A night at the Rosebud

Just got back from my first Thursday night music quiz night at the Rosebud near Rothwell, South Leeds.

The Rosebud is Sam’s local pub, located on a quiet road of houses that overlook pleasant fields. It’s one of last pubs in the area that still regularly brings in guest ales and is a nice little spot for watching Leeds United with a real ale in hand.

Anyhow I met Sam and the chaps and the four us got to trying the guest ales, which were Ginger Pig by Springhead (who’s web site SEO isn’t great!), Sharp’s Cornish Coaster and Copper Dragon’s Golden Pippin.

Copper Dragon's Golden Pippin - pride of the Rosebud pub this Thursday

Firstly I ordered a half (yes, it’s a school night!) of Ginger Pig which had caused an amicable rift amongst the table; Sam believing it to be a little heavy whereas the rest believing it nice and refreshing. The elusive Springhead Brewery have created a straw coloured beer that is light and, if I’m honest a little bland and watery.

Perhaps it’s just very subtle, but this beer is named after it’s core differentiating ingredient, ginger. This is no Blandford Fly by any account, but whilst it sips easy and is refreshing and enjoyable, it’s not much more than pleasant and would benefit from a little extra complexity and depth. Not that it’s bad, I can se it been ,much better on a hot day as a refreshing light ale, but just not as entertaining as I was expecting on a dark and rainy night.

Second up came Cornish Coaster, one of Sharp’s ‘Other Beers’ (again with the poor SEO – titles of their web pages could with some improvement!).  Now this beer is interesting! In my notebook I simply wrote ‘you can taste the country air’ (which would have been the first line of my review had I taken a picture of it).

This was a much darker beer than Ginger Pig, deep browny-orangey-amber, with fruit wallowing in each sip and a tang in throughout that reminded me of the aroma of proper traditional country cider. Overall strongly fruity with a measured malt finish: not quite as bitter as I’d favour but enjoyable and drinkable (and more memorable than doom Bar I thought…?!)

But, then it was on to the Golden Pippin, and one of those moments when you take a sip and go ‘now that’s a good beer’. With absolutely no Yorkshire bias, I can say that Copper Dragon definitely made a winning move by adding Cascade Hops to this beer. Because the American influence is just what edges it to a level above the previous two beers. It stood out because of it’s richness and being that little bit more complex (which might be a little ‘unfair on Cornish Coaster which I actually felt had more longevity in terms of being a session beer).

‘Pippin is citrusy/floral throughout, as well as being beautifully but not too dominantly bitter. It almost has a gentle fizz to it when first poured (it doesn’t actually) but it leaves a little tingle that livens it up in your mouth.

All in all, not a bad selection of guest ales at all, but I drank in the order that I’d count them down in too.

I shall be back to the Rosebud in the not too distant future with the camera, to do the other two beers justice and also sample some Samba from Leeds Brewery which wasn’t on, but I’ve missed at the Midnight Bell in rather of the eponymous flagship dark mild instead.

And as for the quiz? 3 half pints (and a few more full pints for the other lads!) resulted in us achieving a modest, but not last-placed 12 out of 25 on music (and we were the only team that deduced that Marvin Gaye must have been born in the 30′s, even if we didn’t get the questions on Wings right.

And as someone who isn’t a fan of Paul McCartney’s efforts post-Beatles, I’m pretty happy with that.