Jo suggested we have dinner and a couple of pints at the Marble Arch on Saturday and it didn’t take much to get me to agree (she had me at ‘dinner’, to be honest, ‘pints’ and ‘Marble Arch’ were icing on the cake). We were hoping to get there early enough to bump into MyBreweryTap.com‘s Richard Burhouse (@MyBreweryTap) and Rob Derbyshire (@BGRTRob) of Hopzine.com fame, but alas they got there earlier than we did and had already supped their fill and moved on before we’d managed to get into town.

So instead we ended up chatting to half a dozen complete strangers over the course of the evening (topics of conversation ranging from bondage trousers and Stiff Little Fingers, to the relative acoustic merits of the Bridgewater Hall and the Lowry, via the best way to get to the Palace Theatre by car whilst avoiding the gas-main works that have buggered up the city centre for months) and had a bloody good time doing so.

There was ale involved, of course. And oh, my word, what ale there was…

On arrival, I headed for the bar to get Jo her customary half of Marble Stouter Stout and made a b-line for the Thornbridge Raven, which Rob D had mentioned was on earlier in the day. As it weighs in at 6% ABV I thought I’d just go for a half to start with, so I got myself a pint of Marble Pint at the same time, to ease myself in. But Jo finished up her stout and sent me back to the bar for another (along with our food order) and the Raven was so damn good – a dark, smoky, delicious black IPA with a lingering hop-bite – that I couldn’t resist a second. And that pretty much set the tone for the session…

Our food arrived just as we’d both gotten a pint of Marble Chocolate in and we feasted on char-grilled belly pork and black pudding (actually, the best damn black pudding I’ve ever tasted) with duck’s egg for starters, followed by sea bass served with creamed crab meat and spinach for Jo and turbot poached in red wine on creamed polenta with salsify sticks for me, and some lightly steamed greens on the side. Fantastic food, as always in the Marble Arch – we’ve eaten there a few times now and have never been anything less than blown away by whatever we’ve ordered – and it all went extremely well with the rich, tasty Marble Chocolate. Perhaps a dark ale or stout might not the obvious choice for a with-food beer, but the bitter-sweetness of the chocolate and roasted malts were very complimentary indeed to the satisfyingly meaty, beautifully cooked fish dishes.

After dinner we ordered dessert: another Marble Chocolate for Jo, whilst I decided to try a pint of Marble Brew 14. This one was a completely new to me (although apparently it went down rather well on the first #twissup pub crawl / blogger outing in Sheffield back in January. Brew 14 turned out to be a feisty session bitter that was all about the bitter oranges and big hops with a long, dry finish. Very, very good indeed and one I’d definitely have again.

At this point, Jo and I were thinking about winding down and heading home, so I opted for a quick half of Marble Dobber for the road. But of course, one half of Dobber is never enough and as I was heading back to the bar for another top-up, I spotted a new pump clip nestled among the array of Marbles: Thornbridge St Petersburg! I’ve been trying to track down and try this 7.7% ABV Imperial Stout for a while now, so this was just too good an opportunity to miss. And it was delicious: rich, smoky malt, chocolate and coffee, blended to perfection. A top-up of that one was absolutely compulsory, it would have been the very height of rudeness not to.

That really did finish the evening off for us and we weaved our way out the door to find a tram and head home for a nice cup of tea and a kip. Lovely, lovely evening and a fuzzy, fuzzy head the next day, but absolutely, totally worth it. I tell you what, it’s a good job we don’t live just round the corner from the Marble Arch, we’d never be out of the place.

The Saturday before last, after starting the evening off with a curry and a couple of bottles of Black Sheep Ale at our favourite curry house (the Lime Tree in Prestwich), we (Jo, myself and our friends Andy and Dawn) headed up to Bury to visit the Trackside (we were there just before Tyson, by the sound of things).

Talk about a tricky decision when I got to the bar. The Trackside is usually a good bet for a dark beer or two, but last Saturday there was a choice of four, plus assorted bitters and pale ales. I started off (possibly a little rashly) with a pint of Acorn Gorlovka Imperial Stout; a gorgeous, coffee-rich, smoky stout that weighs in at a session-hefty 6% ABV. I sampled this one a few weeks ago at the Marble Arch, in a more cautious half measure. Possibly I should have saved that one for later and stuck to the halves as well, but I think I must have had a rush of blood to the head and besides, the night was still (fairly) young. That one went down very nicely indeed (although probably far faster than it should have) and so it was back to the bar, this time for a swift half of Rossendale Pitch Porter. Not quite as robust as the Gorlovka, although still a respectable 5% ABV, it was another very pleasant roast-malt experience and definitely one I’d be happy to repeat.

After that I made my first tactical error of the evening: instead of joining Jo on the Dunham Dark – a smooth, slightly sweet mild with a light touch and only 3.8%% ABV, I instead opted for a bottle of Robinson’s Chocolate Tom that I spotted in the fridge. I’ve tried both the Old Tom and Ginger Tom before, and I’d always promised myself I’d have a go at the Chocolate version, after Ed gave it a write-up a while back. This was clearly the opportunity I’d been waiting for, so I went for it. Bad move. I’m not sure whether it was because the bottle had been chilled, or the beer was too young, but in any case it was far, far too sweet for even my sweet tooth to enjoy. If Marble Chocolate is Green & Black’s in a glass then this was Dairy Milk by comparison and I’m afraid there was little else to notice or to recommend it. If I ever see a bottle on sale I might grab it and put it away for a while to see if it ages at all well, but I’ll be definitely steering clear of drinking it out of a fridge again.

My second tactical error of the night involved sending Andy to the bar for a half of Dunham Milk Stout. I should have known better: Andy doesn’t really do beer by demi-measures and came back to the table with a large half (two halves in a single glass, if you catch my drift). Which was a bit of a shame, because I’d already sampled some when Jo got a half in an earlier round and whilst I was interested enough to give it a decent go, I didn’t really want to invest in a full draught. It was… okay. Considering Dunham’s beers usually rate ‘damned good’ to ‘excellent’, I was a bit surprised at how ordinary this one tasted. A bit thin, nothing in the way of defining characteristics or stand-out flavours. I’m no milk stout expert, I admit, so maybe it’s actually a cracking example of the style, but if you ask me their Dunham Porter and Dunham Stout are much, much better. By this stage Andy was back on the bitter instead of the stouts and I had a glug of whatever he was drinking (it might have been Dark Star Sunburst, that rings a bell) and very tasty it was, too. Ah, well.

So, there you go: another great selection of beers at the Trackside, which is pretty much par for the course for those guys. We’ll be back, and it won’t be too long before we are, either.

Brewery: Robinson’s
Location: Stockport, England
ABV: 6.0%
Version: 330ml bottle
Source: The Vineyard, Belfast

Darren’s already covered the other tom cat themed beers from Robinson’s,  Old Tom and Ginger Tom, so it’s only fair to move on to Chocolate Tom. This one is basically Old Tom with added chocolate. In more detail it’s Old Tom embellished with the finest cocoa and a touch of vanilla, all blended to an original recipe made in conjunction with renowned chocolatier Simon Dunn.

The beer is a rich dark copper colour, with a very pleasant, and completely expected, smooth chocolate aroma with some underlying fruit notes, much like sticking your nose in a newly opened box of choccies, but at no point does it become overpowering. The subsequent taste was actually surprisingly subtle. The chocolate doesn’t dominate, letting some apricot fruitiness push through, and the alcohol isn’t at all noticable. In fact I didn’t think it tasted very beery at all. A nicely balanced recipe, well made and certainly worth trying but it’s not one to feature on my “buy when see” list.

Brewery: Daleside
Location: Harrogate, England
ABV: 4.0%
Version: Bottled
Source: The Vineyard, Belfast

Daleside Chocolate Stout is a beer with a big flavour that belies its slight strength. Pouring a completely opaque black with a frothy tan-coloured head, this one didn’t have much of an aroma, but it more than made up for it in the flavour department. Lots and lots of chocolate and faint coffee notes, with just a possible hint of tangy raspberries in there somewhere, all delivered via a lovely, smooth mouth-feel.

Quite delicious and, whilst not quite as characterful as, say, Meantime London Stout, or as intense as Meantime Chocolate, this would still be one that I’d definitely be interested in drinking again.

Having said that, this is the last of the bottles I picked up in the Vineyard off-license in Belfast back in August and they don’t do mail-order, so I’ll have to look for an alternate source if I do want to get this one again. Either that or a trip over Harrogate way might be in order, see if I can find the stuff on draught.

Brewery: Meantime Brewing Company
Location: Greenwich, London
ABV: 6.5%
Version: 330ml bottle
Source: The Vineyard, Belfast

Another dinky-sized bottle from The Vineyard, and another very fine beer indeed from Meantime. A dark ale this time, rather than a stout or porter, although my initial impression was that it was quite similar to the Coffee Porter that I’d sampled not long before.

The beer poured a rich, dark black-brown with a thin head and a faint effervescence. It seemed quite sour on first taste (although in an entirely enjoyable, green-apple way, I hasten to add) but then it followed up with a huge hit of sweetness that was almost cloying in its intensity. Judging by the blurb on the Meantime website they’re selling this one as a “dessert beer”, although I think it might actually go better with cheese and biscuits, to help take the edge off some of those sugars.

The chocolate elements seemed to be more distinct in the aroma than the flavour, although there was a definite mocha characteristic. Definitely much more Green & Black’s 80% cocoa than Cadbury’s Dairy Milk though, which is entirely right and proper if you ask me. I’m not sure that Meantime Chocolate is one I’d go for on a regular basis, especially given the rest of the Meantime range to choose from, but I’m very glad I tried it.