Tag: England

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English Brewery # 2 – Brew By Numbers

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The second stop in England is at Brew By Numbers or known by the shorter (BBNo.) They have quite a list of beers. All numbered that riff off of the founders early influencers from Australia and New Zealand as well as the now famed Kernel Brewery.

Here are my numerically ordered choices:
01 SAISON – Gotta start with the first
09 BROWN ALE – Brown ales get a bad rap but it is a must-try English style
10 COFFEE PORTER – How does English coffee differ from hyped American ones?
14 TRIPEL – A style that I need to try more of.
19 GOSE – had a few goses recently and it would be a good test
25 WHITE IPA – need to try at least one IPA

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English Brewery # 1 – Howling Hops

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As I was paging through a recent All About Beer magazine, I had the thought that for the months of January and February, I would cherry pick breweries to feature from the pages. And this month, we will head to England and peek in at three breweries over there.

We start at Howling Hops which probably makes gruits. Not.

Howling Hops started in the basement of the Cock Tavern. They outgrew the brew cave quickly. Brewing over a 100 different beers can speed that process and moved to an old brick warehouse nearby in the lovely sounding town of Hackney Wick where they now brew and operate their Tank Bar.

They offer beers mostly under 6% ABV with one beer down at 3%!

Here is what I would have in my first taster tray…..

Riding Ale 3.0% – gotta start with the low end and see what it is like
Running Beer 4.0% – slowly work up the beer ladder
Howling Pils 4.6% – to compare against the ales
Ruby Red 5.2% – because me mum’s name is Ruby
IPA 7.5% – finish up with the biggest beer on the list.

I am also intrigued by their Pale XX and the Rye Wit as well.

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Holiday Ale # 15 – Winter Welcome from Samuel Smith

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The middle picture on this British Winter Warmer changes each year but I like the Willie Shakespeare version the best.  The weird pursed lips speak to me for some weird reason.  Samuel Smith describes their seasonal as “a limited edition brewed for the short days and long nights of winter. The full body resulting from fermentation in ‘stone Yorkshire squares’ and the luxurious malt character, which will appeal to a broad range of drinkers, is balanced against whole-dried Fuggle and Golding hops with nuances and complexities that should be contemplated before an open fire.”

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Review – Toasted Oak IPA from Innis and Gunn

First off,  I didn’t hold out much hope for this hoppy British beer.  Not because of fear of the Innis & Gunn brewery. But because the two previous IPA’s  that I had bought at Total Wine were old, old.  My fault for not checking the best buy date, but still you would expect a store to rotate the old beers off the shelves. And this beer was coming further than the other two.  And British IPA’s tend to be lightly hopped compared to American ones.

Anyhoo, this was the first I&G beer that I have had,  the marketing copy says, “Its fervent hoppy character hails from the unique addition of large quantities of hops at three separate points during brewing. The result is a beer that’s rounded yet refreshing, with delicate floral notes and oodles of zesty freshness.”

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And here is what I think, or what I would have thought if this beer hadn’t been light years from prime condition. Though it is difficult to tell without any bottled on date. Thus my Total Wine trip was a total IPA loss. This beer, in poor condition, is sickly sweet with a light bit of hops and metallic notes in the background. The toasted oak isn’t clearly coming through but if you swirl it around your mouth a faint bit of it appears. And that is disappointing because toast notes and hops could really work well together.

Maybe if I had cellared it, the sweetness would have diminished and it would be better. As it is, I have learned a lesson. Big Box stores make you do the legwork.

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English Brewery # 2 – Five Points

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Our second stop is at Five Points Brewing Company.  But not the historic neighborhood in NYC but in London. It is a small, neighborhood brewery in Hackney.  Their flagship is a pale ale and their labels are simple but really effective.  Very Kernel like and I like that a lot.  But enough about labels.  What beers would I put in my first taster tray?

OK.  They have three mainstays and those are what I would get first.  The pale which is a 4.4% session beer with Amarillo, Centennial and Citra hops then the Hook Island Red which is a rye beer and then finish up with the Railway Porter, a London classic.

Another plus they subscribe to the London Living Wage inititative.  Good to see that.

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English Brewery #1 – Pressure Drop

Time to see what is going on in England in 2014.  I wish we could get some of the more nano British beers but I guess that is what travel is for.  So count this month as a quick hit of three breweries to watch for if you find yourself ‘cross the Pond as it were. And we start with Pressure Drop in London.

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What caught my eye first was the cool bottlecap logo and the tech term name.  But digging just under a little and I saw this on their website, “three blokes in a railway arch doing lots of cleaning and trying to make the tastiest beers we can.”  Simple.  I like that.

Now usually I would pick a few beers that I would put in my taster tray but I would choose all of them from their list. So instead I am going to focus on the one beer that I think is the most English of the bunch.  And it is the one with the coolest label too….

Street Porter – “A classic London beer style with a long and colourful history, Porter originated in the city around 300 years ago. While there are conflicting accounts of the exact origins of Porter, it’s clear the beer has been enjoyed by hard-working Londoners for centuries. We use traditional malts and Kentish hops in ours, and we’ve also brewed experimental versions with tea, coffee, oysters, chipotle, and New World hops.”

I love the idea of taking a classic style.  Brewing that in traditional fashion and then doing experimental version offshooting from that.  The tea version is making my mouth water right now. Now if I was in a Picasso mood, I would try their Dunkelweiss, their version of a smokey wheat beer.

 

 

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Green Jack

From Lowestoft, UK, comes the easternmost British brewery, Green Jack.

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Here is what the importer Vanberg & DeWulf have to say about them, “All Green Jack beers are brewed with Flagon winter barley, all grown and malted in Norfolk (which Dunford says is in most growing seasons the best barley in the world.) Moreover all are fermented with the same four strains of English ale yeast which can be traced back over 100 years and use whole flower hops. 90 percent of production is cask, 10% in swing top bottles”

I will be on the look-out for these two offerings:

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“A Full-bodied and a copper-coloured premium bitter brewed with English whole cone hops, rich and malty with fruity hop flavours. This Best Bitter has been named after the nickname of Lowestoft Town Football Club as Green Jacks new flagship brewery is opposite Lowestoft’s Crown Meadow stadium. The pump clip features the Lowestoft-built (1978) stern trawler the Boston Sea Stallion launched by none other than Mrs. Thatcher.”

Green Jack Rippa
“This 8.5% ABV English triple was named Supreme Champion Winter Beer of the UK by CAMRA in 2007, this is an amber ale redolent of peach and grape with an herbal, tropical bittersweet taste and a fruity bitter finish. RIPPA is brewed with pale ale malt, caramalt, maize, wheat, and sugar. UK Challenger hops lend a black pepper spice aroma, and Slovenian Celeia hops add bitterness.”

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Review – Samuel Smith’s Organic Chocolate Stout

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I have passed by this beer many times and picked up others from the shelves but recently, I picked this and the Old Brewery Pale Ale up to make my ‘fridge more British.

Here is what Samuel Smith of Tadcaster says about this beer, “Brewed with well water (the original well, sunk in 1758, is still in use with the hard water is drawn from 85 feet underground), the gently roasted organic chocolate malt and organic cocoa impart a delicious, smooth and creamy character, with inviting deep flavours and a delightful finish – this is the perfect marriage of satisfying stout and luxurious chocolate.”
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It pours a garnet brown with a tan head that fades really quickly. For a relatively low alcohol content of 5.0% abv it leaves some legs on the glass. A cocoa powder / milk chocolate aroma is pervasive. Every time I sniff, it comes across strong without overpowering the senses.

And that chocolate note is the first off the block when you take a sip. It lingers for a bit but then is followed by some coconut (almost Mounds candy bar). That initial two flavors are then quickly subsumed into a cloying sweetness that is then followed by a bitter metallic note. I am glad that it is complex with such a disparate set of flavors but I really like the first half and not so much the second.

For that reason, I have to give it a maybe buy. It may well work better with chocolate or vanilla cake where that sweetness can match up and hopefully dissipate a little.

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A Collectible Badger


One of the few nicknames that I knowingly carry is “badger”. Mostly because I get under my wife’s skin a bit too much so I follow the updates from anything Badger themed. And this came across my computer screen recently…

“On 26th November we are launching the first in our Badger Collector’s ale series. The Collector’s Edition 2012 is like no other ale and its journey has been a little out of the ordinary! It was brewed using four types of hop; Boadicea, Bramling Cross, Target and Goldings; then matured in an oak cask from the Somerset Cider Brandy Company, where a second fermentation took place. The beer was then taken from the cask and bottled into full-size champagne bottles to allow for a further tertiary fermentation and the full champagne process of riddling and disgorging, as carried out by the finest champagne houses.”