You sometimes find great beer in the most surprising places.

A couple of weeks ago, Jo and I went out to a 40th birthday meal for one of her colleagues, which was held at Eden on Canal Street, in the heart of Manchester’s Gay Village. I did my research and checked out the Eden website beforehand, but when I clicked on the ‘Drink’ tab, it just linked through to a short wine list, so as a result I had rather low beverage-expectations of the place: a couple of lagers maybe, the usual sort of ‘wine bar’ offering, I assumed. So plan ‘A’ was: get in, do the sociable thing, then get out as soon as politely feasible and go find a decent pub.

Which is why I was also particularly keen to get into town and get to a decent pub before we hit the restaurant. As luck would have it we caught an Altrincham service, which meant that The Bank on Moseley Street was a much closer prospect than the Bull’s Head up in Piccadilly. There I encountered the first Good Thing of the night: draught Thornbridge Jaipur. Beautifully kept it was and as good as I’ve ever found it, and so, suitably fortified against the rest of the evening’s anticipated disappointments, I let Jo drag me off to Eden.

On arrival, I went straight over to the bar and yes, as I’d predicted, there was just a couple of generic lager pumps on show (not even a creamflow bitter). But then, more in hope than anticipation, I glanced at the fridge behind the bar… and that’s when I spotted, nestled snugly in amongst the fruit juices and other chilled stuff I wouldn’t normally give a second glance to, a veritable cornucopia of quite fantastic-looking Australian imports. Result!

First up was Cooper’s Best Extra Stout; a delicious moccacino monster of a sipping beer that weighed in at a respectable 5.9% ABV that (particularly after a Jaipur) set me up quite nicely for the rest of the evening, thank you very much.

Next: a beer that has been unreservedly recommended to me on more than one occasion by @thenashmeister (another Darren, this one an Australian mate of mine from work): James Boag‘s Premium Lager; a rich, malty brew that’s low on gassiness, high on flavour and about as far from the usual UK mass-produced and massacred version of Aussie lager as you could hope to get without moving to the Antipodes.

And then came Little Creatures Pale Ale. Easily the (post-Jaipur) Beer of the Night; extremely well-balanced, light, sweet and malty in the main part, but delivering a delightfully hoppy after-bite to the back of the throat as well. Very, very good indeed, which is why I had another one of those (by this point we were well into plan ‘B’ and besides, I was in a round with and chatting away to a top bloke who turned out to be an ex-Royal Marine, so I wasn’t going to argue when he suggested we have another, was I?), although as a result I missed out a beer from James Squires, as well as another couple of interesting looking Aussies… but they were just going to have to wait for another session.

For alas, by that stage we’d all finished eating (the food was excellent as well, btw, especially as they were catering for quite a large group at the time) and the birthday girl had hit on the notion to head across to O’Shea’s Irish Bar, where the only remotely decent beer they had was Guinness Original. On reflection, I probably shouldn’t have had three pints of that stuff to round off the evening. I blame the live music; singing along always gives me a thirst.

So there you go: great beer in a most surprising place. And I’ve learned my lesson. From now on, I’ll always check the beer fridge behind the bar, whatever the taps on top may be dispensing. Always.

Go on then, what’s the most surprising place that you’ve discovered great beer? Comment away!

Brewery: Little Creatures
Location: Fremantle, Australia
ABV: 5.2%
Version: 330ml bottle
Source: The Vineyard, Belfast

My experience of Australian beer is very limited. Very little of it makes it way over here, no doubt due to the high transportation costs that the majority of breweries just can’t financially stretch to and still make the beer affordable. Other than cans of Fosters lager piled up in supermarkets, the only other stuff I’ve seen here is two or three from Coopers and this one from Little Creatures.

I’ll let the brewery themselves describe their Pale Ale -

“Bag loads of whole Chinook and Cascade hop flowers that we source from Washington and Oregon in the US as well as some local flowers from Tasmania are thrown at this beer, creating an intense citrus and grapefruit aroma and flavour that we balance with a careful selection of specialty malts and a local pale malt made to our own specifications.

“Preservative and additive free our Pale Ale is live-yeast conditioned in bottles and kegs for unmatched freshness and character.

“From brewing to release, a batch of pale ale takes about six weeks, allowing for two weeks conditioning in the bottle after packaging.”

Little Creatures Pale Ale is golden in colour, with a light amber tint. The smell is lovely, light and hoppy with grapefruit and lemon citrus notes, and bodes well for the tasting. And it doesn’t disappoint with that either. First up is some citrus, quite restrained initally but it quickly develops as the grapefruit pushes through to the fore, with some lemon, orange and a hint of apricot adding some extra depth. Mouthfeel seems a bit thin at the start but it soon livens up, before giving way to a slightly dry finish.

Overall, this a lovely zesty ale, one for hop lovers, and ideal refreshment on a warm summer’s day. Just make sure you pick up a few, those little bottles don’t last long, which is exactly what I do anytime I see it.