Categories
Beer history london

Old School Beer “Blogging”

Before blogging, anyone who wanted to record something interesting they’d come across to do with their hobbies and interests had to stick it in a scrapbook.

The Westminster Archive1 (which we’ve mentioned before) has an astounding collection of beer related scrapbooks — 82 volumes in total — all of which were the work of a mysterious chap2 called “D. Foster”.

Between around 1880-1900, Every time Mr Foster came across anything in a book or magazine to do with beer or pubs in London, he copied out the section by hand. His scrapbooks, of which there are between 10-20 per bound volume, are meticulously organised. The first 60-odd volumes cover London pubs from A-Z. Then there are volumes on beer and ale; drinking vessels; coffee shops; and so on.

It really does read like a blog, and is a priceless resource of knowledge about beer. The copy in the Archive is the only one — it’s never been printed or published — so if you’re in the area, it’s worth popping in for a look.

Notes

1. The archives are on St Ann’s Street, in Westminster, and are open every day except Sunday and Monday.

2. We’re assuming D. Foster was a chap — the librarians didn’t know much about where the scrapbooks had come from, except that their author was an “enthusiast”.

Categories
Beer history breweries london photography

Truman, Hanbury and Buxton in the East End

Truman, Hanbury and Buxton were one of the biggest breweries in London in the 19th and early 20th centuries. They moved to Burton in the 1970s, merged with Watney Mann not long after, and then closed altogether. East London — the area immediately around the old Black Eagle Brewery — is particularly rife with small reminders.

bethnal_green_road.jpg

bethnal_green_road21.jpg

bethnal_green_station.jpg

More after the, er, “more” link…

Categories
homebrewing

Fermentation in 3 minutes

This is a great idea for a blog. Stonch attached a “brewcam” to his latest batch of homebrew to film the fermentation and broadcast it via his blog. He then condensed the whole fermentation into a three minute video. Spectacular stuff.

Watch it here.

Categories
london

Beer hunting in London: Stoke Newington

The beer cellar was looking a little bare this weekend, so we decided to seek out some more. Having followed our own advice from an earlier post, “surviving a beer desert”, and tried out all the local shops, we thought we’d branch out and try to find some alternative sources of quality brews. We reckoned it would be interesting to go to another part of London to see what was available.

So we headed to Stoke Newington, North London. Trendy but lived in, we had high hopes that we’d be able to find something interesting to drink. In particular, we were after (a) “premium” ales and lagers (b) Baltic porters.

For the premium stuff, we headed for “Fresh & Wild“, the organic supermarket on Stoke Newington Church Street.

fresh-wild.jpg

They have a small selection of very nice British brews – Sam Smith’s organic ale and lager, Honeydew from Fullers; also Riedenburger, imported from Germany, although disappointingly, only one of their many varieties. (It was also, unhelpfully, labelled “lager” – yes, but which one?)

We felt in general that they could have offered more of a choice, even if they were being strict about the organic criteria, as there seem to be loads of organic ales and lagers around now. At Fresh & Wild, the beer section seemed a bit of an afterthought (especially given the enormous wine selection).

We then trekked up and down Church Street and Stoke Newington High Street looking for nice beers in general and Baltic porters in particular. Complete failure to find any Baltic porters (plenty of pale polski lagers though).

However, we did find an off-licence / convenience store with a great selection of ales, including at least 4 bottle conditioned ones and at least one from a brewery we’d never heard of, always a good sign. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a good selection of ales in a high street off-licence.  We were limited to what we could carry, but came away with a couple of Hook Norton beers that are not widely available (Haymaker and 308A.D), among others.

If you’re in the area, the shop’s called “Intercontinental Wines and Food” and it’s at 209-211 Stoke Newington High Street.

Categories
Uncategorized

Lithuanian Lager Face Off Part 2: the face offening

svyturys_taste_test.jpg

A few weeks ago, we had a “taste off” between two lithuanian lagers – Utenos and Kalnapilis.

We weren’t blown away by either, but slightly preferred Utenos. This time, though, we went back to our old favourite for comparison – Svyturys.

They’re very proud of Svyturys in Lithuania, and it was one of the first Lithuanian beers to be imported to the UK. They have several varieties. Tonight, we tested Ekstra Draught (unpasteurised), Gintarinis (with a gold label) and Svyturio (with a red label).

Gintarinis is supposedly a pilsner (“Pilsner my arse” – Boak) but is not especially hoppy or “dry”. It’s really a slightly more hoppy version of a helles.

Ekstra (unpasteurised) is the poshest beer in their range, and a Dortmuner type. Its bottle is very swanky – no label except at the neck, with a big logo embossed in the glass. The beer is very nice, and very much “true to style”. It’s hard to say if the “draught” status makes much difference, but its nice to see this kind of thing happening.

They don’t say what type of beer Svyturio is supposed to be – only that it’s a cross between Gintarinis and Ekstra. But it tastes quite different. Guilty admission – we actually did a Pepsi-style blind taste test, and we were only able to identify “red” as different from the other two. It’s much thinner, despite being stronger, and pleasantly bland. It’s also a little lighter in colour.

Gintarinus initially won in the blind test, but as the beers warmed up, it started to smell a bit off. This could have just been an off bottle though.

We can’t quite work out whether Svyturys is a force for good or evil in the beer world. On the one hand, their website boasts such delights as Svyturys Extra Cold, and the tempting promise of “even lighter beers” to come (urgh…). On the other hand, we always enjoy a bottle of it, and even Roger Protz rates it (in “300 Beers to try before you die”).

We’re now going to try and track down the rarer treats in the Svyturys range – Degintas (a baltic porter type), Baltas (a wheat beer) and the most enticing, Baltijos, which according to the website is “distinguished for its hard scum”. Yummmmm.

Boak and Bailey