Advent Calendar Window Two

Day Two and I'm already struggling. Honestly, how do people manage tasks like these? I found the time (just) to actually have the beer but had no time at all to write a post. So here it is a day late. I'm really struggling today and have had to take the day off work. I can't see me wanting to do day 3 later tonight, but I'll try to plough on.

Anyway, Day Two produced a beer from a brewery I've had nothing from before and know very little about. It's Stroud Brwery's Ding Dong - a 4.5% Organic Porter (although the website claims it's 4.2%.

A Porter that is thick and dark with a little frothy head. It smells initially of a sweet, yet weak, porter but you really have to get your nose in the glass to get a big waft of ginger and cloves. That was what I was hoping for. The taste comes at you in the same manner. An amateur could sip this and find nothing but a regular porter (I realise that sounds snobbish, let me continue) but one who tastes beer by practically chewing on the flavours gets that adorable hit of Christmas pot pourri, clove and cardamom. But you have to work for it. Supping this in the pub, I would scarcely feel the spice but having the time to search for I've discovered it hiding. Unfortunately the body is far too thin. When people say Christmas beer is just basic homebrew ale with a few spices shoved in, this may be the stereotype. It’s satisfyingly festive but compromising as a finish. Drinkable, but not outstanding.

Comments

"They Had Their Issues, So..."

There’s a set of garages to rent as storage units near my workplace. One of them is taken by a local florist that uses it to store flower arrangements for various events, that are more often than not funerals. As such, at least once a week at 8am I will pass a car being loaded up with flowers arranged into heart shaped patterns or the letters M U M. It is a grounding reminder that, as I mentally grumble my way through the upcoming arbitrary grievances of my ordinary working day, a group of family and friends locally is going through the hardest time. It provides much needed perspective on days when I could do with being reminded of all that I have to be thankful for. These little moments explain to me why it is possible for us to share a communal loss when a celebrity passes away. Grief is often a personal and lonely experience, shared between a minority of people in your life. When a co-worker loses a relative or friend, it has little affect on me, bar signing of

The Ten Pubs That Made Me - Part 3: Dr Okell's / My Foley's Tap House and Leeds

A pint in Mr Foley's Tap House from December 2022 This is Part 3 (the fourth post) of an ongoing project. Please see the beginning of Part 0 for details. Come the end of this journey, there may be a lesson in procrastination that I am unlikely to heed. These posts stem from a list that I made three years ago and a series that I embarked on 18 months ago. We’ve only now reached a 30% completion rate and with this post we are back to fail for the second time. This odyssey began with a trip to Mr Foley’s Tap House in February 2022 – named Dr Okell’s bar on my first visits in 2005 – only to discover that it was closed. It did reopen by the time that the post was coming out and I managed a brief visit in December 2022. However, my July 1 st 2023 trip to Leeds, on which this post is based, is met with this sign at the door of the bar: A quick check of social media shows an Instagram post from the day before (June 30 th ) announcing the closure of the

LIVERPOOL - the City that Craft Beer Forgot Part II (and found...)

After visiting Liverpool, one of my favourite cities, in February this year, and not impressing people with my rather hasty but honest verdict on the city’s lack of craft beer, I jumped at the chance to return last week and hoped to come out with a more attractive judgement. A couple of friends and I visited on a day out, with neither of them having been drinking in the city before. It was left to me – or rather, I volunteered – to plan the day’s itinerary and places to visit. I had a couple of new or unvisited places in mind myself, but knew it would be unfair to miss out on some of the city’s famous gems. With around 10-12 hours in which to fit in an entire city, I opted to concentrate on the famous Georgian Quarter and see if we had time for the Dale Street end later on. We planned to arrive in the city for around 11a.m. just in time to walk up Mount Pleasant to the new-on-me, though I believe it has been opened three years, Clove Hitch on Hope Street for breakfast.

Beer Compurgation

Search This Blog