It was a bracing Saturday on Shoreham Beach, lashing with wind & rain, drawing towards the end of a gloomy January. I thought I would cheer up an otherwise boring trip to the supermarket by looking for a few local Sussex beers I haven’t yet tried. I wasn’t disappointed and found a rather interesting trio of beers, all somewhat reminiscent of a warmer season, to sample over the evening.

Arundel Special Bitter

Brewery: Arundel Brewery Limited
Location: Arundel, West Sussex, England
Style: Special Bitter
ABV: 4.5%
Version: Bottled
Source: Tesco, Shoreham

First Arundel Special Bitter proved a refreshing start to the evening. As the name suggests, this is from the West Sussex based Arundel Brewery, unsurprisingly based near Arundel (actually just south of it on Ford Airfield Estate, where it was founded in 1992), famous for its castle and quaint tearooms. I thoroughly recommend visiting Arundel if you’re in the area – a very nice spot for a wander.

Anyway, back to the drink: ASB is a clear chestnut coloured bitter with a light, subtly fruity, yet malty taste. The liveliness leads to a pleasantly long lasting head and an invigorating texture. With challenger & cascade hops, it has a good blend of bitterness and aromatic hoppy-ness. It brightened up a dreary Winter day with its summery feel and made me very, er… hoppy.

Sunburst

Brewery: Dark Star Brewery
Location: Partridge Green, West Sussex, England
Style: Golden Ale
ABV: 4.8%
Version: Bottled
Source: Tesco, Shoreham

Starting life as a tiny brew plant in the cellar of a pub in Brighton, Dark Star has gone from strength to strength, winning numerous awards. The current brewery in Partridge Green was opened by Roger Protz in 2010 and produces a wide variety of favourites & seasonal specialities available all over Sussex and beyond.

Sunburst is a light coloured almost lemony coloured beer with a hint of cloudiness. At the suggestion of the blurb on the bottle, I chilled first before drinking. With a malty, slightly flowery aroma, this is a slightly lively, sharp bitter with more than a hint of grapefruit. The serving suggestion recommended drinking with strong flavoured food – I tried it with fried halloumi, prosciutto, salami & chorizo, prepared by my ever patient wife and it worked very well indeed. I’d say it turned out to be my favourite of the trio.

Hip Hop

Brewery: Langham Brewery
Location: Lodsworth (near Petworth), West Sussex, England
Style: Blonde Beer
ABV: 4.0%
Version: Bottled
Source: Tesco, Shoreham

Just two years after Langham Brewery opened, Hip Hop was chosen as winner of the Western Sussex CAMRA beer of the Year 2007 and retained the title in 2008. I chilled it for a few hours in the fridge before drinking and poured to reveal a light, partially opaque beer with just a few bubbles and a small head.  It has a noticeable flowery, grassy scent and I found the taste slightly sweet and very clean, with a citrus tang. A fine final beer for the evening and I discovered it was an unexpectedly good accompaniment to moussaka.

I would like to thank the brewers of Sussex for transforming Winter into Summer, for a few hours at least.

Brewery: Adnams [@adnams]
Location: Southwold, England
Style: Blonde Ale
ABV: 5.0%
Version: Bottled
Source: Courtesy of Adnams

The thing that struck me about Adnams Spindrift – a blonde ale designed to appeal to lager drinkers and a recent addition to the Adnams bottled beer range – is that it’s an incredibly elegant beer.

Elegant packaging: bottle-glass a gorgeous shade of deep ocean blue with silver lettering and the artful curl of a breaking wave on the neck. Elegant appearance: a clear copper body with a pure white head and a slight effervescence; just enough to add sparkle, not enough to cross the line into fizz. Elegant aroma: fresh, green hops, bursting out of the bottle. Elegant flavour: crisp, hoppy and refreshing, with a bite full of lemon zest, apple peel, peach, green herbs and fresh grass and very well-balanced by a lingering, dry-biscuit finish (all-butter shortbread, of course). Even the ABV is an elegant 5%; just strong enough to make it interesting, not too strong that you couldn’t down a few 330ml bottles of an evening without feeling too much the worse for wear.

All in all: Adnams Spindrift is a rather lovely drop of pure Spring in a glass. All that needs to happen now is for it to appear on the shelves at my local supermarket and I’ll be a very happy chap.

Thank you very much indeed to Sean at Adnams for sending this one along!

Brewery: Alkan-Maes/Heineken
Location: Jumet, Belgium (according to RateBeer)
ABV: see text
Version: bottles
Source: Tesco, The Vineyard

I had originally intended to post a round up of the Belgian beers to be found in the major UK supermarket chains but then I popped into Belfast’s fine beer stockist The Vineyard and found another couple of Grimbergens. So instead I decided to compare the four of those I now had – Blonde, Dubbel, Triple and Optimo Bruno.

The abbey at Grimbergen was founded in 1128 by Saint Norbert and became well known over the years for its hospitality to visitors, including offering home-made beer. Destroyed several times by fire and rebuilt, the abbey adopted the phoenix as its emblem, and this prominently adorns the bottle labels. The abbey also has a beer museum. (Source – Google translation of the dedicated French website, also available in Dutch).

So, on with the tastings, and the first two should be readily available in most Tesco stores. The Blonde is a mid gold colour, with a light hoppy, herby aroma and 6.7% alcohol. Taste is quite restrained and tame, in comparison to others of the style I’ve had – fruity hops, bit zesty with an underlying dryness, hint of orange and herbs, but still quite smooth and easy drinking, with a lingering light hoppy finish. It’s just a bit too light for any lasting appeal to me, but it would probably serve as a fine starting point for those just beginning to dip their taste buds in the abbey beer world.

The 6.5% Dubbel is a red tinted dark brown, and gives off a dried fruit aroma, with warm, malty notes. There’s more malt in the flavour, which is still quite restrained, with elements of treacle, dark chocolate and raisins, and a touch of bitterness in the finish. Not up there with the best dubbels, it’s still reasonable, and like the blonde I reckon it would serve as a decent enough intro for newcomers to the style.

Next up, the Triple. Dark gold with an amber glow, there’s loads of bubbles, with an aroma dominated by oranges and sugar, and some floral notes. It tastes like a citrus fruit punch with some bananas, and a load of sugar dumped in, but oddly I didn’t think it was overly sweet, managing to stay on the acceptable side, just about. Considering the 9% strength it’s quite easy going, laid-back but not lazy, but still demands not to be rushed. Much better than the blonde for those, like me, who find that one just a bit too tame.

And so on to the Optimo Bruno, a dark brown 10% monster that means business from the start. Crack open the bottle and first impressions are…not much. Other than cola there’s very little to the aroma, until it’s poured and left to settle. Then I got caramel, dried fruit, plums and cherries. From the first sip it’s clear this is a strong one, with a rush of sugary sweetness quickly followed by spiciness. I got toffee, plums, raisins and liquorice in there as well, before my taste buds were overwhelmed by the syrupy, cloying sweetness. Less of that last bit would make this more to my taste.

So overall, of these four the one I’d most likely go back to is the Triple, which is an unusual choice for me, as based on what I’ve had before it should really be the Dubbel. I can see me getting the occasional Dubbel as it’s so easy to find, and sometimes I just want to be able to shove a few decent beers in the trolley along with the rest of the groceries without the need for a trip to a specialist off-licence. But to be honest, none of them are likely to be regular purchases, there are much better abbey/trappist beers out there.

Brewery: Brasserie Duyck
Location: Jenlain, France
ABV: 7.5%
Version: 330ml bottle

I’ll admit my exposure to, and knowledge of, French beer is very limited. I’m fairly sure I could count the number of beers I’ve had from there on the fingers of one hand, and those were quite some time ago (the beers, not the fingers, although they are getting on a bit too), so I’m not even going to attempt to compare this one with others from the country. Brasserie Duyck don’t have an English version of their website as yet, but RateBeer can always be relied on to provide some background info. Basically this is a stronger version of the original Jenlain Blonde, which was previously 6% ABV and is now called Jenlain No 6. No surprises when I say I haven’t had that incarnation, so again no comparison will be made.

Despite being called Blonde, this is quite a dark beer, the rich golden colour enhanced with an amber hue. The aroma is much as I was expecting, very similar to a Belgian Blonde, with light fruitiness and a touch of grass and malt. Those fruity notes are present in the taste as well, mainly orange with some pear coming through. It’s also quite sweet, a bit too much so for my tastes, but overall it wasn’t too bad. While I don’t think I’ll be getting this particular one again, it certainly hasn’t put me off  sampling more French beer. There’s bound to be some out there I’m going to like, so suggestions will be gratefully received.

Brewery: Daas
Location: Hainaut, Belgium
ABV: 5.0% / 6.5%
Version: Bottled
Source: Courtesy of Daas

I must admit I’ve never been all that keen on wheat beer and these days I usually avoid it as much as possible (I have a wheat intolerance) but every so often I make an exception, just on the off-chance I’ve developed a taste for the stuff. So when the folks at Daas sent a couple of bottles of their organic Belgian artisan beers along for sampling and one of them turned out to be a wheat beer, I thought it would be rude not give it a go.

Daas Witte poured a cloudy golden colour with a thin white head and had a distinctly bread-like aroma. It was quite fizzy out of the bottle, although it settled down to a background effervescence before too long. Flavour-wise it was quite sharp and tangy, with a hoppy dryness, a hint of vanilla and something of a doughy after-taste. Not bad. Not bad at all.

The last wheat beer I tried was BrewDog’s Pixie prototype (as far as I know it never went into production) which was packed full of juniper and lemon zest, so it had a bit more going for it in the flavour department. But still, Daas Witte was, if not a beer I hugely enjoyed, one that was more pleasant than I remember Hoegaarden being, back in the day. I’m afraid you’d need to ask someone who actually appreciates and enjoys the style to give you a more meaningful comparison than that, though.

I cracked open the Daas Blonde immediately after finishing the Witte. This one poured a classic golden colour, with (again) a very thin head (I thought Belgians were meant to be… frothier? Perhaps I was using the wrong-shaped glass?) At 6.5%, I was expecting Blond to have a bit more substance to it than Witte and I wasn’t disappointed; the mouth-feel was noticeably thicker for a start. Flavour-wise, a honeyed sweetness dominated with a noticeably herbal after-taste. All in all it reminded me of cough sweets and not in a bad way at all (I’m quite partial to a nice lozenge, frankly).

Daas Blond is very drinkable indeed, as long as you’ve got a bit of a sweet tooth. I’d certainly be happy to try this one again, although I think next time I might chill it a little before serving. I think it’s one of those beers that could deliver a pretty good back-of-the-throat hit if it was taken down a few degrees and the lower temperature might help dial down that sweetness, which did verge on the syrupy.

Many thanks indeed to the folks at Daas for sending these two along for me to sample! If you’re interested in tracking down a bottle or two yourself, I believe they’re on sale in Waitrose, and you could try some of the online retailers. Or, if you’re not in a particular rush and are feeling lucky, Daas are running a competition with a monthly draw to win a 24-case of Blond or Witte:

[Click the image to see the full-size version]

Daas Organics around the beerblogsphere:

• FletchtheMonkey was quite impressed and said so over at Real Ale Reviews
• Roger Protz gave the Blond a three-point-five star rating.
• The Beer Nut concludes there’s more style than substance to Daas’s approach to brewing and marketing their beer.

Brewery: Innis & Gunn
Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
ABV: 6.0% / 6.6%
Version: Bottled (both)
Source: Courtesy of Innis & Gunn

We’ve actually covered both these beers on Blog o’ Beer before now – Joe was full of praise for the Original Oak Aged and Ed enjoyed the Blonde (although he preferred for the Oak Aged) – but I wanted to re-visit them both myself, for a couple of reasons. First off, so I can send a thank you shout out to Nicky at R&R Teamwork, who sent these bottles along on Innis & Gunn’s behalf. And secondly because it afforded me the opportunity to re-visit the Oak Aged and provide a more direct comparison of the two in the process.

I tried the Blonde first, it being the lighter of the two. I have to say, it was a lot richer than I expected it would be. It had a definite hop-based character but with a lingering malty sweetness as well. The golden colour and faintly zesty aroma was extremely pleasant as well: all in all an extremely satisfying, well-rounded beer that I thoroughly enjoyed.

The Oak Aged followed and to my surprise – especially considering Ed’s comparison and taking Joe’s rapturous praise into account – I actually found this one to be slightly less flavourful than the Blonde. It was noticeably smoother and richer, certainly, with a more pronounced sweetness and a more enticing aroma, but still… the Blonde just had a bit more bite to it, a bit more going on in the taste-bud-tingling department.

You know, I have to say – and this surprised me, given my usual preferences for darker, stronger, sweeter beers – that I actually preferred the Blonde to the Oak Aged. Perhaps the longer maturation process in the case of the Oak Aged ends up knocking off the Blonde’s remaining edges? If so, it’s almost a shame; the Oak Aged’s velvet mouth-feel with the Blonde’s sharper punch would make for a hell of a combination.

Don’t get me wrong, though. Both are extremely fine beers. I’d happily drink either one of them again and no doubt will before too long. In fact, perhaps I should do so sooner rather than later while, just to make sure this comparative tasting experiment didn’t generate a fluke result? Sounds like a plan to me.

Brewery: Morrissey Fox (or Morissey Fox, or Morrisey Fox… you choose)
Location: Marton cum Grafton, Yorkshire, England
ABV: 4.2%
Version: Bottled
Source: Tesco

Long Intro…

I’m sure everyone is well aware by now that actor Neil Morrissey and chef Richard Fox are currently starring in a TV micro-series – Neil Morrissey’s Risky Business – about the pair’s venture into micro-brewing and pub-owning, the first two episodes of which have aired on Channel 4 recently.

I had no idea that the beer was linked to a TV series when I picked it up in Tesco the other week. I bought it because it was just something new to try and maybe, just a little bit, because I once met Neil Morrissey at a bookstore event that I helped to run back in my book-selling days – he and Martin Clunes were promoting one of their Men Behaving Badly spin-offs and came along to do a live in-character interview and Q&A session, which I seem to remember resulted in a damn good night had by all.

I tried Morrissey Fox Blonde Ale last night and then watched the first episode of the series (courtesy of our Sky+ box) this morning. I thought the most interesting parts of the first episode were the segments in which the two intrepid micro-brewers sat down at a London marketing agency Antidote to discuss an advertising campaign that would catapult their product onto the supermarket shelves. Most probably because I work in marketing myself; beer plus marketing, best of both worlds.

Anyhow, the chap they were talking to (I think it was agency owner and M.D. Tim Ashton) was presented as the voice of sanity and reason amidst the wild, laddish enthusiasm of the other two. And the main point he kept coming back to was a rebuttal to Morrissey Fox’s mission statement – to present themselves as young, enthusiastic, passionate (and media-friendly) micro-brewers and by doing so convert a whole slew of lager drinkers into real ale quaffers instead – which could be summed up quite nicely with a pithy: “so what?”

As in: so, guys, you’ve bought a pub and a micro-brewery and made an initial batch of homebrew and tested it by giving freebies away in Harrogate and folks seemed to like it… but so what? What does Morrissey Fox have to offer that will make the venture stand head-and-shoulders above the hundreds of other micro-breweries with much better brewing credentials, above the 5,000 or so beer varieties currently produced in the UK, and above the huge amount of corporate competition for that all-important, coveted supermarket shelf-space?

To be fair the pair were quick to acknowledge that their main asset in their long run has to be the quality of their beer, the success or failure of which will be the main determinant of the overall success or failure of the entire project, long after the media-buzz (which has to have helped get their bottles on the shelves of Tesco, surely?) has died down again and they’re left with the serious business of actually running a pub and micro-brewery.

So they key question has to be: how does the beer itself shape up against other micro-brew products of a similar ilk? Is it just a case of a gimmick that plays on Morrissey’s celebrity status, or does it have a genuine strength of character that will enable it to stand on its own, without the additional media attention? You know, I’d really like to have been able to voice a resounding “yes!” at this point – if only because the show is very entertaining and I’ve learned quite a bit about brewing, just by watching the first episode and both Morrissey and Fox seem like good blokes and all. The thing is, though…

Actual Tasting Notes…

Morrissey Fox Blonde Ale is a 4.2% pale ale which, the label claims, lies “somewhere between a lager and an ale” brewed with a blend of “aromatic, fruity” hops and lager malts. And I suppose that, given the previously mentioned mission statement to convert lager drinkers to real ale, this makes a certain amount of sense. But the result is a beer with a bit of an identity-crisis which, given the decent amount of choice generally on offer in most supermarkets, isn’t going to help it get past the ‘curiosity-satisfying’ purchase stage and turn it into a staple cellar-filler. It’s pleasant enough. And as the vast majority of the taste-testers who were filmed said, it’s “not bad”. But then, it’s not “great” either. Nobody on the TV show said “wow!” when they tried it, and neither did I…

The first thing I noticed, on sniffing the bottle-neck, is a rather pungent aroma of… well, I wasn’t really sure what, but it was something not entirely pleasant. The beer poured a very light golden colour with a frothy white head and luckily the aroma settled down and became more recognisably beer-like in the process. First impression on tasting was of a definite effervescence, a malty, biscuity flavour, a hint of sourness, a hint of hoppiness. After that, things got a little… flat. It was beery, definitely, but lacked the outright mega-hop hit of a good IPA (and I’ve had a few big IPA’s recently, so they’re still fresh in my mind) leaving it languishing rather in bland summer ale territory; it reminded me a little of the Theakston’s Lightfoot Bitter I tried a while back (which is ironic, seeing as the pair seem to have rather fallen out with Paul Theakston). The hop notes did develop towards the end of the glass after it had been breathing a while, but overall I’m afraid I was left with a sense of… yeah, “not bad”. Nice enough, but… so what?

Further Thoughts…

I could hazard a guess (without having seen episodes 2 and 3 yet) that, in an attempt to make their debut brew palatable to those legions of pre-conversion lager-drinkers out there, they could’ve dumbed it down to make it (literally) easier to swallow. But in that case, I’m rather afraid they’ve probably dumbed it down to the point of depriving it of a distinct character, something to make it stand out from the rest of the real-ale crowd. Which could either be chalked up as a failure or a success, depending on your point of view. And I rather think that – given the intention to establish this one as a supermarket-regular, commercial brand rather than a characterful (but perhaps, more commercially limited) Real Ale – Mssrs Morrissey and Fox would actually prefer their first beer to be described as a lager-like summer beer that’s easy enough to drink but won’t leave you feeling like you’ve tried something too new, or too distinct.

Let’s not forget, as well, that this is just their first brew and they’ve already announced plans to release two new ones in the near future. So perhaps with their next batch, having established themselves as a presence on the shelves of Tesco with their Blonde Ale, they might actually go for something a little more interesting and challenging.

To summarise: I, personally, wasn’t hugely impressed with Morrissey Fox Blonde Ale, but then I don’t think I, or any of the other Blog o’ Beer guys, or anyone who might get around to reading these tasting notes, will be the intended audience. And I’m not going to write these guys off just yet. They might not be doing anything quite as interesting as the likes of Meantime or Brewdog or any one of hundreds of other well-established, small, independent and/or micro-breweries, or at least not just yet. But they are prepared to use Morrissey’s celebrity status, Fox’s reputation as a chef and the production budget of a Channel 4 documentary show to promote the cause of real ale and real ale drinking… and that alone seems worth supporting.

So I reckon that even if you only buy one bottle of Morrissey Fox, just to give it a go, and then never go back again, you should at least do that. I’ve had my one, and I probably won’t be having another Blonde Ale in a bottle, but if I find myself in Marton cum Grafton in the near future then I’ll definitely nip into the Olde Punch Bowl to try a pint of the draught version, and to see what sort of new additions they’ve made to the range.

The BBC website reported yesterday that UK beer sales are on the way down again – in pubs and off-licenses alike – to the tune of 7.2% year-on-year for July-September, according to figures from the British Beer and Pub Association.

The BBPA (or the BBC interpretation of the BBPA press release) was quick to blame the combined effects of the worsening economy and a 9% hike in duty on beer. I was surprised, though, that they didn’t make the rather obvious connection to the generally lousy weather we’ve had this “summer”. Surely that, coupled with the inability of any of the home nations’ football teams to qualify for the European Championship, would have had a fairly significant impact as well, no?

Anyhow, economic collapse and footballing ignominy aside, I’m happy to report that I’m still doing my bit, with a trip at the weekend to the (usually lamentably under-stocked) real ale section of the local Tesco which, to my surprise, resulted in the acquisition of no fewer than seven new (to me) interesting-looking bottled beers:

• Brewdog Punk IPA – recently reviewed and highly-rated over at The Beer Diary, so I’ve been keeping an eye out for this one.
• Morrissey Fox Blonde Ale – I actually had no idea when I picked this one up that it’s the subject of the new Channel 4 TV series Neil Morrissey’s Risky Business, which starts tonight. I’ll be watching that one via Sky+ later in the week.
• Williams Bros Midnight Sun – a rather interesting-looking porter from one of Ed & Joe’s favourite breweries (judging by the growing volume of their combined tasting notes to-date…)
• Farmer’s Harvest – a benefit ale for the NFU, but I’m not sure which brewery this is from as I couldn’t spot it anywhere on the bottle (or the NFU website).
• Jennings Golden Host – A premium ale from Cumbria.
• Orval – Belgian trappist ale; should be a good Autumn warmer.
• Pivovar Herold – Czech dark lager. One for the fridge.

There you go. Can’t say I’m not doing the best I can to help reverse that trend, eh?

Brewery: Williams Bros
Location: Alloa, Scotland
ABV: 3.8%
Version: 500ml bottle

So summer’s officially over and the nights are closing in but there’s still time to cram in another light summer ale review. And it’s another from the William Bros stable (just to continue the horse references started by Joe).

As per the label instructions I shoved this in the fridge for a few hours; it is intended as a refreshing summer ale after all. When it comes to deciding how a particular beer should be served I tend to follow any instructions on the bottle, with the view that the manufacturers should know how their beer tastes best.

Suitably chilled (okay, to be truthful it stayed in there a few days), and on a suitably warm evening (these notes were originally written up weeks ago), it was time to sample the contents. It gets off to a good start with a light golden colour and fresh hoppy, fruity aroma. The flavour is bright and zesty, leaning more towards the hops than malt, slightly sweet but pleasantly so, with a light and refreshing finish. Very pleasant on a hot day, the chilling doesn’t mar the flavour; I suspect that, like Deuchars IPA, it might actually taste worse at room temperature. Overall, Harvest Sun doesn’t stand out from the crowd of others of this style, but it’s enjoyable and I’d happily drink another if it was offered.

Brewery: Innis & Gunn
ABV: 6.0%
Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
Version: 330ml bottle

The other day there I was, drifting around Tesco picking up a few essentials, when I just happened to find myself at the beer shelves. I usually know what to expect to find, my local Superstore branch may have a reasonably good selection but new additions are not that common. So I was surprised to find this one, the Innis & Gunn Blonde. Being a fan of their Original Oak Aged Beer, covered so eloquently by Joe here, I quickly stuck a bottle in the trolley.

So what does this have to offer? First off, it’s described as lightly oak aged but still matured for 37 days prior to bottling. The alcohol content is slightly lower, 6% compared to 6.6%. And it’s still recommended “serve well chilled”. So basically it’s a lighter version of the original. All the characteristic Innis & Gunn elements are there, just lighter with a more hop-driven flavour.

The colour is a paler gold more in keeping with its blonde moniker, and the vanilla and oak is less pronounced in the aroma. The flavour also has less of these vanilla and oak elements, allowing the fruity hop flavours to dominate. This hoppiness also reduces the sweetness, but I felt it weakened the overall flavour. The fruity bitter aspect just doesn’t seem to sit well with the warm, smooth oaky elements that makes the original so wonderful; too contrasting. Overall, worth checking out but I’ll be sticking with the original formula.

Now to track down some of their new Rum Cask Finish.