OPEN IT Day 3

 It Gueuze a little something like this...

Over the last few years we seem to have been amassing small (but perfectly formed) collection of Gueuze with the intention of samping them as part of a Gueuze-y tasting session, but seeing as it it OpenIt weekend we thought we'd pop a cork or two!




Starting with the weakest of the bunch we happily arrive at a favourite of  ours Cantillon Gueuze 5% (Bottled 25/9/09).

Poured with a quickly dissipating, perfectly white head with a light golden, straw like colour. The initial aromas were familiar to a lover of the style: notes of horse blanket, straw and lemon sherbet. With a beautifully sharp first sip kicking up lemongrass, vinous grape, juicy lemon/lemon sherbet, and ripe orange with a hint of candi sugar. Juiciness mixed with extreme tart and dryness. As you get further down the glass oak and fruity orange peel becomes much more apparent on the nose. It remains gum-shudderingly tart and moreish down to the last sip. This remains a firm favourite and, deservedly, a world classic beer.






Beer number two comes from the same Belgian stable as the previous beer. Cantillon Rose De Gambrinus 5% (Bottled 17/6/10).

We found the aroma of this one a bit softer than the previous gueuze although still some citrus and, oddly, blackcurrant aromas, opposed to the expected raspberry, are apparent on the nose. The sweetness of the raspberry addition has seemed to soften the tartness, and has imparted an almost Ribena-like flavour into the rouge liquid possibly due to the youth of the sample tasted. The label recommends ageing for at least a year before drinking, and this falls just short of that mark, meaning the flavours haven't quite melded to perfection yet.

 

This said it was still delicious, carrying an array of flavours  similar to those in the standard gueuze but with a fruit sweetness, whilst remaining dry, just not quite receding the gums as much as it's less fruity brother.

We intended to get through more of these, but we savoured longer than anticipated and enjoyed these two so much it seemed a waste to open six of the finest gueuze on one afternoon. We've made an executive decision to extend our OpenIt weekend into the week and therefore to prolong the gueuze-y goodness for a little bit longer.

Trav-ale Tales

Leeds- North Bar, The Victoria Hotel, Veritas, Mr Foley's and The Angel Inn.

What with us both having some time off, and being bored with the same ol' local pubs we decided to make a pilgrimage to Leeds to sample some of what West Yorkshire has to offer. So we packed a bag (filled mostly with chicken sandwiches and mentoes) jumped on a coach and made our way across the Pennines.


Our first port of call was North Bar, and we were greeted with all the cultural diversity Leeds has to offer- French Hip Hop and Morris Dancers! The beer was equally as eclectic, and for our first round we opted for a Sierra Nevada Torpedo IPA 7.7% (yes- very adventurous for my first drink- start as you mean to go on!) and a Roosters Citra 4.3% (a little bit more sensible- if a bit duller).  

Rooster Citra & Sierra Nevada Torpedo. Lovely glasses!

The Torpedo IPA was delicious, and very well balanced, if extraordinarily hoppy. All lemon and grapefruit citrus sitting on a good caramely malt base, with a light carbonation pushing the hops to the foreground. The Roosters was probably a more sensible, if less exciting starter. It has a lovely creamy mouth-feel with expected lemon sherbert finish but was a tad sweet for my taste.  For our next act we both swapped preference- keg moving to cask- and vice versa my opting for Brother Rabbit 4% from our friends at Thornbridge and a Brooklyn Brewery Lager 5.2%. The Rabbit was very hoppy, with a grass and lemon flavour and was enormously quaffable with a nice pleasing dry finish. Could be very dangerous on a summers afternoon! The Brooklyn was a delight, a crisp malty backbone and not too carbonated meaning it went down very easily. 

We had to eventually make the difficult decision of whether to stay here for another beverage or make our way on, but after a tiny chat with the bar staff and a recommendation of Anchor Brewery Humming Ale 5.9% we decided to stay for one more (against our will of course!).

Humming Ale is an Anchor beer that I'd yet to try, but was happy to see it at North Bar as it is a seasonal beer and only brewed between August- November, so seeing it in March was a nice surprise. My initial impression was not too good, the aroma is a bit barnyard-y and straw like with a slight hint of berry. The taste definitely made up for the smell, it was bursting with an old style hop flavour, being all brambles and berries and with a slight espresso note in the finish. It was delicious and more-ish and I was disappointed to reach the end of the glass. 
Another old friend was on the bar and couldn't be left without sampling: Brewdog's Punk IPA. A schoolboy error occurred here: we forgot to ascertain if this was old or new Punk, we had thought it was old, but now not so sure as the resulting drink was less harsh than I expected. Comment was passed that the hops were a little tired , though it was delicious none the less and having only tasted the new version in cask (I think) the jury remains out.
We stayed here for a quite a while and greedily eyeballed the bottled beer list, though we thought it rude not to see what the rest of the city had to offer, so we decided to make our way into the sunlight and stumble slightly to some other venues.

On our way to the next watering hole, the well tweeted-about Mr. Foley's, we bumped into a friend who had failed to get a beer in there as he, and we, had forgotten an international football match was on and the pub was heaving. Luckily he was up for a few pints and became our unofficial tour guide to the cities pubs. He guided us to quieter climbs, the Nicholson's owned Victoria Hotel. We were delighted to find a wide range of beers on. We selected a pint of one of our old trusty ales, Thornbridge's Jaipur 5.9% (we had been informed at North Bar that Thornbridge beers seldom make it to Leeds, so I was glad to see their beers for the second time today.) It was in good condition and was as good an example of it as I have had recently. We also tried the Majestic Lager 4.2% which had been recommended by the barman. He informed us that he and other members of staff had been involved in the brewing of this beer at Cropton Brewery and it was a seasonal special brew just for Nicholson's pubs. It was well looked after but cask conditioned lagers are a style of beer I inherently distrust and was not shown much to change my mind here. Perfectly pleasant but a little sweet, softly citrus and a bit bland for me.

From here we were shown a newer addition to the Leeds scene; a little wine bar come deli come pub called Veritas. A four roomed venue, it seems quite small and intimate but vast at the same time. This might be due to the fact that it was virtually empty, making the main bar feel huge, but the side rooms were small enough to make us feel cosy without being quaint. It was the perfect escape for us until the match ended. Sporting four hand pumps, all three of us opted for the Ilkley Brewery Mary Jane 3.5%. We'd heard a lot about this beer due to it's fast rise to multi-award winning status so was eager to try, but was a tad disappointed. It was very well looked after, perfectly clear and had a pleasant floral aroma and flavour, but to all our tastes was a touch thin and watery. Guess this was to be expected from a beer at this strength after a succession of 5.5%+ beers, so in fairness it was probably not the ideal time to try it. After a short time here, a little chat with the lady behind the bar and a sample of some of the cheeses on offer behind the deli counter in the side room (delicious!) we figured that the game should be over and Mr. Foley's should be safe to drink in once more.

I'd not been in before but was impressed. Again we were presented with a good mix of cask and keg and got a good sample of each. We tried Liverpool Organic's cask Rakau 5% which, apart from having not much of an aroma and a slightly overly harsh bitterness was nice with lime and lemon grass citrus as one would expect from one of my favourite hops. Brewdog featured again here, with us finishing off a keg of 5AM Saint 5% which was then replaced with Bramling X 7.5% from the IPA is Dead series. 5AM was delicious and showed no negative side effects from it being the end of the barrel, and the Bramling X was a particular favourite, and in our opinion the best of the series showing the greatness of an underrated hop variety- all berries, hedgerow and loveliness. One other massive highlight of this pub is the sheer amount of pumpclips on the wall in the corridor for the facilities, I could've spent all day looking at them, if it wasn't outside the toilet that is!

Just a small helping of what Mr. Foley's has to offer...

As you can imaging, everything was getting to a certain state of fuzziness, but STILL we pressed on, to The Angel Inn, a Samuel Smiths establishment of which we only remember one of the beverages that we sampled. Samuel Smith's Wheat Beer 5% was a pleasant tipple with clove and banana notes  and a hint of bubblegum. We waved our travelling companion goodbye, thanking him for a delightful afternoon, and decided to head home ourselves.


As we were passing on the way to the coach station we felt it would be rude not to go into North Bar for one swift beverage and be on the way, so we opted for a Thornbridge St. Petersburg 7.7% and another Sierra Nevada Torpedo IPA 7.7%. St. Petersburg is one hell of a beer, rich and dark without being cloying, it's all berries, coffee, chocolate and a hint of lemon. I can safely say that these beers were a perfect nightcap as we intended, so me merried our way across the city, onto the coach, delighted with our days work and brimming with girlish glee(!?)

Harviestoun- OLA DUBH- Special Reserve 30- 8%

 Whisky barrel aged stout from Harviestoun Brewery, Scotland. Aged in Highland Park 30 Year Old Single Malt Scotch Whisky barrels.

 

We discovered this little beauty a few weeks ago in a farm shop near Huddersfield. Having sampled the Special Reserve 12 on draught and, dare we say, being less than impressed with it, we approached this with hopeful caution! We were to be pleasantly surprised! 

 

The cap was popped and out poured a pitch black, viscous liquid with a lively, mocha coloured head that quickly dissipated.

The aroma instantly spills from the glass filling the room with raisins, vanilla, and cinder toffee which develop from the oak ageing.  There are also dark fruity notes of plums and ripe cherries. Some notes of whisky come forward too, but this is not overpowering or unpleasant as found in some other beers of this style.  

Initially the mouth was overwhelmingly coated with dark bitter chocolate but this was soon replaced with more raisins and vanilla, cherry and plums, and an almost clove-y smokiness. These flavours mixed and matched, changing with each sip. It is much more developed than the Special Reserve 12 that we had initially tried (that tasted a bit like a whisky and stout mixer!) and the older, more developed whisky had a more pleasant effect on the stout and filled our bellies with lovely  higher alcohol warmness that made us wish we had a dog and an open fire. It would also be interesting to see how the flavours would develop when laid down for a couple of years.

Our first review, and our first recommendation!
 
 

An Epic beer journey.

We have come to the conclusion that telling each other about beer is not satisfying enough. We find each other amusing so why wouldn't other people?!?! Sitting around on our own discussing beer, correcting its flaws and applauding its wonder is apparently to be shared in the 21st century so here are our musings from nights in and evenings out and the wonders of beery goodness that we find. We hope you find our ramblings relevant!

 We hope to do a mix of beer reviewing, rambling, travelling, seeing and doing.  

We want no pat on the back- Just a round of applause for the beer we are blogging about.