Categories
breweries london pubs

Harvey's porter at the Royal Oak

royaloakpub.jpgIt’s hardly an original observation, but we have to say that the Royal Oak on Tabard Street in Borough is a great pub, with wonderful beer.

It’s an old-skool pub, with some amazing beards on display, but there were also some youngsters, and even a party of very jolly Spaniards in a corner who were enjoying pints of Best and shepherds pie.

The beers are all good — Sussex Best is a classic, the mild is absurdly drinkable at 3% and the Armada tastes like a weak (but not dumbed-down) IPA. In fact, one of the wonderful things about Harvey’s is their ability to deliver astounding beer in session-able doses.

The star of the show was the porter, the strongest of the offerings at 4.8%. Michael Jackson described the taste as “toasty, faintly anise-like”. It had stacks going on — waves of roastiness and dark fruits, with a very unctuous body and great aftertaste. I think I might even prefer it to Fullers*.

The Royal Oak is on Tabard Street, near Borough station, or a short walk from London Bridge.

*Which, incidentally, you can get on tap at the Euston Flyer. Don’t know if Fullers have responded to my prayers and started doing it all year round, or whether it’s just left over from the autumn, but it’s marvelous!

Picture by da mad pixelist at Flickr, under a Creative Commons license.

Categories
American beers beer reviews bottled beer real ale

Trans-Atlantic Beer Tasting Simul-Post

adnams.jpgOr, “Sadly, we don’t know Mr Bean”.

Last week, we had a pint with Wilson of Brewvana fame. We were several thousand miles apart; he was drinking at lunchtime, we’d just got home from work; and the banter was by email. It kind of worked.

We’d agreed which beers we were going to drink so that we could compare, based on the UK beers Wilson could get in Iowa, and which American beers we could get in London. Somewhat ironically, he found it easier to get hold of Adnams Bitter than we did. So the final line-up was Adnams Broadside and Anchor Porter. Here’s how it went from Wilson’s point of view, and here’s how it went from ours:

Categories
Beer history london

A Day at a London Brewery

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In the early 1840s, George Dodd trolled around all kinds of different British industrial establishments, writing up his adventures for the Penny Magazine.

I bought a copy of Penny Magazine No. 577 today. It includes “A Day at a London Brewery”, the brewery in question being Barclay’s in Southwark.

I was going to scan it, but instead, I’ll link to Google Books, where there’s a perfectly good scan of Days at the Factories, the 1843 anthology containing all of Dodd’s factory memoirs.

Of particular note:

“The distinction between ale and beer is well known by the taste, but it is not easily described in words: ale is of a great specific gravity, lighter coloured, more transparent, and less bitter than porter.”

Eh? 

Picture credit:

Days at the Factories Or, the Manufacturing Industry of Great Britain Described, and Illustrated by Numerous Engravings of Machines and Processes. Series I.- London By George Dodd

Categories
beer reviews Poland

Baltic porter round-up

balticporters.jpg

A long time ago, we bemoaned the lack of Baltic porters in London — dark, stout-like beers from Poland, Lithuania, Russia and other Baltic states. Light fizzy beers from these countries are now amply represented in cornershops throughout this fair city, but not a hint of the dark stuff.

We’ve always been intrigued by the history of these kinds of beers. They appear to have evolved as a hybrid of Russian Imperial Stouts and “local” (i.e. lager-brewing) traditions. I wonder why the Porter name, then? Did they also owe something to 19th century porters?

The Beer Judge Certification Progamme (BJCP) Style Guidelines identify Baltic Porter as a style, and say:

Baltic Porter often has the malt flavors reminiscent of an English brown porter and the restrained roast of a schwarzbier, but with a higher OG and alcohol content than either. Very complex, with multi-layered flavors.

It also reckons the style derives “from English porters but influenced by Russian Imperial Stout”. So let’s see.

Thanks to the Great British Beer Festival in August, and the Pig’s Ear festival in December, we finally got our paws on some proper baltic porters. Well, dark beers from that part of the world. We thought that by comparing and contrasting we might understand better if there is a unified style or not.

Utenos Porter – 6.8%

Utenos, from Lithuania, are very popular both over there and in cornershops in East London. Although it’s a different brand from Svyturys, it’s actually part of the same company, owned via Baltic Beverages. We weren’t overly impressed with their normal lager (a Helles type), but the Porter was much more tasty. Then again, at 6.8% it should be. It was a brown-red colour, with a treacly- toasted caramel flavour – and not a huge amount else. Not very complex at all, but nice enough.

Black Boss Porter, from Browar Witnica, Poland – 8.5%

Again, sweet-treacle flavours and not a lot else. Quite a heavy body, and reminded us a bit of Guiness Foreign Extra but without the bitterness. Not terribly exciting, and we’d expect a lot more for 8.5%. However, we would recommend the “Kozlak” (bock) from the same brewer. This is a *mere* 5.8% but packs in much more flavour. As well as the hints of treacle, there are liquorice, chocolate and coffee notes — and it’s not cloyingly sweet!

Huvila Porter – 5.5%

The labels on the bottle are all in Finnish, but the brewery helpfully provides explanations of the beer on its website here. The Porter is made with British ale yeast (I suspect the other beers above are lagers). We thought that it had a sticky but light body, without much aroma. It tasted very roasted, with hints of liquorice. Pleasant enough, and I’m quite intrigued by the brewery and their other English-style beers.

Well, that’s all the baltic porters to date. There are more to go, but no more in our cellar — we still haven’t seen Okocim Porter for donkey’s years, and have never seen Zywiec Porter in London. (I had it on tap once in Poland and thought it absolutely horrid, but that was a long time ago and I reckon it had been sitting in the barrel for about three years.) So far, the Baltic porters we’ve had are sweet and not particularly complex.

I think I like the idea of a Baltic porter better than I actually like any of the Baltic porters we’ve had so far. I wonder if today’s incarnations bear any resemblance to the 19th century originals?

PS: Not a *Baltic* porter, but while we’re on the porter topic; we did pick up a”Hazelnoot Porter” from the Klein Duimpje brewery in the Netherlands, which we rather enjoyed. I remember that the hazelnut flavour was definitely present, but very subtle, and blended beautifully with the malt and hops. I’d happily drink this one again.

Boak

Categories
beer and food

Beer & food matching at Christmas

christmas_beer_menu.jpgGarrett Oliver maintains that there are no foods that can’t be matched with beer. So I thought I’d have a go at matching beers to the different courses of the traditional Boak family Christmas.

I didn’t have the benefit of Mr Oliver’s advice while I was choosing the beers, but I can consult in retrospect, as I bought Bailey a copy of The Brewmaster’s Table for Christmas. We may put up a book review when we’ve finished, but we’re enjoying it immensely at the moment.

1. Grapefruit appetiser + Blanche de Namur

Why selected: Grapefruit was always going to be a challenge, especially when grilled with spices. Spices and citrus suggested a Belgian Wit to me. I went for Blanche de Namur as it’s one of the more subtle (some may say bland) of the Wits I’ve tried.

Garrett Oliver says: citrusy flavours work well with Wits.

The verdict: This worked very nicely, although I might go for a less subtle Wit next time. Incidentally, this beer goes fantastically well with orange-flavoured dark chocolate.

2. Roast Chestnut soup + Meantime London Porter

Why selected: I thought a nice roast porter should work with roast chestnuts (stunningly original there, eh?) and went for Meantime mostly because it comes in nice snazzy bottles, but also I remember it as being bitter and smoky, which was what I wanted.

Garrett Oliver says: “British porters are rich, elegant beers that… are capable of matching many more dishes than one might imagine” and lists scallops, chargrilled meat, Shepherd’s pie and subtle chocolate deserts.

Verdict: This would have worked if I hadn’t added sherry to the soup. It made the soup taste wonderfully Christmassy, but clashed with the porter. That’s my fault, rather than the porter’s.

3. Turkey (plus trimmings!) + La Chouffe Golden Ale

Why selected: Wasn’t really sure, but I felt that a good-bodied blonde Belgian (fnah fnah) was what I needed for the main course. I went for La Chouffe Golden Ale as I didn’t want anything too extreme, and I remembered this as having an understated but satisfying flavour.

Garrett Oliver Says: With turkey, Biere De Garde, dunkel, dubbel, Oktoberfest Marzen, American Amber Lager, Belgian Pale Ale. He also mentions La Chouffe (as a Saison) and suggests it with Indian food (really?), barbeque, Thai, duck, cassoulet and rustic sausages.

The verdict: It’s a lovely beer, but not quite right with the turkey. I think you could go two ways with this — either go for something more extreme (a good trippel?) or perhaps go something lighter, like Palm.

4. Christmas Pudding + Delirium Christmas beer

Why selected: We had Delirium Christmas a few weeks back, and were impressed with its dark, spicy warmth, and thought that it would go well with spicy & sweet Christmas food. At 10%, it should round off the meal nicely.

What Garrett Oliver says: Haven’t found anything on Christmas pudding, and I’m not sure how he’d classify the beer. He recommends Delirium Tremens with a whole host of savoury stuff, but DT is pretty different from the Christmas beer.

Verdict: Didn’t work. For some reason, the beer tasted completely different when up against the pudding. There may have been some differences between bottles (yesterday I served from a large bottle, and there are some that maintain that Belgian beers taste different in large bottles to small bottles). Or it may be that it just couldn’t cope with the mighty pudding, which had been maturing for a year and a month. The pudding brought out the worst in the beer — the carbonation (too much!), the comparatively light body, and the sweetness — without delivering the warm spicy kick I’d hoped for.

I don’t know what would work with the pudding — maybe a heavier Belgian (St Bernardus 12?) Think I have a way to go with this food and beer matching business.

By the way – hope you all had a lovely Christmas.

Boak