Anspach and Hobday, The Kickstarters

The Kickstarters stout porter from A+H. Minor gushing. High carbonation. Nice smell, bit like the Buxton Tsar. Coffee, choc, liquorice, burnt malts. Dry finish. Yeast soup for the last 3rd.

Evil Twin,Yin

It seems that almost every imperial stout gets a 99 on Ratebeer these days. The more of them I try, the harder it gets to distinctly qualify on paper the differences between all these top rated beers. I would say though, that those differences, however subtle, are certainly there and worth mentioning, but, it seems to me, only really in comparison to other stouts in the same style.

I had this one after the other Evil Twin, the 'Christmas Eve In A New York Hotel Room' (*needs pithy comment re: name inserted here*). (Both purchased from Whole Foods Piccadilly - I was quite surprised to see them on the shelf actually and in the very reasonable sub £4 bracket.) Mellower I think than that one (less thick than a Kernel), a vaguely hoppyish nose (unlike, say, Wildebeest), some coffee. Mushroom. Initial sweetness, but only fleeting. Minerally, coca cola, coffee. Hop (I think) and burnt, coffee bitterness in the after. Booze. Not much to lose your shit about, but not much to argue with either.

Buxton, Jawgate

A style of beer that I do know a thing or two about: the good old American Pale Ale. This is Buxton's second branding of this (the old one is in this image). This mid strength beer didn't exist in Buxton's core range for a while (the closest was Wild Boar at 5.7%) and why they introduced it when they already had an existing beer that was quite similar in style and taste seems a strange choice. It's certainly a solid APA, but the fact that it doesn't reach Gamma Ray or Bethnal Pale Ale heights makes it seem as though it's really only included as part of the range to make up the numbers, to tick the APA box.

Cheers Kon once again for this!

Partizan, Stout Porter

A very pleasing drink. Not mind blowing, but all the better for it: to my mind, it was just nice to have a beer with nothing wrong/weird/different with/about it. It was exactly what I wanted. Appropriately light body for this porter, nose was consistent, taste was tar, some berries. Nice lick of booze on the finish.

Redchurch Brewery, East End Sasion

Orange pour - mad fizzy. Big piney/orange smell off the bottleneck. Taste follows, then a minor pepper/farmhouse element. Can't taste the booze (6.9%) Some bitterness. Typical London beer hype is Camden, Beavertown and some others, but Rechurch have been around since dot, knocking out amazing and consistent beers. The Pale ought to be ranked close to Gamma Ray and the Hoxton Sout is, for me, possibly the greatest hoppy stout on the market. This saison mightn't quite reach those heights, but it is another example of this understated and apparently overlooked brewery doing things really well.

Beer Bottles Revisited

There's a spot at the end of my road, at the beginning of Crystal Palace Park, which is loosely fenced off from the public. In it, there are shipping containers, park benches, Victorian iron railings, old bins, tires, pillars from the old gates and all manner of outlying city space detritus (leather chairs, playing cards, beer cans, footballs, washing machines etc). It's a wonderful space between spaces. I've been there a few times now over the past year to photograph beer bottles for this blog and I'm fascinated to revisit the site over time to see the previous entries untouched by human hands yet ravaged by the elements and overtaken by the undergrowth. Have a look at my other blog (here and http://reverendmedia.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/crystal-palace-14th-march-2014-2.html) to see more images of this great space which probably won't last for too much longer once the Zhongrong Group gets started.

Summer Wine, Maelstrom

Non-hazy bottled IPAs aren't appealing to me anymore (über cheap versions from Tesco nonwithstanding), particularly when I pay close to a fiver for them. (Give me a Kernel, Weird Beard, Moor, Siren, Redchurch etc etc. Excessive yeast sediment used to upset me, but I've come to love it and that pepperines it brings.)

In fairness, I've had a Sabretooth and a Diablo on keg (Fox E8, also a pint of Diablo on cask at the Westow I think) and they were sublime, misty and cloudy tropical beasts. I suspect that draught Maelstrom is much in that vein. This bottle was ok, but i think my prejudices stopped me from enjoying it as fully as I might have. Pine and a thick bitterness, but a little thin for 9% and, without the haze, it felt as though there was something missing... For some reason, the word 'maelstrom' will forever remind me of Peter O'Toole falling into the Vortex in Supergirl.

Partizan, Falconer's Flight

I kind of see this as a mid-weight version of the Beavertown Quelle Saison - a hoppy saison that could almost be a super fizzy pale ale. Pepper and rainwater nose, dominant taste was lemon and grapefruit, bit of fresh, fat blade grass, a high carbonation that faded quickly down the drink. Not a great deal of the saison farmhouse essence as such. Nice dry finish. Again - drank from the fridge, possibly more funky when warmer. Top beer.

Celt Experience, 613 Années

Not 100% to my tastes this one from Celt. The sweet, sort of winey/grape/raisin nose is something I've come to associate with out of date hops (although I'm not sure if that's correct). The taste was piney (mild hoppage), a bit orangey + a bitter finish. I was expecting higher carbonation. My first bière de garde - I expected a malty saison, this felt like a sort of malty, spicy, slightly past it's best ipa, I suppose. This type not really for me.

Beavertown, Quelle Saison

A very light yellow pour, tangy satsuma nose, plus pineapple and grapefruit. Taste follows - mouthfeel is a very fizzy and very light fruity pale ale. There were some saison elements in there (just about) - some straw and pepper etc - possibly more pronounced at cellar temperature than straight out of the fridge. Good bitter after. I'd session this. (Imagine if they put this in a can.....!)

Beavertown, Ger'onimo

Drunk April 12th, photographed June 18th. Best of the Beavertown BA's for me. Nice whiskey upfront on the nose, damp leaves/mineral water and some meat. Good booze on the taste, slight dryness (possibly the whiskey influence?) in the finish. A woody spice going on in this, possibly a little nutty? Decent untunctuous mouthfeel. Nice heavy body. My impy stout nemesis, the dreaded vanilla sweetness, crept in towards the end, but not too much thank goodness.

Partizan, Stout

Like Kernel, Partizan don't eff about with their beer nomenclature. I'm tickled by their simply calling this drink a 'stout'. (I'm sure other breweries would be tempted to add unnecessary prefixes in a bid to make it sound 'more exciting'.) Truth be told, I was excited to see the single word on a blue Partizan bottle rather than the 3 word 'FES' (I'll drink an FES but prefer my stouts less sweet and fizzy) - I'm not sure there's been one before?

A shade lighter in colour than your typical imperial stout. Taste was a satisfying blemd of the meat/choc/coffee/licorice (liquorice sp?) thing with a decent bitter finish. Just a fraction light (for me) of being a full blown imperial stout (this bottle was an 8.5%, I think the current stout is milder at 7% or so). I am absolutely fiending for their stout porter, doubt I'll get one though. We watched 12 Years A Slave when I had this. This film is not a date movie.

Dark Star, Imperial Stout

Sussex's Dark Star offer a mixed bag. I love Hophead and the wonderfully off balance nonsense of their Six Hop (bottle and cask), but Revelation (bottle, cask and keg) was so-so and this one didn't tick my impy boxes I'm afraid.

Whilst it committed the cardinal sin of being over-carbonated, I was reasonably into the English hop aroma (tinged with bananas possibly?) and the heavy bitterness. It was sweet but not syrupy and there was a little nail varnish remover in the finish too. A shame, as i really wanted to be into this.

Weird Beard Co, Single Hop Series No. 4: Citra Pilsner

I wouldn't have picked this as a pilsner in a blind test, but a good beer from Weird Beard nonetheless. Cat wee nose, big citrus taste. Gentle lasting bitterness that turns into a pleasing dryness. Quite like these hoppy lagers/pilsners. (This bottle was drunk back in March.)

The Kernel Brewery, 2013

I try to keep the beer bottles I drink for photographing. They're rinsed and then they sit in a Sainsbury's bag under the sink until I get an opportunity to photograph them in a way in which I've planned out in my head. I shot a previous run of posts where there was a common theme and I'd hoped to continue it with this second batch of Kernel bottles. However, my mind is in clear-out mode at the moment, so I plumped for something quick and simple instead this time.

Kernel beers are very possibly the best in London, if not Europe. Quality control is obviously very high and it's rare to have a bad, even an average beer from them. (Going through these images for this blog has got me salivating for them at 8 in the morning. That's not good is it....) I know that it's largely redundant reviewing Kernels but sod it: I'm a completist so indulge me.

Imperial Brown Stout

Version photographed is obviously not the 1856 version (I suppose they're not too dissimilar from one another). Smell of raisins, oil and booze in the gob, barely carbonated and heavy coffee flavours. I find that when this is chilled, I get more of the grassy/freshness element of the hops which I really like. Drunk at a warm room temperature, this is a very imposing drink which really oughtn't to be drunk after a night out.

I've got a stash of bottles of the 1856 version which were bottled in Jan 2103 - they're more or less perfect for me: very smooth (unctuous) in the mouth and highly drinkable. There was a batch which was bottled over half a year later in October 2013 and I remember them being quite harsh by contrast. Not unpleasant by any means, but there was certainly a sort of mild 'stripping' effect on the palate and throat whilst drinking. Anyway, left to condition for a year or more, this impy is rivalled only by the De Struise Black Albert. I've got a weird (and slightly sad) OCD thing that I can't not know that I have at least 2 bottles of this in the flat at all times.

Simcoe IPA

I went a bit silly with this one and bought quite a few. Ultimately, I think I preferred the Mosaic version, but I came into a bit more dosh around the time this came out so I indulged. Archetypal cat piss IPA this one, with stupid tropicalness and stratospheric drinkability.

Mosaic IPA

As above but better.

CREAM IPA

There's this cool game that you can play with the Kernel brews - "Guess The Acronym". Actually, it's not that cool (Chinook, Riwaka, Ella, Ahatanum, Moteuka). Anyway, this Wu-Tang inspired IPA was actually not so much to my tastes. Which is annoying as it makes me feel that I'm one of those lupulin idiots who's only impressed by hop IEDs. Anyway, in some (very probably) psycho somatic way, this IPA tasted like cream soda with a little tangerine on the edges. Hoppy obviously, but quite a mild drink in terms of overt flavours, much like their subtle Ella pale ale that came out around the same time iirc.

Double 4C

4C? Chinook, Columbus, Centennial and ummm....hang on...err...is it...maybe...Cascade? DIPAs (or imperial IPAs or whatever) from Kernel are rare. This was one of only 2 (I think) from 2013, the other being their Double Citra which was bloody brilliant and won the CAMRGB best of 2013 award. the Double 4C wasn't as good. Thick mouth feel, foam sweets etc but it was a bit flat and lacked something, not sure what though. I'd love it if the Kernel did more DIPAs. Maybe a DBIPA would be nice....(please..?)

Barrel Aged Stout

Noteless for this one. I imagine it was a bit like this one. In a world of almost parodical beer label blurbs, this one makes me laugh.

Imperial Brown Stout, London 1856 B.A. Glen Spey

Sensational BA impy. Heavy whisky nose and taste with a viscous booze at the end of each sip. £6/bottle is about right, I bought a few and I've got one left. Good until 2020 apparently.

Shepherd Neame, Double Stout

Double (?) stout from Shepherd Neame. Nose of coffee and mineral water and hops! Taste follows suit then adds a very dark malt, sweet chocolate and granola. It's almost like a porter with those hops. Solid mouthfeel with a good viscosity, ends on a sharp espresso bitterness. Aftertaste is a nice herbally residue on the teeth and gums, maybe a slight touch of mint and more bitterness. Bit of dryness too. A little watery towards the end of the drink and the mint made itself more and more noticeable which I'm afraid I didn't really like too much.