In a fit of what appears to be sheer optimism (judging by the forecast for the weekend, at least), The Independent ran an article on Monday that featured Roger Protz’s ‘Ten Best Summer Beers’:

• Adnams East Green
• Fuller’s Organic Honey Dew
• Meantime IPA
• Shepherd Neame Whitstable Bay
• Budweiser Budvar
• Duvel
• St Austell Clouded Yellow
• Young’s Kew Gold
• Brakspear Oxford Gold
• Goose Island IPA

I posted tasting notes on the Adnams East Green yesterday and the Kew Gold back at the end of June. I’ve got the Fuller’s Organic Honey Dew lined up next. Tried the Whitstable Bay and Oxford Gold a while back, but I’d need to re-visit before I could comment.

As for the others: Budvar is one of the better-flavoured commercial lagers out there, the Meantime IPA is on sale in our local Tesco’s and Duvel is available pretty much anywhere, so shouldn’t be too hard to track down. The Clouded Yellow I can’t drink (it’s a wheat beer and I have an Intolerance, or an allergy, or something – whatever, wheat is evil and makes me feel like crap after consuming it) and Goose Island is apparently only available in cases of 24 from T’Internets. Hmm.

Brewery: 3Rivers
Origin: Stockport, England
ABV: 4.2%
Version: 500ml bottle
Source: Tesco

The two major chain supermarkets in our neck of the woods used to be pretty similar in terms of their range of beers. Then the local Tesco pretty much trashed their real ale section in favour of expanding its range of fizzy lagers. At roughly the same time, the local Sainsburys underwent a refit in which its real ale section roughly quadrupled in size. Guess where I do the weekly shop these days…

Having said that, though, I still have to remember to check the depleted and shell-shocked shelves in the former megamart from time to time, because very occasionally they’ll surprise me. Which is what happened a couple of weekends ago, when I found a single, lonely bottle of a new (to me) beer produced by local brewery: 3Rivers (of Stockport).

I can’t remember whether their Manchester IPA is bottle-conditioned or not – because I’ve recycled the bottle already and the 3Rivers website is in an interim rebuild phase at the moment, so I can’t double-check… oh darn, sounds like I’m going to have to sample it again – but I did make notes.

And I do distinctly remember that the overwhelming characteristic of this one was dark chocolate, both in the bottle-aroma and the flavour. I also noted that the beer was a smooth drinker with a pleasant bitterness and lingering coffee flavours. All of which sounds quite favourable to me and definitely worth a second outing.

Checking on ratebeer.com it seems that most of the reviews aren’t hugely favourable, but from what I gather 3Rivers is still a young brewery, so they have plenty of room to improve and I was impressed enough to want to keep an eye out for a draught version to sample. Maybe a trip down to Stockport might be in order, one of these weekends.

This Saturday’s Independent Magazine carried an advert / feature placed by CAMRA, suggesting a selection of bottled ales and bitters that can be “served refreshingly cool… the perfect tipple to accompany summer barbecues at home or the pub.” 10 to 14 degrees celsius, ideally…

And the seven cool-ones of choice are:

• Wychwood Hobgoblin
• Fuller’s London Pride
• Caledonian Deuchars IPA
• Brakspear Brakspear Bitter
• Brains SA
• Sharp’s Doom Bar
• Greene King Greene King IPA

I can vouch for Hobgoblin, Deuchars IPA and Greene King IPA – all very nice indeed at cellar temperatures – although I wasn’t all that impressed when I tried a draught pint of Brakspear Bitter a couple of weeks ago (mind you, it was mid-session when I was on something much stronger and heavier, so maybe that wasn’t the best time to try it).

The last three are now on my ‘to try’ list. We’ve just had a brick barbecue built in the back garden (which could explain the recent spate of crap weather) so hopefully I’ll be able to get a few in for the first time we fire it up…