Two decades in pursuit of perfect pints of ESB

At a Fuller’s pub in West London on Friday night we drank perfect ESB – one of life’s greatest pleasures.

Despite takeovers (Fuller’s is part of Asahi these days) there’s a definite romance about its beers.

When we first started to take a serious interest in beer, back in the mid noughties, ESB had a reputation as a big, important beer.

It was strong and expensive.

And it was served, most of the time, in a chunky chalice that said: “This is a pint that demands your full attention.”

It was drunk by old boys in big coats – men who knew what was what, and who was who, and could handle the booze.

We drank it in The Jugged Hare on Vauxhall Bridge Road or The Sanctuary in Westminster, both of which were handy for our respective offices.

We drank it at The Plough in Walthamstow, East London – a pub that no longer exists.

And we drank it in beautiful pubs like The Red Lion in Piccadilly, where ornate mirrors echoed the jewel-like details of its elaborate drinking vessel.

With practice, we learned to know what good ESB tastes like – and bad.

At its worst, ESB can be like chewy, vegetal pond water. In pubs where nobody drinks it, neglected and unloved, it loses its sparkle.

And unfortunately, because it’s strong, and old fashioned, it is often neglected.

It’s neither session beer nor the kind of ‘craft beer’ that people expect at that ABV these days.

Frankly, we’re surprised it’s still being brewed, 50-odd years being a good run for any particular British ale.

As it is, the chalice has gone, as has the handled mug that replaced it for a decade or so. Now, pints come in standard straight glasses – nice enough, but a sign of ESB’s loss of dignity.

Our perfect pints on Friday were served this way, as towers of autumnal mahogany topped with loose but steady foam.The aroma was of marzipan and fresh woodland sap.

And it tasted like the inevitability of one pint too many, like the Holy Grail, like the White Whale, like a miracle in progress, like being 25 again learning for the first time what beer could really be.

It was so good that it made Jess switch from Titanic Plum Porter. It was so good that she didn’t even resent the inevitable day after headache. It was so good that, even with the headache, she co-wrote a blog post about it.

The pub was nothing special. Fuller’s pubs are run by a an entirely separate company these days and, even in the West London heartlands, can feel a bit plastic. We’re not naming it because, frankly, there’s no guarantee the ESB will be this good on your visit.

Other breweries are making ESB these days.

We had a good one from Tiley’s recently, for example, and a really interesting version at the West London micropub/microbrewery The Owl and the Pussycat. The latter felt like a tribute to, and text about, the real thing.

Because, of course, Fuller’s remains the temperamental reference model.