In Defense of the Keg

Much debate has been raging lately over the provenance of carbon dioxide. It seems that some CAMRA brain washing tactics have worked and a significant number of members believe that only beer which comes from a natural secondary fermentation produces good beer. Those of you have read this far will probably realise that this is pure horse shit and good beer can be served from a cask with a blanketing aspirator/breather or from a pressurised keg.

The case in point I will be making is Meantime Pale Ale (4.7% abv). On Saturday evening after our mission to North Greenwich, the wife and I had planned to have a Belgian dinner at The Dovetail and then pop into a 30th birthday party being held in a nearby pub. Due to elephantitis like swelling in my wife's ankle we ended up staying closer to home and I piggy backed the missus round the corner to The Havelock. The Havelock is a nice little gastropub owned by Lawrence Dallaglio that also happens to serve good beer (it is a pub after all). The pub has 4 cask ales on, and has 8 keg beers including Meantime Pale Ale. From my seated position at the bar, I noticed an alarming trend. For each pint of real ale that was dispensed, 4 pints of the kegged Meantime product was sold. Actually the Meantime beer was far outselling anything else in the pub. I ordered a pint and found it to be similar in carbonation to cask ale, but tasted incredibly fresh with brilliant hop aroma. So is this beer shit just because it's not naturally carbonated? The customers voting with their wallets certainly didn't think so. After my pint of Pale Ale, I opted for a pint of Sam Brooke's Wandle which is a cask conditioned best bitter. This beer was incredibly bland after the Meantime beer and when I commented about this to the barman he agreed and replied that it was a freshly plumbed cask as well.

The point I am trying to make is that just because a beer is not cask conditioned does not make it rubbish. Sure a lot of the mass produced mega lager is not the most flavourful of products, but then a lot of cask conditioned beer is pretty ordinary too (btw, I'll name a few poor cask conditioned ales if asked). I think we as consumers should be open minded and not be so troubled by the provenance of carbon dioxide which CAMRA seems so fixated on. Great keg beers do exist and examples from Meantime and Lovibond's Brewery are clearly paving the way for a new generation of keg products. So taking a leap out of Wychwood's marketing - What are you so afraid of beardy wierdy man?

Meantime Pale Ale 2

I am not sure if the Meantime Pale Ale I had recently at swish chain bar, Brown's in Covent Garden is the same as the London Pale Ale I had earlier in the year, but I have to say what a refreshing drink! There are some subtle differences, mainly being the hopping, with the draft version I had at Brown's lending more toward a bitter hop flavour than a strong aroma hop flavour which I found in the bottled version. But still it's the kind of beer that jumps out of the glass and shouts "FRESH FLAVOUR" in your face. Browns itself is a pretty classy joint which you should probably check out if you are in the west end. Their beer list is actually quite good for a franchised chain.

Anyhow the most recent tickers opinion on ratebeer is as follows;

"Jun 7, 2007 Updated: Oct 15, 2007 Alongside the decorated Meantime Porter sat the Meantime Pale Ale. It was somewhat diminished in comparison to its red flared cousin, but the outstanding merits of the latter recommended a purchase of the former. It begins with a thin, white wall head lazily atop a red-honey body. The nose is confounding – my notes leave no hints as to what it was like at all. I can only guess that it was so subtle that I couldn't’t venture to evaluate its qualities. The taste, however, was more memorable and measurable. The Meantime Pale Ale plays host to a variety of flavors like honey, apple and lemon in a dedication to Spring. However, these are muted by an overbearing, bulky bitterness. The cause is a slip shod hop flavor balance; the bane of many well intentioned pale ales. The brewers simply flexed the hop character too much. Despite the brutal bitter quality, the palate maintains an elegant feel to it. The carbonation, gravity and flavors, even if they’re a bit off, align beautifully to produce the ideal pale ale tongue texture. All the more pity that the hops had to strong arm the better qualities. I’ll be anxious to try another batch of this in the future, with the hope that somebody has gotten around to tweaking the sweet and bitter."

I couldn't find honey, apple and lemon flavours in mine, but then maybe my palette is not refined enough!

Meantime London Pale Ale

During my weekly shopping trip to Tesco I managed to sneak a couple of bottles of beer into the trolley! Meantime London Pale Ale (4.3% abv) is a new addition to the line up from the Greenwich Meantime brewery. The beer is an American Style Pale Ale in a similar vein to Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, but offering a slightly English twist to the formula. The results is a cracker of a beer! The beer has minimal carbonation which tones down an insane hop level and intense bitterness. But in saying that, this beer is still extremenly well balanced and could easily be a session ale.

I really like this emerging trend for UK based brewers to branch out and try some of the newer beer styles emerging from the US. This is definetely a beer to checkout. Website: http://meantimebrewing.com/

Meantime London Porter

After reading Darren from Blog'o'Beer report on Meantime London Porter (6.5% abv) the week before last, I thought I might check it out for myself. I managed to stumble across the rather expensive (£3.99) champagne style 750ml bottle in Waitrose on Kensington High Street.

The beer itself is rich and roasty and a big step up from the Midnight Sun I had the night before. I initially had chilled the beer a little bit too much which resulted in a rather acrid burnt roastiness. Letting the beer warm up let the true rich flavours from the underlying dark crystal malts come through. This balanced out the burnt roast flavours nicely and reveled a really complex beer.

The verdict, as with all the Meantime range, I just can't get enough! Although the expensive price tag does put a dampner on the experience a little bit. Website

More IPA Challenges

Over the weekend I continued my IPA challenge. This time I pitted Goose Island IPA up against Little Creatures PA, Snake Dog IPA and Meantime Pale Ale. Overall the Goose Island is a good beer, but does not have the bitterness and density of flavour to compete with Snake Dog IPA (which is still the best beer I have had this year). The Goose Island IPA is similar to Little Creatures PA - actually almost the same. They are refreshing but don't have that strong bite I like in an IPA. The Meantime IPA was bottled in a mini champagne style and hit well below the mark of the US and Australian beers. I think it's a better beer on draught than bottled, but then Meantime have a few different Pale Ales including their IPA, London Pale Ale and this Pale Ale.
I don't normally consider my self much of a hophead, but I think my palate is coming around to the US way of doing things. Luckily I am off to New York over Easter where Dogfish Head 90 minute IPA is well up on my list of things to do, along with visit the Statue of Liberty, World Trade Centre memorial and Times Square.
Oh, I almost forgot, you can learn more about Chicago's finest Goose Island at their website: http://www.gooseisland.com/

Meantime Chocolate

Meantime Chocolate (6.5% abv) is a strong chocolate infused porter style ale which was on the desert menu at Brown's Bar and Restaurant, Covent Garden. Whilst this beer claims to be chocolate falvoured, it actually doesn't taste like chocolate at all - well maybe a little bit in the aftertaste which has a dark chocolate bitterness, but certainly not the velvet smooth chocolate flavour of Young's Double Chocolate Stout. The beer feels gimmicky and certainly not something that should be taken seriously. My thoughts are out on this one, I am note sure if I love it or loathe it. On one hand its a nice robust porter with enough roastiness to give it the oomph that most porters lack, however it also has a horrid dark chocolate (or even burnt chocolate) aftertaste which really off putting. It also weighs in at double strength compared to most ales, therefore session-ability is out of the question. Maybe it falls into a similar category as dessert wines? You wouldn't necessarily go for it, but sometimes its a nice way to round out an evening?

Meantime London Stout

Whilst recently searching the Real Ale section at my local Tesco I noticed a new addition to their lineup - Meantime London Stout (abv 4.5%) and I also successfully convinced my wife that I needed to get a bottle! This stout is a throwback to Porter style stouts and is a very good interpretation of what traditional stout porters would have been like. The beer is balanced towards the roasty licorice end of the stout spectrum and whilst not completely dry, has a nice molasses like sweetness, that does'nt protract from the dry roastiness, but certainly seperates the beer from an Irish style dry stout. I think this is an excellent example of a brewery doing the research to identify a product that the market needs and then producing a product and actually trying to meet the requirements identified. This is definetely one of the best beers I have had this year to date.

Beer Heaven

My little flat is like a beer oasis at the moment. After recent deliveries from Beer Ventures, Beer Merchants, a fistful of beers from Whole Foods in Kensington and some samples sent to me by Nicky who works takes care of PR for Marston's, Innis and Gunn and a few other breweries - my flat is pretty rammed with various bottles of good beer. So many in fact that I am going to be dropping a few 'ticks' in here and there to keep you guys on your toes! Make no mistake about it, these will not be beer reviews and there will be no intellectualizing.

Anyhow at some stage I usually post about my Friday night's beer activities. Maybe not this week. Well actually nothing really exciting happened. I had two pints of Abbot Ale at the Clock Tower on Leather Lane during my lunch hour, a pint of poorly conditioned Deuchar's IPA followed by a pint of Bombardier at the Roebuck in Chiswick and then a bottle of Peroni Gran Reserva over dinner. As I said, not particularly exciting.

Hopefully tomorrow I will be able to find the time to tell you about Saturday's boozing which was a little more interesting! Also, the picture at the top is a bottle of Meantime Raspberry. Even though I am a big fan of Meantime beers in general, this beer was utter shit. Avoid at all costs.

Rocio Trigo

Another beer from the Gaucho Grill (Brewed under licence by the Greenwich Meantime brewery), Rocio Trigo is a Bavarian style wheat beer. This is the second wheat beer I have had this year and so I cannot really draw any similarities between this beer and Erdinger Weiss, but they are both interpretations of the same style. Trigo is a milder beer which is bordering on tasteless without the signature banana or clove notes associated with the style. The beer does not even have a spritzy level of carbonation and really isn't to style. It is more in line with the American wheatbeers that are popping up on the 'craft beer' scene. Anyway the point is: if you are going to Gaucho for a steak, get the Rocio Gold!

Here is an excerpt from the drinks menu at Gaucho and how they describe the beer.

ROCIO TRIGO
From the Spanish word for wheat, this
Bavarian style wheat beer made from a
unique strain of yeast to give a cloudy
orange – colour, zesty flavours of banana
and bubblegum spice with a refreshing,
malty finish.

Young's Double Chocolate Stout

As I have stated a few times recently, my parents have been in town visiting. After eating in nearly all the restaurants and pubs near us I took them down to my old local - The Brook Green hotel. Now its not that I have anything against the Brook green, its just that since the renovations after the smoking ban the place has become a bit pretentious. OK not just a bit pretentious, very pretentious! First of all, they insist on table service... It's a Young's tied pub for crying out loud! They have also become quite expensive and the ale is usually not kept very well.

Anyhow rant over - I opted for a Double Chocolate stout (5.2% abv), a bottled ale (so it will be in OK condition) and a fair whack cheaper than a pint of draught (£2.60 as opposed to £3.40).

The beer delivers what Meantime Chocolate attempts - and fails to do. A strong intense chocolate flavour and aroma, chocolaty bitterness and a smooth mellow lingering bitter aftertaste. The beer is also quite thick and oily, which I am assuming comes from the chocolate used in brewing. For some reason, I think Young's may have discontinued this beer - and my thoughts were suspiciously confirmed when I failed to find any mention of the beer on the Young's website.

Rocio Gold

Ok, my first Kölsch of the year! Rocio Gold (4.3% abv) is a Kölsch style beer brewed for the Gacho Grill chain of restaurants in the UK. Kölsch is an unusual beer style from Cologne, Germany in that it has noticable bitterness and is straw in colour like a Pilsener but is actually top fermented and is therefore an Ale. A quick search around the web has many people identifying this beer as a lager but it is actually an Ale. The Rocio example is particularly true to style and is a refreshing beer with a fresh crisp bitter taste with a slight fruitiness. The beer is not strictly a Kölsch as it has not been brewed within view of the Dom Cathedral in Cologne, but actually brewed under licence by the Greenwich Meantime Brewery. A nice beer to have next time you feel like heading to Gaucho for a steak!

McConnell's Irish Stout

McConnell's Irish Stout (4.6% abv) is an interesting beer, as it is brewed in Jarrow which is actually in North Yorkshire, UK and the beer has nothing Irish about it except for the name.

The Jarrow brewery was formed in 2002 by real ale lovers Jess and Alison McConnell with the intent of creating unique and flavoursome ales. The brewery is tied to the Robin Hood Inn, at Primrose Hill in Jarrow and the beers are brewed on the premises. Brewing capacity has expanded to 100 Barrels per week with a second site at the Maltings. The brewery has enjoyed moderate success and has been awarded several accolades from CAMRA including a Silver Medal at the GBBF.

The Irish Stout was a bit of a let down. I was expecting a thick, dry and robust Irish stout, but what I received was thin almost tasteless except for mild liquorce notes which were extremely subtle. Again compared to Meantime Stout or even Guinness, this beer was overly average.
You can find more information on their website: www.jarrowbrewery.co.uk

A Nice Friday Afternoon

Last Thursday saw me back in Wuppertal, Germany on a client visit. This involved a 4.15am start and didn't see me back in the UK until well after the sun had set (OK it was about 10.15pm). The upside of this is that I enjoyed several Altbiers on the companies dime, but I had to travel to Wuppertal (the ass end of the universe) for the pleasure. Understandably I was dog tired on Friday morning and decided to work from home so I could have a lie in. Most people take the piss when they work from home, but for some reason I always end up being smashed with tasks flooding into my email inbox. Last Friday was no exception and I also had to deal with a solid back load of crap from Thursday as well. As I am a "work hard, play hard" kind of bloke I decided to knock off early and head down the pub for a beer and something to eat. My first choice is usually The Havelock for their excellent food and proper real keg from Meantime, but I missed their lunch service (which finishes at 2.30pm). In light of the stupid inconvenient food service hours at The Havelock, I opted to head down to Fuller's recent acquisition "The Queens Head" on Brook Green. This was a good move as they had the new Gales beer "Seafarers" on which is nice and hoppy and very drinkable at 3.6%. I decided not to get any food, but crumbled during my second pint and went for the steak baguette with horseradish mayo. If only all Friday's were this productive!