The North South divide

I know I can't please everyone. Two posts ago I was at a difference of opinion with Tandleman and Curmudgeon as a result of my views on the beer tie. Jeff Pickthall on the other hand seems to have closer ideas to me on such subjects. But sorry Jeff, today my story might find myself back in favour with Tandleman at least.

I know this subject has been done to death but I just thought relating the discussion in the bar last night might amuse some of my readers. Two drinkers came in to try my beers and seemed to rather like them, as of course do most drinkers of my beer. But then what do you expect? we make nice beer here. They were very pleased in general to be in the valley of Eskdale where several other pubs serve good ales.

They then continued to enthuse about how beer is much better in the North of the country. "After all" they explained "they don't use sparklers down south".

Honest, I didn't provoke them. The said gentlemen are, I believe, from Nottingham, which appears to be in the north, according to Tandleman.

To see what sparklers are all about see Tandlemans postor better still look at all the posts on the subject on Stonch's blog. Jeff Pickthall is known to view sparklers as "the work of the Devil" oh well, we all have our faults.

Distractions

I need to tidy my shed.

But instead I found this cartoon.

Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

A good image?

I'll have to be honest and say that my beer blog resulted as an indirect conflict between my perception of what CAMRA seemed to be saying and the realities I found in running a pub. The peak of that conflict occurred before we found our feet here, before we started brewing beer, before we gained entry to the Good Beer Guide and most importantly, before I joined CAMRA. Luckily I didn't start this blog until I had gained some understanding that it is all to do with perception, perspective, context and opinion. For sure there is no right or wrong answer. Except when it comes to sparklers.

Today I saw that Melissa Cole is picking a fight with Malcolm Gluck. Good, I thought. But I'm getting bored of this Gluck fella. He's clearly a pillock and a wine snob and his comments are simply being used to gain attention. I was concerned that Mellisa was biting. But still, riding his publicity won't do her any harm. I lazily browsed to find her writings about the situation and found a piece that I enjoyed. I was interested in seeing a comment from some blogger called WellDoneFillet, which of course, for any food aware person is a contradiction of terms. I had to check it out.

I was initially quite offended by what I read. The guy is a waiter in a restaurant and it seems his blog is mainly about things that annoy him during his time at work. These annoyances normally come in the form of customers. I understand this, as we get customers too. Some are not worth the hassle, although normally the annoying types can be spotted by their confusion over the lack of Carling, or similar. This blogger had clearly had a real ale drinker in and had been irritated by the customer's questions over the beer on offer. Mr WellDoneFillet, in his piece, proceeded to attack real ale drinkers in a similar way to Malcolm Gluck's attack on beer drinkers in general. It does bother me that a restaurant waiter is alienating a section of his customer base that would like to eat quality food but would also like quality beer with his food, I could do a whole post on this alone.

Luckily I have learnt to step back from offending posts and take a deep breath. Perhaps sometimes not long or deep enough, but I'm getting there. I decided that his post was a bit of naughty fun making and little more. The problem is, despite the fact that real ale drinkers cover a much wider spectrum of people than is portrayed in this and many other places, it is still a perception held by many.

There are people who have been bothered about this perception for some time. Despite attempts by CAMRA to dispel this perception. Jeff Pickthall being one and pubcurmudgeon another. A very important observation was made by Real Ale Blog recently, which I had to sympathise with. Perhaps Malcolm Gluck has a point about the perception that beer drinkers are sadsacks. If a proportion of the population thinks that beer drinkers are either lager numptys or real ale geeks, then while his observations might insult us, the real beer geeks, there might well be a discerning customer base out there that would only ever drink wine with food, G&T most of the rest of the time and a fizzy lager if it's hot, because they don't want the label of real ale drinker.

Out of the three people in the pictures here, which one is an odd one out? The obvious answer is the last one, he's a normal person. The other two are bearded weirdos. Well although this is true, the last person is our Labour MP - normal? you judge. Actually, I've got my reservations about the damage done by Labour to small businesses like pubs, but still, he is a nice guy and drinks real ale.

The first picture is of a real ale drinker at the NWAF. The second is my father, who does not drink and is always slagging off Labour at every opportunity and I wish he wouldn't. I have a beard, drink real ale, other beers, wine and whiskey - I don't waste my unit allocation on G&T, I might vote Tory next time, but might not.

The correlation between beards and real ale does exist, but it is not as strong as perception suggests and is damaging to it's image.

Yes, I know I've mixed up CAMRA and politics and beards all together. But I'm concerned about perception, not reality, which I know are two different things.

Taste

A visit to a pub last night resulted in me drinking 3 very nice beers: Timothy Taylor Landlord, Hawkshead Bitter and Yates Bitter. There was also Jennings Cumberland available, another golden brown bitter. I preferred the Yates, personally, because it seemed a little less sweet compared to the other two I tried - it had a hop dryness that I like, although normally, I also find Yates too sweet as well.

This leads me to a couple of observations that I would like to make. Firstly, why did the pub in question have four, albeit very nice and well kept, golden brown beers? There was nothing dark and malty, nothing stronger, no winter warmers. I would have liked to have seen something quite different. The second observation is that after drinking the Hawkshead and the Timmy Taylors I enjoyed the Yates a little more than usual. Was this because the beer has changed or is it to do with the order in which I drank them?

Jeff Pickthall questions his judgment on tasting beers, and here also. This both pleases and disturbs me at the same time. I cannot answer his legitimate question, and often find myself asking the same of myself. I consider Jeff to be more knowledgeable on the subject of beer flavour than myself, so if he feels he can't always trust his own judgment then I have no chance. But Jeff's uncertainty makes me more comfortable with my own doubts.

Ted is also struggling with this question. I know, as we've touched on it several times in conversation. In the link here Ted does talk more about a beer I brewed, so please forgive my gratuitous reference. I know that he questions the apparent widespread scathing about beer quality and taste. Mood and company, which of course are linked, previous consumption either of beverage or food and of course the particular batch of a beer will affect the taster's experience. The pub can also have an effect, such as the length of time the cask has been open or the line cleaning regime in play. Other factors can include the design of the pump clip, correct use of a sparkler or not depending on the consumer's choice and even perhaps the quality of service and ambiance.

It is perhaps unfair then for the large volume of apparent negativity in WEB2.0*. I have seen many comments on the Internet made about pubs and beers where I wondered what planet the appraiser was on. It strikes me that punters make the effort to comment when they have something they are aggrieved about. The bad experiences are the ones that motivates them to hit out some words on the keyboard and click that publish button. We rarely feel motivated to be nice. And here I am being grumpy about it, just the thing Ted is trying to avoid, bringing in negativity, which is exactly what I'm being grumpy about.

But, wait. This is all good. This is freedom of speech at its best. This is a channel of communication that is open to all. If the information isn't to your liking then you can click elsewhere. If you really disagree then you can engage with it and put your point across; although sometimes it can take forethought to avoid appearing to be a pillock or a numpty and quite often both.

So here I can grumble about the fact that there was no winter warmer available last night. I can also explore my own journey thought the mighty world of beer tasting and share my thoughts with the reader. Best of all, this virtual world, one that is free from the publishing constraints of corporation funded advertising, is discussing many great things about the diverse and growing world of interesting beer.

*WEB2.0 is user generated content. You are reading an example of it. http://www.beerintheevening.com , http://www.ratebeer.com are also examples.

I hope this doesn't undermine Ted's own unpublished posts. Go on Ted, be grumpy about people being grumpy, I'm eager to hear your views.

Dave Bailey is NOT unwell

There does appear to be a growing fashion to announce ones medical state on ones blogs. Well today was Christmas and I think it was the best Christmas I've had since I was very, very young. This first picture is the contents of mine and Teds stockings. The background is our view as we ate Christmas Dinner (Goose, Duck and Rock Cornish Game Hen). So how can I claim to be less then completely replete with joy, let alone dare to be unwell?

A few days ago we visited the Bier Stein in Eugine to pick our Christmas dinner drinks. The girls had however excelled themselves in providing a surplus of beer.

I have to point out that the American Ale was bought by Ted just to annoy me, along with a hamper of all American Culinary treats that included Twinkies and Cheese Whiz. Thankfully Ted is a confirmed beer snob, which makes up for his heathen attitude to food......

The accompaniments for dinner though, the two superb beers we had picked ourselves, Damnation and St Fruillien, took center stage - or should that be center table?

I was amused at the cork and label on the Damnation. It left no doubt about the expected use of a goblet rather than standard beer glass. As you see, we duly adhered to the brewers wishes.

I am falling in love with these Belgian style beers when it comes to paring with food. Sure, the west coasts IPA's work really well with spicy foods, but when it comes to finding a beer that is robust enough to work with a wide range of foods you can't beat a dubbel or triple.

While in the Bier Stein it surprised me the number of British bottled beers on sale. Included was Coniston XB. This beer is a favourite of mine for general session drinking. But I wasn't going to buy this bottle. Why buy a bottled beer brewed under licence when I can get a full 72 pints of cask conditioned beer at my own pub and serve it through a sparkler?

By the time I hit the "PUBLISH POST" button most of the world will be in Boxing Day. I've had a great time here in Oregon, made possible By Ted and Patti to whom I'm very grateful. I need to return to our little Inn in Eskdale soon. I mentioned to Alan before we went to Brussels that we might remove the ceiling in the gents and replace it with a new one. I don't have to ask Alan twice to demolish things. He trashed the gents and uncovered a rotten purlin whilst we were in Brussels. I guess the rebuild will be up to me.

The hand in this picture is Ted's along with his blasted IPhone. When out with Ted if you ask a question, the answer comes in the form of an IPhone thrust into your hands accompanied with the words "Google it!". Of course I can live life without such technological niceties, can't I?

Strength to your elbow

It is nearly 5 years since we bought our very own alcohol retail outlet. It is just about exactly 3 years to the day since we first mashed in at our little brewery. It is also 2 years, and nearly 7 months since the owner of the little "Anglo-American" brewpub I am currently sitting in came to my hostelry and made up his mind to set up brewing "Craft Ale".

I have always found the flavour and enjoyment of stronger ales to be more satisfying. Sure, you can't "neck" them quite so quickly, but watery ale is just not my thing. In the UK, for many years 3.5 - 4.0% seems to be the acceptable strength for "session ale". Any strength above this falls out of the classification of session ale.

During past 5 years the number of times I have had a 4.1% beer on the bar and a customer has said they can't possibly drink anything over 4% staggers me. How can 0.1% ABV make that much difference? There are many 5% beers around that are fantastic examples of ales, but customers very often turn their noses up at them. If the reader is any good at maths, (or just the singular math, as they say here) there will be a realisation that 4 pints of 5% ale is exactly the same as 5 pints of 4% ale.

I'm sitting here in this little pub in the sleepy and snowy town of Oakridge in Oregon drinking, early afternoon, a 6.2% ale called Tanninbomb. A malty, not overhopped ale that has been aged with oak chippings in the cask. It's warming in this unusually cold weather and drunk carefully with responsibility it is causing me no adverse effects.

Equally interesting to me is the fact that I am drinking the pint in the manner that the Brewers Union Local 180 intends, dispensed through a sparkler. The sparkler, of course adding to the enjoyent. Indeed, the widespread disbelief that any citizen of the USA understands the traditions of northern English beer customs can hereby be completely dispelled. Ted really is serving true cask conditioned ale, no artificially introduced gas whatsoever, through handpulls and with a very interesting back bar visible cellar.

There is a tradition of brewing ale in the west coast USA with strengths 6% and up. 8% is not unusual and over 12% being frequently found. When I was in Belgium recently the best ales were in the order of 6-8% and above. Why then are we quite so bothered about ABV in the UK? I believe this is part of a blinkered mindset that is inhibiting the movement of the UK beer industry into much more interesting territory.

A very interesting time is being had here. The beer is great, if just a tad too hoppy even for me on occasions. I can't say that most of the food here is even OK in the bulk. The strong bias of fast food is apparent even in the places that state they are restaurants. Cooked vegetables don't seem to be an option and salad is widespread even in the depths of winter. But, visiting the Trail Head Coffee shop did find me consuming a El Bacondilla de Teodoro, Dedicated to Ted it would have to been rude to not try it, as it's his birthday. Very simply it's flour tortillas with cheese and bacon between, heated on a griddle, served with sour cream and salsa: it was scrummy. The Mexican biased food has always been the best in my 3 trips over here. Needless to say, The Brewers Union has good food with a significant proportion being fully prepared on the property, including the bread. The Etouffee that Nick made was good. Oh, and as Ted points out, Nicks Lasagna was great too.

The journey continues

Finally we landed, yesterday, in PDX, Portland International Airport in Oregon. Mission: to find out how the West Cost of USA does beer, bars and breweries.

Perhaps also we'll do some skiing.

Ted and family met us at the airport and we were quickly whisked off to find our digs for that night so we could dump our luggage. Then search for a brew pub for lunch. This was not difficult as Portland is reputed be the city with the most breweries in the whole world. Totaling 28 breweries. But this is America where everything is bigger and better.

Except their pint, oh and gallon.

Roots brewing company is typical of the Portland brew pubs in that the brewery is clearly visible from the bar.

Later that day we visited Amnesia. The smell of the boiling copper was very pronounced. The owner very kindly invited me right past the "EMPLOYEES ONLY" sign into the heart of the brewery to take pictures.

Several other pubs were visited and much beer sampled. The beer community here likes heavily hopped beers. After a while I was pleased to get a more malty beer at Horse Brass Pub until Ted decided to have a Racer 5 which had an incredible orange peal nose and really nice very definite orange taste.

We then visited Bridge Port Brewing company, which seemed like it had gone too far down the wine bar look with all bricks and steelwork making it feel very impersonal. Finally Lucky Labrador beer hall which is a delightful spartan place and I got a very satisfying pint served with a sparkler.

There is too much to cover in the short time I have here. I need to do some comparing of British pubs with these very interesting establishments out here.

Meanwhile I am sat in the Brewers Union local 180 while it is snowing heavily outside. So it looks like a while Christmas here and a very good chance of some skiing.

I believe we may show up on the Gordon Swindlehurst show on Monday, perhaps.