You have heard me, dear reader, wax lyrical about my visits to Belgium and the USA. I make no apology for this. We are poorer if we close our eyes to the world beyond our shores. But I am well aware of the riches on offer closer to home and over the past few months I have been taking all available opportunities to sample them.
As with my overseas trips, I am grateful to my employer for requiring me to visit a number of promising locations for the purposes of work, and it is a simple matter to carve out a couple of hours for the purposes of tasting. Always with quality in mind. Although let’s be honest, sometimes in decent quantities as well.
You will note that I specifically talk about craft beer. I have nothing against traditional English cask beers. There are certain contexts with friends where I will happily settle down to a session of one of the classics - London Pride, Landlord, Tribute - in a pub that I know will do them justice. But even the best traditional cask cannot match the taste sensation of something a bit stronger, a bit hoppier and frankly US-inspired. And I have had a few experiences of a great-sounding cask beer not living up to expectations because the pub has not looked after it.
I have written in the past about the agonies that this has caused some of my fellow CAMRA members. They are right that there is no definition of “craft”, and that not all of it is great. They are right that the big breweries are muscling on “craft” type styling, with mixed results. (Although I cussedly rather like Greene King “Level Head” IPA, despite being no fan of Greene King). But they over-argue their case, with unbalanced assertions that craft is irrelevant to anyone except “London hipsters”, and that CAMRA’s zero tolerance policy towards CO2 is also that protects us from the return of Watney’s Red Barrel. Enough of this internecine warfare for now - it’s fun to follow, but let’s get back to the great beer.
Starting in my home city of London. Home inter alia to what is generally accepted as the origins of the British craft movement, in the shape of Alastair Hook and the Meantime Brewery of Greenwich. Mr Hook studied brewing in the traditional way at Heriot-Watt University, but he had a restless spirit. This led him to work at the venerable Weihenstephaner in Munich, and also on the US West Coast. He first set up a German style brewhouse in 1991 and eventually ended up founding Meantime in 2000. (CAMRA couldn’t handle this guy who wasn’t German producing German-style beers. As one expert wrote, Hook was barred from the Great British Beer Festival while James Watt was still in short trousers). I enjoyed Meantime Pale and Meantime Porter long before I understood their significance.
Many others followed this internationally-influenced path. The upshot is that in many places in the UK a little research will point you to some wonderful beer. So this is the key message of this blog. Don’t just go to the local pub. Do that research and be prepared to go slightly out of the way. This might be a particular pub with a great range. I would also urge you to look out for brewery taprooms, where you can guarantee that the beer will be fresh, where there will be a range of options and where you can end up taking home a few cans as well.
Following this steer, let me tell you about some of the great places I have been to recently during work trips. Not because they will definitely be your favourites too. You may find others, and that’s great. But to illustrate the riches now available.
London
Battersea (my local area) - Mondo Brewing - a great basic range from their online shop, and you will always find some things at the taproom that you won’t find anywhere else
Kennington - Orbit - their rice lager was a valiant effort that didn’t work for me, but their Festbier triumphed at the most recent “Dads and Lads” camping trip (https://www.londonbiermeister.co.uk/blog/the-art-of-a-dads-and-lads-beer-tasting )
Bermondsey - The Beer Mile. Lives up to its legendary billing. Everything from the honey beers at Hiver to the stripped back single hop IPAs at Kernel to the porter at Anspach and Hobday to the weird stuff at London Beer Factory Barrel Project.
Blackhorse Road. I haven’t managed to go there yet for the “Blackhorse Beer Mile”. I will. I know about the likes of Wild Card (home of my all time second favourite lady Jaega Wise) and Exale, but I need to explore it properly.
York
After a bit of looking around, I settled on the “Valhalla” pub and enjoyed a glorious couple of hours of beer, food and vintage heavy metal on the loudspeakers. I started with their “Odin’s Judgement” ruby red ale before switching to their mead, accompanied by some wonderful Yorkshire tapas.Then I walked down to Brew York, where I picked the “Time Travelling Taxi” DDH pale out of a great range of options, before going dessert with the “Dreams of Brew York” apple, cherry and cranberry pastry stout.
Sheffield
I saw that the renowned Rutland Arms was near my hotel. There was nothing on offer actually from Sheffield, but I still had an amazing session. Starting with the “Abacab Pale” from Pomona Island (see “Manchester” below), then an intriguing geographical DIPA collab between Verdant (Cornwall) and Floc (Kent), then a mind-blowing sour imperial stout from Pastore (Waterbeach, Cambs) called “Shepherd of the Sith”. All accompanied by “Yorkshire Poutine” - chips with Yorkshire curd cheese and braised beef cheek… yum.
Bristol
I started off at Left Handed Giant (“Twin Cities” Citra and Galaxy Pale) before heading up to the bijou surroundings of Little Martha under a railway arch (“Mysterious Intergalactic Object” NZ pale and “Neighbour we left behind” tea IPA). But the climax and highlight was the Wiper and True taproom, with the “Sundance” IPA followed by the “Cococolada” coconut and orange IPA, followed by the “Purple Rain” blackcurrant (very) sour.
Glasgow
I have been a couple of times recently, and this always means the Innis and Gunn taproom on West Nile Street. Partly because it has Innis and Gunn beers (see https://www.londonbiermeister.co.uk/blog/happiness-is-a-cold-gunn ). On my most recent visit, I grabbed a swift half of their red ale matured in Laphroaig barrels. It is also brilliant as a hub for Scottish beer more broadly, bringing in stars such as Overtone and Vault City.
So all great stuff, and hard to judge a winner. But nevertheless I will, and say that my evening in Manchester trumped the rest. I deliberately carved out the time between my work and my train because I was determined to visit Cloudwater on the industrial estate near Piccadilly Station. But in the run-up I read about Track Brewing and decided to visit there first. And I was glad I did, because I was stunned at the sheer fact of two such amazing taprooms right next to each other. At Track I started off very simply with the Somona pale on draft - quite simply the best session beer I have ever tasted. I moved on to the “Dust and Wind” draft ESB before ending with the “Sun and Stars” DIPA. All amazing. I then strolled next door to Cloudwater for their “Piccadilly Porter” and an 7% IPA called “I Have Become the Boat” (particularly evocative for a boat dweller such as I).
As I said, these are just illustrations of the possibilities. But my message is that you need to seek these possibilities out for yourself. There has never been a better time to be a drinker of British beer. Enjoy it.