[The Happy Cropper]

Hi all,

Recently (the last 3 months or so) I seem to have developed/aquired a taste for Real Ale, Ive never really been a Lager Drinker as it gave me hangovers from hell. I always thought Real Ale was horrible after tasting it years ago when I was first in England, however after tasting it recently I have really started to enjoy it. Ive tried a few London Pride, Deuchars, Greene King IPA, Theakston Old Peculiar (A favourite) Spitfire, Old Speckled Hen and a couple of others, Old Peculiar has been my favourite so far. Have any of the seasoned Ale Drinkers got any reccomendationsfor me to try?
Many thanks
Ileach

[Underwater]

Black Isle are doing some nice organic stuff atm. the have an incredible wheat beer - havnt seen it outside scotland tho.
Isle Of Skye brewery - their most popular Red Cuillin is in most pubs here - but its the Black Cuillin thats the champ for me very dark ale, i think its won CAMRA 2007 another brilliant treacley dark is the Cairngorm Brewery Black Gold - rich, deep and complex.

And morrisons bottle conditioned is incredible for a supermarket beer, actually so is co-op wheat beer.

[Boojum]

There's a whole world of real ale out there, welcome to it

If you like O.P. then I'm guessing you're more into dark ales. It's hard to find any real ale down here in Brighton but most offys sell Tanglefoot from the Badger brewery, and that's a good dark ale. Not a dark ale, a stout, but I heartily recommend Youngs Double Chocolate Stout. Bishops Finger is reasonably well available and is good. The Fullers range are generally good (I particularly like 1845, strong but nice). The aforementioned Badger brewery make some good beers. For a lighter ale try St Austell brewery Tribute, a superb pale ale, and Harviestoun brewery Bitter and Twisted, one of my all time favourite beers. Hop Back brewery Summer Lightning is an absolute classic, a lovely beer. Youngs, as well as the double chocolate stout, also make some good ales. If you like your dark ales then look out for anything called 'porter', it's a classic style of dark ale, particulary suited to winter drinking. For a mass produced dark ale Newcastle Brown is actually surprisingly good. But it goes without saying that the best real ale is stuff on tap in pubs, not many pubs cater for us real ale drinkers nowadays but there are ones to be hunted out, many that rotate their beers so you can try a new one every few weeks. You just need to find a pub that knows how to treat it's beer, cos well kept real ale is wonderful, but badly kept real ale is fucking awful (IMHO it's why not many people drink real ale, cos not many pub landlords nowadays know how to treat their beer properly, they're used to mass produced industrial lager that tastes like piss no matter how its treated). So many more good real ales out there, my memory is just failing me at the moment but if any more significant ones come to me I'll post them.

[Hipgnosis]

St Peters Organic Ale is one of me favourites.

[d_L_t]

Try Brains Bitter, it's not bad in a can too and lidl sell it 75p a can?

[The Happy Cropper]

So Scottish Ales are good? Interesting.
Ive just opened a bottle of Wychcraft from Wychwood Brewery, blonde Ale apparently. Looks lovely, yumyum, tastes a bit citrusy?

[Boojum]

Wychwood makes some good beers - Hobgoblin is another good dark ale. And I love the slogan "What's the matter lagerboy, afraid you might taste something ?"

[Militant]

I'm only a young drinker myself so my palette is yet to sample all delights called Ale

Recently i've started to drink pale ale's like Pilsner (Becks Vier 4% being a bit of a fav). Reasons being is that it doesn't leave such a harsh taste in the back of the throat when i have a smoke. Though it is fermented cold like lager!

When i go away in the UK i try and pop into a nice country pub and sample some local ales. A few years back I went on a canal-boat holiday on the Norfolk broads and sampled some of the ales around there. One particular favourite was a 5% ale called Straw Dog. If you get to go to a 'Weatherspoons' pub or a 'Hobgoblin' they normaly tend to have a wide selection of ales including 'guest ales'. About 4-5 years ago Hobgoblin produced a nice heavy kicking ale called 'The Dogs Bollocks' it was about 5-6% they have produced a paler version since i believe.

A nice smooth pint of Murphys can be lovely from draught, but i think this could be a stout!

Cheers

e2a: What Boojum said^^ & The Hobgolin chain belongs to The Wychwood Brewery

This post has been edited by Militant: 05 January 2009 - 09:31 PM

[Abe Froman]

just on the last drops of a pint of old specked hen atm
my next couple will be sneck lifter
 _snecklifter.jpg (2.17K)
Number of downloads: 0
whilst watching tonights feature presentation
http://www.uk420.com/boards/index.php?show...p;#entry1594719

Quote

"What's the matter lagerboy, afraid you might taste something ?"

[The Happy Cropper]

Cheers Booj, very interesting list, might have known you would know your Ales.
I think the Dark Ales are more my thing, the Blonde seems quite nice though. Double Chocolate Stout, that sounds lush.
Hipgnosis - Do they sell that in Bottles in Supermarkets?
Smokey - 75p can has got me interested, love the name Brains Bitter.

This Wychwood one is quite nice.
The effect of Real Ale seems to be nicer also, a more rounded effect? (Hope that makes sense).

Should I drink one Ale all night or is it ok to mix or will this ruin the flavour?

[The Happy Cropper]

The names are amazing, kinda reminds of Canna. All the flavours, names, colours, effects etc.

Im LOVING this Wychwood Wychcraft.

[Underwater]

The Ileach, on Jan 5 2009, 09:51 PM, said:

So Scottish Ales are good? Interesting.
Ive just opened a bottle of Wychcraft from Wychwood Brewery, blonde Ale apparently. Looks lovely, yumyum, tastes a bit citrusy?

Thats just my taste - tbh all the beers mentioned here sound great, have had the harviestoun and it is good - but not on draught - like boojum says get on the hunt for real ale pub. I used to drink in a belter back home - The Ship, never anyone under 50 in there but that was a good thing! If you like a bottle - get searching for it on draught! Any micro brewery worth its salt will have a look at the cellar before putting their ale in so you should never get a bad pint of real ale! One of the wychwood ones is in vicky wine i think i'll try it tomorow.

[Boojum]

I mix, but then again I'm a pisshead

Mixing, the first couple of mouthfulls of a new beer will be contaminated by the taste of the previous one, but after that it's cool.

Real ale & food is also something to experience. I find real ale goes best with full flavoured, spicy (but not necessarily curries) type food. cumberland sausages go great with a good ale

[Hipgnosis]

Yeah ASDA sell it mate.

[Militant]

Sorry to sound commercial but i like a Cobra beer with a Curry.

Is the double chocolate ale the one that comes in a purple looking label? Think i have had it once

e2a: http://www.wellsandyoungs.co.uk/wellsandyo...ouble-chocolate i got a bottle in a box set for Christmas. Very tasty

This post has been edited by Militant: 05 January 2009 - 09:43 PM