about possibly getting in more US beers, and i was pleased to see a chance to try something other than the Pale ale from Sierra Nevada as on the shelves was their Torpedo IPA.
Turning the corner and amongst the very recently newly stocked shelves was Sharp's Monsieur Rock, which i think most beer drinkers who read blogs will have read about, a brilliant tasting and extremely drinkable bottle from Stuart Howe and Orval's Jean-Marie Rock apparently. I picked up three bottles, kept looking at the others on the shelf though, i might go back sooner rather than later.

 Next in the box was something i've seen around in books and online but never actually on a shelf, that is Young's Double Chocolate Stout. Joining it was Saltaire brewery's Cascade Pale ale 4.8%, Naylor's brewery Bradford Lad 7.2% strong ale/barley wine.
Ridgeway brewery's Bad King John, a 6% black ale which going by the label is supposed to exported to the US.

Now from the other side of the English Channel comes:
Saison Dupont 33cl 6.5%, Lindemans Faro Lambic 4.2%,
Maredsous Abbaye Blonde 6%, and Westmalle Trappist Dubbel 7%.

Again there was so many i picked up and left behind, 3 Monts, Bosteels Tripel Karmeliet, so many british breweries, Thornbridge's pilsner also was hesitantly put back (this time). He only had the Marzan smoked beer left no Urbock unfortunately, and i was hoping for a couple of different wheat beers but his German supplier is not as good as it used to be he tells me. And i got a free glass!

M&S Southwold Winter IPA

Quick review of this beer, picked up, obviously, in M&S the other day. Funny enough when i got home i read a review of this beer by Darren at Blog o' Beer, which made me want right there and then. But it was mid morning so i put it off til after i picked the kids up from school, seemed the sensible thing to do!
Brewed for them by Adnams its 6.7% and 500mls. Not sure though i can add to much more to Darrens post really, but cut n' pasting would be a tad lazy.
Okay, lovely amber brown colour, frothy but diminishing head. Nutty malty aroma, good sharpness - grapefruit, nice medium body with a bit of dry fruit in there.
As i write this i'm supping a Marble Dobber, full on good smack in the face grapefruit there, but this Winter IPA is more rounded, calmer, and one i would drink more than the Marble i suspect.

Edited 25/1 to correct abv %. 
2nd edit:
Crap, i forgot the FABPOW with this beer. Rowntrees Randoms - went brilliantly, light juiciness and sweetness with the IPA dryness and sharpness. High class here!

Marble Lagonda IPA

Well, now i'm truly jealous of those beer bloggers who got to go on the Twissup recently, supping those Marble beers in the brewery and Marble Arch pub.
I also think my wife got bored of me saying 'thats so good' and similar comments after every mouthful! 500mls was not enough.
Beautiful fresh citrus and hop aroma and a small creamy head that lasted the drink.
Taste wise, again citrussy, ?peach that give some floral aspect i think. Lovely long dryness also, great beer all round.


Bigger picture here.

Good times ahead.

Just before the weekend i had to go into Cardiff for a work thing which meant i could make a slight detour to probably the best (as in most varied selection) beer shop in South Wales that I'm aware of. Please feel free to correct me if you know of another.
On 97-99 Whitchurch Road is the Discount Supermarket which from the outside looks reasonable ordinary, little hint at the treasures inside.



Aside from the usual convenience shop fare and a large wine section, is a fantastic beer selection. Floor to ceiling shelves with a choice from all corners of these isles, including as high up as the Scotland's Orkney Brewery. Then there is the Belgian beers, German, many other European, and a good but small selection of US beers.
I picked up:
two from the Anchor brewing co. Porter and Liberty Ale
Orkney Brewing co. Red MacGregor

William Brothers Kelpie Seaweed ale
Timmermans Gueuze Lambic   -   this will be my first lambic beer btw.
Schneider weisse Tap 6
Samual Smith Oatmeal Stout
Marble Lagonda IPA
Leffe 9
and the Untapped Triple S  in my last post.

I then went to Dorset for the weekend to see family and friends, and my oldest friend Dougie kindly gave me three beers he picked up on holiday in Devon recently from the Teignworthy brewery. Cheers mate!!

Unfortunately i know am working three nights and then have the next few nights already booked up so all of these will have to wait until next week!!! To be fair thought one of these nights out is a small stag do which will be attending a beer festival so that pretty good compensation!

Tesco Finest Brewdog American Double IPA

Yes thats right, a Tesco Finest Brewdog beer collaboration!!!

On my weekly shop this morning and amongst the almost never ever changing line up on the shelves was a new bottle. I noticed first the labeling and almost mistook it for the newish Brains   IPA  bottles until i saw the Tesco Finest label at the bottom.

Tesco Finest Brewdog American Double IPA

Produced for Tesco by Brewdog its a 330ml 9.2% American Double IPA and yours for £2. None of the usual Brewdog ethos or angsty spiel on the bottle, just lets you know that its an american craft style with west coast hops, lots of them. Must of been an interesting meeting between their buyer and the brewdogs guys i reckon!

I have never had any US craft beers or any double IPA's before but from the beer blogs i'm expecting massive hops and bitterness from this, and i really enjoyed their Punk IPA.

Its has the aroma of unsurprisingly grapefruit, melon and a wiff of alcohol, its colour is light amber (doesn't come across in this photo) with a small creamy white head. It also has the massive hops bitterness, fairly low alcohol warmth hit, and there is some caramel and floral aspects too.  So one sided though, its all hops and nothing else, not sure i would have more than one just because its not that its not interesting, its just unbalanced to my mind. It in no way seems like a 9.2% beer though, and i just wish Brewdog put more of their other beers on Tesco's shelves.

Untapped Brewing Co. 'Ember' 'U.P.A' & 'Sundown'

After the thoroughly enjoyable Untapped 'Eclipse' the other night i decided to get stuck into the rest of their range.   'Ember' at 5.2% is described as a "Winter Warmer" , an ale with three types of roasted malt that give it a good dark colour (see below) with slight tan head. There is a tang and fizz on your tongue, chocolate aroma which then follows through in the taste and its not to heavy either.

In their description of this beer they call it a "strong, old style ale" rather than a stout. I'm not sure i'm knowledgeable enough to know what the difference is with this beer, but i do know its a very good one.


Next up was the U.P.A 4.5%. A light golden pour into the glass, sweet fruit and citrus aroma.
A balance of hops and malt, and a good, medium amount of bitterness follows. Very enjoyable but i would say not particularly distinctive.
Lastly was the 'Sundown' a golden ale which is lively, with a sweet fruit note i couldn't put my finger on, and bready aroma, a refreshing yet dry and bitter end. Superior to the U.P.A. definitely.
In order of preference i would give top marks to the Eclipse, followed by Sundown, Ember and then the U.P.A.

All of these beers, and a few more beside (Marble, Otley, VoG, RCH were ones i picked up), were bought at the excellent Arth Wine in Penarth run by a very knowledgeable and friendly chap called Richard. You can find them next door to the railway station, where they have a walk in chiller section keeping our lovely beers at the exact temperature (9.3`c when i went in!) as well as a great range on the shelves. I will be going back very soon!

Brewdog Punk IPA

Punk IPA and a Scelidosaurus.

If your someone who just likes to drink beer, buys from supermarkets or local convenience shops and doesn't read beer media then you may not be aware of Brewdog apart from what you see on the shelves.
I suppose that depends on how successful they have been getting into mainstream media and judging by their last efforts 'The End of History' thats pretty good.
On the shelves i see Punk IPA, in a 330ml bottle at the same price as most of the 500ml bottles. Now before i knew who they were and that they made pretty well regarded beer i would be in two minds about buying any of the bottles. Actually though not two minds for very long, i would discount it quickly. If i can get a Fullers/Badger/Adnams beer, good beer and 170mls more for the same money that seemed a no brainer to me.
However i have been meaning to try one of their beers now for a while and last week Tesco's reduced the Punk IPA 4 bottle pack to £3.43, or 85p a bottle so no excuses any more.

Is there any point doing a review? you've all drunk it too haven't you?
Just to say i loved the big flavour, the way the massive bitterness brings it on, tropical fruits and glorious colour.

Been tweaking the blog design also, better i think.