The first time we tried Worthington White Shield, we weren’t especially impressed. People told us that we needed to let it mature, so we gave that a go. The aged bottle did, indeed, taste fantastic.
But is there any room in the pub trade for a beer that needs to be aged for at least a year before it starts to live up to its reputation, and which tastes awful cold? I doubt we’re going to get pubs to change their habit of putting bottled beer in the fridge in a hurry, so beers which taste nice a bit frosty have a definite commercial advantage.
White Shield is a beer that only really makes sense at home.
8 replies on “Worthington White Shield doesn’t work in pubs”
A shame as the bottle is very attractive (even if it is too big!)
The same when it arrives to Spain….
It’s a great beer with a full flavour and rich undertones.I like it a lot
I’ve just seen the link to CAAC, our Association of crazy beer lovers…Thank you very much Amigos
Haya Salud
I love Whiteshield, its always ‘aged’ by the time it gets here.
I wrote about it here:http://tandlemanbeerblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/white-shield.html
and liked it. It wasn’t aged and it wasn’t ice cold. Go figure!
Last time I saw Fuller’s Vintage in a pub it was a vintage from a couple of years previous.
But then Coors don’t own any pubs, or do they?
This breweries-owning-pubs and chain-pubs-that-aren’t-owned-by-breweries thing can be very confusing sometimes…
Fuller’s not only age it, but they tend not to keep it in fridges either. I’ve forked out for the occasional bottle of Vintage in a Fullers’ pub and it’s been great – but they do charge around a fiver for the privilege.
It would be that much or more off license here. I think I once shelled out $38 (15 odd pounds) for a bottle of Tom Hardy’s in a certain bar (it was a special occasion). I paid $28 (11 pounds) for a bottle of O’Harra’s Celebration the other night.
This is one of the key difficulties with bottles ales (and in particular BCAs) in pubs. At the bar I used to run in west London we kept getting asked to stock BCAs but the problem is we would have to keep them in the fridge, so the serving temperature would be totally wrong. The only other option would be to keep them on a shelf, in which case the temperature would be wrong again, and the shelflife would be degraded. We couldn’t win. So we chose not to stock them – instead we stocked a few decent Belgian beers and German lagers, plus a good selection of draught real ales.
I can’t see any way you’ll persuade pubs to install special fridges set to 12 degrees for BCAs, so I can’t see them ever taking off in pubs. Which is not to say that they shouldn’t be produced – I can’t drink in pubs ALL the time…