Homage to Catalonia

Last week I was briefly in Barcelona for work. I had only a few hours in the afternoon free so there was no time to bring Francisco red carnations, but starting in the Plaça de Catalunya I was able to give a quick nod to the site of the Spanish Kronstadt before commencing my wanderings.

Thanks to some tips from Mark Dredge I had some quality beer bars to track down but before I made it to any I was tempted into La Llibertària by a young newspaper seller.

It didn't seem much of a place for beer so I just asked for a caña, or small crappy lager as we say in English. Then it was time for a bit of culture at a bookshop, where I picked up a CD:

After that I finally to to a decent Barça beer bar: BierCab. There were 30 beers on here. I started with something local, having a Naparbier IPA, strong and tasting of American hops this was definitely craft beer, and it was a great step up from the crappy lager I'd had earlier. With the clock ticking and a work related meal to get to in the evening I couldn't settle down to working my way along the bar so as I sipped my drink  I carefully pondered my selection.

In the end I went for a small Bourbon barrel aged stout from De Molen, not exactly local but I hadn't had any of their stuff when I was in Amsterdam so I figured I was just making up for lost time. It was really good too, but at over 10% ABV I'd reached my limit for safely meeting with new colleagues and it was time I was on my way.

Craft Beer Billionaire

Despite my dedicated beer nerdery some things still pass me by. That 'Craft Beer' has its first $ billionaire was one of them. Last month the value of shares in Boston Beer Company owned by founder Jim Koch passed the billion dollar mark. Now you may think he must be brewing on a rather large scale to make that huge heap of money, but remember so long as he brews with passion it still counts as craft!

The full story is here, and it also raises some interesting questions about where exactly the growth in 'Craft Beer' sales is coming from. 

Culture Shock

I was back in the big smoke on Saturday. I went to see Culture Shock, who I rather disturbingly last saw 23 years ago.

Along the way I managed to pick up a book on German history, something my knowledge is rather lacking in, much like my knowledge of German beers. I'm sure I'll soon be alle macht den rätening with the best of 'em but increasing my beer knowledge may take longer. There are so many German breweries I've never really got to grips with what's hot and what's not, except maybe for wheat beers.

We stopped at a 'Spoons on the way, which I'd prepared for by packing a wad of discount vouchers I liberally distributed amongst my friends. There was an 8.5% ABV version of Abbot Ale on draught but I didn't want to risk making a tit of myself later so I steered clear of it. I had Innis and Gun IPA instead which was a bit too odd for me, I don't think oaky and hoppy mix well.

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A bottle of Nigerian Guinness accompanied my pre-gig curry, which was alright but not as good as FES. I couldn't see any mention of sorghum on the label but I believe that's the main grain it's made from.

After that I resigned myself to cans of lager whilst watching the band. A delightful surprise waited for me  in the room the band were in though as they had vegan Redemption Hopspur on. As the good lord saw fit to bring beer to perfection in its fined cask form I don't really approve of dicking around with it by leaving out the finings, but despite a slight haze the beer was great and a vast improvement on the crap Polish lager I'd been drinking previously. Perhaps the band were behind it as they opened their set with Pressure, a tirade against the horrors of extraneous CO2.

OK I made that bit up but it was good to see cask beer there.

Hopfenweiss

One of the beers I picked up on Saturday was a beer I'd been after for far longer than I should. It's a sad tale caused my own stupidity.

Some time ago I read about Brooklyn Brewery and Schneider & Sohn teaming up to make hoppy weiss beer. Normally wheat beers have a low hopping rate so I was interested to see what cranking it up did. I've kept my eyes open for the beer when in specialist beer shops but all I ever found was a 8.2% ABV weizenbock version. Changing the amount of hops and the strength of the beer was a variable too far for me so on each occasion I passed the opportunity to buy it and I continued my search.

And so the months went by. Eventually it dawned on me that there could be a reason I'd found the weizenbock on a number of occasions but never a normal strength version so I got googling. It didn't take much to find out that in fact the hoppy wheat beer was indeed the weizenbock and there was never a normal strength version. It was enough to make me sing the Siamese national anthem.

As to how the beer tastes, it was good. You can taste the wheat beer base, with the extra hops balanced and a good floral addition to the flavour. Bitterness still seemed low so I guess a lot of the hops were added late. On the down side it was a bit soapy and with the added taking it up to 8.2% ABV has definitely made it too sweet. They really should do a normal strength version of this!

X In Search Of Sucker Juice

On Saturday I went in search of sucker juice. The latest beer in Fuller's Past Masters series was out, as well a new Imperial Stout. The Past Masters beer was pricey, but I do like beer history so couldn't resist. The Imperial Stout though ticked all the boxes for sucker juice: strong, limited edition, unusual ingredient, with it's very own cardboard box and of course bloody expensive. I did think long and hard about getting a bottle of that but in the end decided if I'm making a trip to Chiswick I might as well.

Sadly it was not to be. Despite Chiswick appearing to be part of a bustling metropolis, it seems it is in fact a hotbed of inbreeding and the Brewery shop was shut, with a note pinned to the door saying they couldn't sell beer as they were busy playing banjos with their family.

Fortunately I had a route back planned with plenty of beery delights. Our first stop was Realale.com, which turned out to be a surprisingly long and tedious journey, though I was pleased to see the Stag Brewery for the first time when we went through Mortlake.

I hadn't found a decent parking spot so we didn't stay long, but long enough for my rucksack to get satisfyingly heavier and my wallet disturbingly lighter.

Then it was on to Twickenham and Noble Green Wines.They were having a beery event so I chatted briefly to a few people I knew then it was more beers in the bag.

Having spent hours building up my beer stocks I spent the rest of the weekend doing my best to run them down, which I may well blah on about later.

Hops on the radio

There was a full half hour about our little green friends on Radio 4 today. You can get it on iplayer here.

South Side, Yeah!

I was pleased to pick up a bottle of Bristol Beer Factory's Southville Hop recently. It seem highly rated by my fellow beer nerds and it won a SIBA award so I figured there must be something going for it. And indeed there was.

The first taste was of the grapefruit flavour you get from Cascade hops, but as the beer went down I thought there was something more, a bit lemoney too? Anyway it was good stuff, and I really need another bottle so I can compare it with Goose Island IPA, which I've realised is my benchmark beer for pale with American hops. It may be time for the return of The IPA Challenge!