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Just desserts
A handful of British beers today, starting with one that caused a bit of a buzz when it appeared on draught in Against the Grain last month.You need to take a deep breath for even the basics of Siren's...
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All crazy now
The last American beer I wrote about was from Colorado's Crazy Mountain Brewing. I normally try to mix things up a bit better, but this can had been sitting in the fridge since Thomas gifted it to me...
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Circling excellence
The year's Irish beers begin with Third Circle. I hadn't been impressed by this client brewer's first offering, a Red, but put that down as much to the style as anything else. They've stuck with...
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Offside trapp
It's a fizzy one, is Nivard. This is the third release from Austria's trappist brewery Engelszell. Lots of foam came gushing forth from the bottle and the mouthfeel is almost sharply carbonic, giving...
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Turkey trimmings
The Christmas break was spent with family in Shropshire, just outside Shrewsbury. Castle Pulverbatch may be a one-horse town but fortunately said equine is The White Horse, a charming little country...
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Shropshire drops
Not far from where I spent Christmas in the Shropshire countryside is the Red Lion pub in the village of Longden Common. It's as pleasant a country inn as you could wish for: ceiling beams, an open...
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A week in Provence
The annual New Year jaunt was to Nice last time round, in search of some Mediterranean sunshine and arty culture but not really for beer. Which of course is not to say some beer didn't cross my path...
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Brewpub roulette
I've mentioned before that micronations are a bit of a fascination for me. A week in Nice over New Year left plenty of time for the short train trip eastwards to Monaco, a barely-there principality...
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Dis und dat
I got theseĀ DistelhƤuserĀ beers from Barry a shamefully long time ago and they were at the front of the queue when I began an overdue clear-out of my beer fridge recently.Starting with Distel Blond, a...
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Curiosities
I'm aware of the risk that this blog may turn into What I Drank At 57 The Headline but, for better or worse, that's where I encounter a lot of new beers these days, and often ones that aren't even on...
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Chill out
"Snowed in" is the topic Jon Abernathy has chosen for this month's Session, raising the perennial controversy over when winter ends and spring begins. Ireland persists with the daftly optimistic notion...
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Blind justice
And so, before January had even slinked away, the 2016 beer festival calendar got under way at Franciscan Well in Cork. Irish cask beer has been central to this bijou affair in the brewpub yard since...
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Not here just to take part
It's interesting to watch the milestones going past on the journey towards Irish craft beer becoming mainstream. A fairly major one went largely unnoticed last year and it was a happy surprise when I...
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Passing sweeps
Dropping into bars and offies on spec in search of beers new and interesting is a fairly regular part of my drinking life, particularly when left to my own devices.One such wandering into the beer...
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Unsaisonable
Two Belgian saisons today, one traditional with a twist, the other from one of the country's new wave brewers.Saison CazeauĀ is first, from Cazeau Brewery, which is in Cazeau, in case you were...
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The circus comes to town
There's a jubilation that comes with the Alltech Craft Brews & Food Fair that other Dublin beer festivals don't seem to share. Maybe it's the surroundings: the warm, enclosure of the Convention...
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Soul glow
We're back at the 2016 Alltech Brews & Food Fair today. Probably the most interesting stand for the hardened beer geeks was that of Soulwater, an offshoot of the Clada Group, a Galway-based...
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Festival periphery
We're out of the Convention Centre at last, but the gravitational pull of the Alltech Craft Brews & Food Fair drew in a couple of other beer events in 57 the Headline either side of it. The day...
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Critical conditioning
Just like on the last leap day, I'm in northern England for today's beers, both of which arrived via the kind offices of Myles. I've enjoyed the small number of Durham Brewery beers I've had in the...
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Out for the season
Spring is upon us, and with it the first of the al fresco beers. I'm reliably informed that the beginning of outdoor drinking season is a major occasion in the Norwegian calendar so I decided I would...
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