Slain from the Station House Brewery in Frodsham, Cheshire, is actually pretty nicely branded for a St George’s Day cash-in.
It was so restrained compared to the other beers on the bar (British Bulldog and Old Enoch Powell) that it took me a while to ‘get it’.
As for the beer, I think it’s the only example of what those who are into beer styles would call a ‘northern brown ale’ I’ve ever had on draught. It wasn’t fantastic, but it certainly made a change.
What’s an Imperial Burton Ale? Or a luncheon stout? They both feature on attractive historical beer labels from Essex brewery Ward’s available at the excellent Foxearth local history website. There are also some great historical photos of the brewery and its people from the 19th and early 20th centuries.
This sign advertising the range of Charrington’s beers is about two metres square and now sits on the side of an otherwise very plainly decorate budget-conscious hotel on Markhouse Road, Walthamstow. It’s one of our very favourites.
A lazy post for Friday — here are a few more bits of old pub livery we’ve come across on our travels. Click on them for bigger versions.
The Chequers, Walthamstow Market
Two more bits of old pub livery spotted on Mare Street in Hackney at the weekend.
Grain Brewery are riding the zeitgeist with their packaging — they’ve come up with a label design which makes their delicious porter look like some kind of health food.
They’ve cleverly chosen to remind people of what’s actually in the beer. If you’ve brewed yourself, you’ll know how nice the grain smells when it goes into the tun. That’s what this branding makes me think of.
That’s presumably why our local free-range, organic, fair-trade deli is stocking a good chunk of their range.
So far, we’ve only tried the porter. It smells like espresso and tastes sour and fruity. The head lasted all the way to bottom of the glass. It’s fortified with port and bottle-conditioned, so was anything but dull. These are qualities we like in a beer.
We’ll be trying the others soon!
Bailey
We’ve put some of our beer photos online for people to use on their beer blogs, should they find themselves in dire need of a picture for a post.
Here they are in a little slideshow:
http://picasaweb.google.com/s/c/bin/slideshow.swf
Or you can go to Picasa Web Albums and help yourself!
In yesterday’s post, what I didn’t mention was that the Old Monk is serving its real ale in old fashioned handled dimple glasses. I gather that a couple of would-be trendy pubs in the Islington area have started to do the same thing.
This is an interesting affectation which seems designed to appeal simultaneously to the old school beer fan and the retro-ironic hipster. I suspect we’re going to see a lot more of it about.
I gather the reason for their demise was that they were relatively expensive to make, prone to breaking, and hard to stack. Those arguments hardly hold up now that fans of German wheat beers or Belgian obscurities are getting their favourite tipples served in ever-more elaborately shaped and printed glasses, some of them a foot tall, others as delicate as egg shells.
Mild in particular tastes a little bit nicer out of a dimple — well, it does to me, anyway, because that’s how my grandad used to drink it. Let’s hope that by May, when every decent pub in the land will have a mild on, the dimple has made its triumphant comeback everywhere.
Picture from h-e-d.co.uk, who also sell dimples if you fancy a few to use at home.
Bailey
The Independent’s list of the 50 best beers in the UK included one brewed for Lord Brocket.
Lord Brocket is an old Etonian who is (just about) famous for (a) having been in prison and (b) appearing on the appalling reality show “I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here!”
He now has a side-line selling Brocket’s Bacon, Brocket’s Bangers and so on.
I wonder which marketing genius thought that having a minor celebrity mugging on the label would make people want to drink Brocket’s Beer? I mean, the beer itself might be perfectly nice, but, well, just look at him! He’s grinning like a maniac and wearing a tweed jacket. We should probably be grateful he hasn’t got his thumbs up, I suppose.
Still, it could be worse. At least no-one is expecting us to buy Jeffrey Archer IPA or Jonathan Aitken Stout. Not yet, anyway.
A couple of months ago, I spent some time off photographing my pint of Summer Lightning. Tragic, I know. But I’ve gone further — I spent today building a special light box specifically for taking risque images of flirtatious, nubile glasses of beer.
Here are some sample photos:
I didn’t do anything to either photograph in GIMP, other than shrink them for the web.
I say “built” but, not being a proper man who’s comfortable with tools and wood, it’s actually an old carboard box modified with a Stanley knife and Sellotape.
I cut holes in the top and one side, which I covered with greaseproof paper. I then put in a large sheet of white card, curved from the top at the back, and Velcro-d in place. I used Velcro so I could put in different coloured card. Here’s a photo of something other than beer, with a red background:
For a light, I used two angle-poise type lamps with daylight bulbs, one shining through the greaseproof paper on the top; the other shining through the greaseproof paper on the open side.
The end results aren’t perfect, but they’re my best beer photos yet.
Bonus tip: use your camera’s macro mode for close up shots, usually indicated by a picture of a flower. The difference can be amazing.
We're geeks in general, but especially about beer. Bailey's a bloke, Boak is a lady. We live in Cornwall in the UK and have been blogging about since 2007 and it's taken us all over Britain and Europe in pursuit of the perfect pint.
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Our favourite beer of 2011
Penzance Brewing Company Potion No 9 (cask ale)
4%. The beer we enjoyed most in 2011 -- golden, featuring US hops and with a satisfying, chewy maltiness.