Ivanhoe English Pale Ale
The guy behind the counter looks as decrepit as the shop, and the shop doesn't even look open, it's grape-bordered window dressing might be confused for a long boarded up newsagents. It leans against Ladbrokes on the Dereham Road, just a short walk (and not very scenic walk) from the pot-holed streets of Norwich city centre. Ivanhoe jumps off the shelf, of all the local beers it looks the most promising (though in fairness surprisingly few ...
Spurn Point
Just like Mike Parker, the author of Map Addict, for years I've been mesmerised by the enigmatic Spurn Point, that strangely shaped strip of almost-land that stretches from the tip of the East Riding of Yorkshire and awkwardly attempts to reach back downstream towards the sands of the Humber estuary. Spurn Point (or Spurn Head for many) is a sand bar that has been precariously edging it's way westwards over the last millennium of geological time as the ...
M&S London Porter
Smoky as hell to smell and like a burnt caramel bar to taste, M&S's London Porter is a sweet beer to devour with masses of chocolate or marshmallows over a camp fire. If you don't fancy the great outdoors then no worries, the lingering smoky presence hangs around for a long time in your mouth and may invoke daydreams of sitting under the stars and gazing at the heavens. It's packed with malt variety: you can settle ...
Halloween Hobgoblin
It's Halloween! And if your local supermarket or beer shop doesn't have pumpkin beer, then the next best thing to celebrate the might be the Halloween branded bottles of Wychwood Hobgoblin, found retailing for £1 at ASDA. The £1 price tag didn't scare us but the beer did a little. We must have grabbed a dogby bottle because the usual stewed fruit aroma had matured into rotting crab apples (old hops perhaps?) and the familiar fruit cake ...
Ales of the Unexpected
Since the dawn of my drinking days I've been a big fan of the dark side. Stouts, porters, milds or brown ales, I've always enjoyed savouring their brooding malty richness. And as autumn has arrived with a bang, it's fitting that I happened across a couple of unusual and very worthy offerings from Wentworth on my travels last week. This South Yorkshire brewery is one step ahead of the game in the stout ...
Meantime Pilsner
A strong, frothy head, a pale countenance and a ferociously Noble body makes Meantime Pilsner unmistakeably Bavarian. Put simply it's the colour of straw and the embodiment of light, refreshing, authentic lager. It's so pale you might even miss the barely toasted malt in this one. It's pale, delicate fizz, infused with the scent of stalks and greenery, ensures it's fresh and natural in body and soul with a congenital bitterness screaming of the vernacular style. E.g. it's hoppy, ...
Underbelly
Once upon a time Britain was an industrial nation. The population were manual workers, skilled or miners, all contributing towards the rise of the Empire. Nowadays we work at screens, behind partitions, "in services". Those grey, growing gas stores, the vast warehouses, the corrugated factories; they're alien to much of Britain; a spec on the landscape, an irritation to an otherwise green and pleasant land. These gunmetal structures, whilst reduced in their visibililty, still make up the backbone ...
Goose Island India Pale Ale
Hoppy, vibrant, refreshing and tangy to finish, Goose Island is a mighty fine American IPA. The Chicago brewers bottled ales are a staple of many of the best bars in the UK, with both the IPA and Honker's Ale permanent fixtures at our work's regular, The Cross Keys in Leeds. American IPAs differ from their UK counterparts. I don't think it's all down to the fact I enjoy them quite a bit colder than I'd usually ...
Co-operative Harvest Ale
Beers these days are hoppy. Well, I reckon they probably are more hoppy than they used to be. Hoppy hoppy hoppy. Such...an easy word to use. And such a generalisation. I never wrote about beer 20 years ago. I was a young Yorkshire lad acclimatising to life in North Oxfordshire, still a decade or so away from being able to legally drink. But I don't reckon the bitters were as hoppy nor the hops as ...
Ringwood Old Thumper
Admittedly Ringwood Old Thumper has taken a while to grow on me. Approximately 10 bottles to be relatively precise. Perhaps it was the nose that created images of toffee apples doused in vinegar or meths. Or the uncertainty of trying to enjoy the gone-off flavours of rotten veg, crab apples, musty drawers and dirty rags? Yet, Old Thumper kinda grows on you. Unfurled slowly is the, not quite delicate, but protracted sweetness and bitterness of an aged and ...
Plot 16: The Fermenting Room
When beer and art collide: Modern Art Oxford's limited edition green hop beer Down a dark and wet side street between the less historical buildings of the city's shopping district, the white washed walls of Modern Art Oxford are accustomed to the strange and gangly structures of modern sculpture. But to the strange and gangly structures of humulus lupulus they are not. Twisting, reaching, helixing, yearning upwards, the leaf-heavy green bines have designs on the famously spired ...
Roosters Pumpkin Beer
Roosters Brewery, whose beers are the staple diet of many a Yorkshire pub, marked this Hallowe'en with a pumpkin beer. No ordinary pumpkin beer though, a pumpkin beer served in nothing less than a giant pumpkin. A really, really giant pumpkin. Pumpkin 5 Spice Ale was tapped at North Bar in Leeds, in front of Calendar news and a small selection of excitable beer lovers. Arguably a more delicate task than tapping a cask, the job ...
Moor JJJ IPA
This not, I repeat NOT, an IPA. Punchy, citrus hops? Nil. Alcohol? Deep, stewed and sweet beyond believe. Apple skins & fruit pudding? Yes, yes, YES! None of which gives Moor JJJ IPA much credence as an IPA. But then again this isn't an IPA nor a double IPA. It's only a bleedin' triple IPA(!!!). This couldn't be further from Green King's bland and monotonous flagship brand of ale and is similar in nothing but colour. By their own admission Moor didn't ...
Moorhouse's Pendle Witches Brew
From Pendle Hill you've more chance of seeing Ian Holloway celebrating at Bloomfield Road than coming across any broomsticks or clandestine hurlyburly. And that's on a cloudy day. The sandstone plateau does have a slightly spooky aura about it though. Standing proud from the undulating hillside you can imagine a cackling coven of witches peering over the landscape and plotting the demise of their rivals. Especially if you visit during thunder and lightning... Moorhouse's Pendle Witches Brew is inherently ...-
December 2nd, 2009Beer and Food, Pubs & barsIt was the best of times, it was the worst of times…
…and I must first of all apologise for the lack of pictures to accompany this post. The reason is that I was not intending to ‘publicise’ what was initially going to be a quiet day out with my Mum and Dad. That is until we received shockingly different levels of service and quality of food at two Leeds eateries that inspired the Dickens theme for this post. So where did the weekend start…?
The weekend started well with the collection of my beerswap spoils. While I was posting I decided to contact Katie at Leeds Grub to see if she had any suggestions as to where I should take my parents for Sunday dinner. My Mum wanted to do some Xmas shopping so I needed somewhere in the City Centre but, as I don’t see them very often, I was wanting somewhere I could be sure was going to be good first time. Katie very kindly suggested one of the Leeds Brewery pubs which she told me, although she had never had a Sunday lunch, tend to do quality food on any day of the week.
It was with some irony then that the reason I turned up to meet my parents with a dry mouth and slight headache was the fact that the Cuthbert Broderick had had Leeds’ Midnight Bell as a guest on the Saturday night. With my CAMRA tokens they were only costing me £1.39 a pint. Wizard…. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: Beer Swap, CAMRA, leeds brewery, Leeds Grub, Roast Beef, Sunday Roast, The Midnight Bell -
It seems so simple, this-setting-up-a-brewery lark.
Walking around the compact, but seemingly organised Leeds Brewery with co-founder Sam Moss, it’s easy to forget that the business has only been in existence for a touch over two years.
Situated on a light industrial estate not far from Leeds’ bustling centre, the brewery is the hub of an expanding local empire that now stretches to three pubs across the town centre as well as the modern and compact Leeds Brewery HQ. The team produces three permanent beers and twelve seasonal beers; one for each calendar month. The beers are on sale across the country and also in Leeds brewery’s three self-owned pubs in Leeds city centre.
The Leeds Brewery team
Being Leeds residents and big fans of the beers that the brewery makes, we jumped at the chance to take a day off work and visit our very own local brewers. Upon arrival the other half of the management, Michael Brothwell, was busy making an emergency keg delivery in the back of his Ford Fiesta, so it was down to Sam to take us round the modern set up… Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: best, brewery, business, leeds, leeds brewery, midnight bell, pale ale, tetleys, West Yorkshire, yorkshire -
Leeds Brewery – Leeds Pale Ale
I am sitting in The Grove Inn, Holbeck, following Leeds’ exit from the play-offs. The amount of pale Leeds fans around me makes this the opportune time to review Leeds Pale Ale.
The football team lacked intensity for much of the night and I suspect that most die hard pale ale fans would argue that this beer has the same problem. From my point of view what this beer does have is the smoothness of an in touch Arsenal team. With a reasonably subtle but lingering flavour this beer goes down really well which is just the ticket for getting your depressed Leeds supporting housemate shedded.
We’re off for a major sess and, if you fancy one on the IPA, this could be just the ticket.
A treasure of a traditional pub located right underneath Bridgewater Place
3.8% abv
Brewery: Leeds Brewery
Tags: Grove Inn, leeds brewery, pale ale, smoothness, subtle
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