Molson Coors still behind Doom Bar

Had the pleasure of meeting the new Scottish team at Molson Coors last night at The Blythswood in Glasgow as they unveiled some research into the Scottish beer market (almost exclusively looking at the on-trade) and rounded it off with a beer and food matching event.
The company's beer portfolio is extensive, in terms of brands it owns and brands it distributes and markets in the UK through various partnerships but of most interest to me is not the raft of big name lagers (Singha, Grolsch, Cobra, Corona etc) but the more flavoursome drops like Blue Moon and Doom Bar.
Distribution for Blue Moon is getting better and better north of the border, certainly in the on trade, and it's quite easy to find a pint in Glasgow's west end for example. Doom Bar is another story, with its heartland being in its native south west of England, though it won't take you too long to find a pub selling it in London these days either.
A tiny bit disappointingly, Molson Coors Scotland MD Phil Whitehead told me that Doom Bar won't be making its way to Scotland any time soon - but only because the brewery is already toiling to keep pace with demand. A fairly chunky recent investment should improve that situation and, having previously expressed concern in this blog about the future of Doom Bar post-acquisition [Doom Bar beached?], it's great news to see that all of that investment was actually made at the original brewery in Rock in Cornwall, and Whitehead told me they've no plans to move brewing of the beer anywhere else.
The amount of interest in non-lagers and more interesting light beers is quite encouraging though - a focus shared to a certain extent by SAB Miller - so maybe the market is shifting a little.
I remain convinced that 'craft beer' is something that marketers can sell to younger drinkers in a way they never could with 'real ale' with its chronic image problem and the obdurate reluctance of those looking after its wellbeing to adapt in any way to the world they find themselves in. You really have to worry for CAMRA sometimes.
Other than that I got to try the three Animee beers aimed at women drinkers - I'm not convinced that women are interested in things marketed 'for women', but we'll see - and found them not at all to my taste. Overpowering and sweet and oddly labelled, but then I'm not a woman so what would I know?
The beer and food matching was hit and miss, as these things often are - but that's as true of wine as it is of beer.  Doom Bar and some ice creamy pastry dessert thing worked well enough, Grolsch and mature cheddar and blue cheese categorically didn't. I get the 'crispness cutting through the fatty, oiliness of the cheese' principle, but no. Just no. Oddly enough, to my taste the Doom Bar went far better with the cheddar - but I suspect the Doom Bar would have gone better with most of the food served.
For whatever it's worth, the new team at Molson Coors seem like a good bunch and it'll be good to see them get a bit more of a sweat going in the Scottish market. They've still got their work cut out up here with Carling though. Good luck with that, guys.

Stumbling across Oslo's only microbrewery

Great pub, even better beer - shame about the barman.

It's been a few years since I've been in Oslo but I've always had a real soft spot for it so it was great to spend a few days over there a week or so ago - even if the trip was booked just a couple of days before the various atrocities. Thankfully the unique atmosphere that Oslo has doesn't seem to have been too badly affected.
While I was there I stumbled across Oslo's only microbrewery. I didn't know it was Oslo's only microbrewery at the time - only discovered that after a bit of online research later that day. But it was a cracking little gem to discover and I lost a lovely little hour with a dark, malty, liquoricey, sweetish porter that was made on the promises, literally at the end of the bar. A little glassed-off high tech very microbrewery with a couple of pristine stainless steel tanks - you can just about see them in the pic. Oddly, the barman showed absolutely zero interest in encouraging my interest in his brewery. "So you actually brew all your beers right here then?"
"Yes".
"How many do do you brew?"
"These ones" he says, pointing to the founts on the bar then walking away to read his paper.
OK, fair enough - maybe he's just the barman and has no interest in beer or customers. Maybe time for a new job? Shame, because it is not too far away from my (admittedly old school) idea of the perfect pub. Lots of wood, horseshoe shaped bar, no gimmicks, free newspapers to read and moderately full of people drinking quietly, thoughtfully and everyone in the room reading something and busy just being. My kind of pub. And what's more, not a light coloured beer on show.
Anyway, managed to deduce from my barman's helpful wave of the arm that they do a porter (delicious!), an IPA, an Imperial stout and a pilsner-style beer. Unfortunately I didn't manage to get back and work my way round the portfolio. Always good to leave something to do next time, though...

http://omb.no/index.php

Tasting notes: Hopping Hare

Working on the premise that no excuse is too thin to drink beer on a school night, a new label seems as good a reason as any to crack open a bottle of Badger Hopping Hare, especially as the PR company for Dorset brewers Hall & Woodhouse were kind enough to send me a few sample bottles. To be fair to Hall & Woodhouse (and the BrandOpus design agency they used) the new labels do look rather nifty. Traditional yet modern was the brief, I'd guess, and they've succeeded. I know there are a lot of sandals and socks traditionalists out there that think that flash labels and high spec printing is not in the spirit of real ale, but I have to say I think that's a lot of bollocks. There are a lot of great ales out there and customers have more choice than they've ever had - which is great for all concerned - but not everyone that walks into a store is a beer anorak with a tick list in a grubby notepad in their paw. Lots of them will try beers simply on the strength of the label and let's be honest, we've all done it.

There's also the small consideration that Badger Ales have long done well in the supermarkets (boo, hiss) where a decent looking label is a pre-requisite for a listing. Good luck them too because I'd far rather be able to buy a bottle of Hopping Hare out of Sainsbury's than be reduced to a four-pack of Carling and a free t-shirt.
Anyway, onto the beer, which is 'thrice hopped' using Goldings, Cascade and First Gold hops...

TASTING NOTES, AFTER A FASHION:
Badger Hopping Hare, Hall & Woodhouse, golden ale, 4.4%, gifted
Lemony gold in the glass with a not much of a head going on, it has an interesting and difficult to pin down aroma. Faintly floral with a some citrus fruit, some grassy hop resins and maybe even a biscuity hint. Not surprisingly, it kicks off with a big hoppy assault in the mouth, bitter and crisp but with a surprising amount of underlying sweetness. More lemony fruit and some spicy notes round off a proper mouthful. A little greasy (or perhaps oily is a better word), if I'm being hyper critical but enough body to carry it all off and a good, firm hoppy finish with some floral notes. Not a bad drop at all.
Score: 3/5

http://www.hall-woodhouse.co.uk/

Arran set for expansion?

Great to see Arran Brewery in the midst of raising a chunk of money (£1.6m to be precise) to fund an expansion that will allow them bring the bottling of their beers back up north (they're currently bottled by Marston's in Burton on Trent). Check out this article in the Herald for more info.

New brewery, new brews...

Happened to stumble across a brewery that's apparently new. It's definitely new to me but that doesn't necessarily mean it's new to the world of course. Website's not very helpful as yet - http://www.pantherbrewery.co.uk/ - but seems to have three brews worthy of a nosy.

Tasting notes: secret threesome Tryst

Desktop printer labels outside. Top notch beer inside.

Having recently discovered The Lade Inn's fantastic online Scottish Real Ale Shop I succumbed to the urge one night last week of ordering a mixed case after discovering Tryst Brewery's legendary Carron Oat Stout on the site. (Oatmeal stout is right up my street, you see. There's not enough of it in the world.). Having stuck 4 bottles in the mixed case I decided to fill the other 8 gaps in the case with a selection of more or less randomly chosen ales from Tryst. A brewery at a time is a good way to work your way round Scotland, I reckon. Needless to say, when the case arrived a few days later I had completely forgotten what I'd ordered so it was like Christmas morning when I opened it up. (Full marks to the guys at The Lade for prompt delivery and for clever use of a couple of old copies of The Daily Record and lots of bubble wrap. No casualties at the hands of the courier, I'm pleased to report.)
And now, a week later, I've had a punt at every beer in the case and it's safe to say I'll be back with a new order soon. Every beer is chock full of character with not a dull one among them. They're not all to my taste, which is fair enough, but every one is a wee journey in itself. The labels on the bottles are frankly awful, even by bottled real ale standards, but in its own curious way that only seems to magnify the appeal of what's inside - and at the end of the day that's all that really matters, right?
Tryst Brewery came to life in the early 1990s when John McGarva bought the remnants of the now defunct Berkley Brewery in Manchester and shifted the brewing kit (10 barrel gas-fired boiler, hot liquor tank, 2 fermenting vessels, conditioning tanks, pump and "loads of pipe work") and shifted it up to Larbert, near Falkirk. Since then, the brewery has grown and gathered gongs along the way for its hand made, lovingly turned out ales and for this session I was looking at a couple of them: Carronade Pale Ale, a 4.2% offering made with Washington state hops (the brewery has an interest in more unusual hops), and Drovers 80/-, made to a traditional Scottish 80/- recipe. Both are bottle conditioned.

TASTING NOTES, AFTER A FASHION:
Carronade Pale Ale, Tryst Brewery, pale ale, 4.2%, Scottish Real Ale Shop
An unusual, soft yellowy gold in the glass, it has just the slightest yeast haze and a head of very dense and small bubbles. On the nose it gives off the loveliest reek of soft lemon and lemon-flavoured boiled sweets, possibly even honey and lemon Lockets, which sounds bad but isn't at all - quite the opposite in fact. It's all very gentle and rounded, characteristics that are carried into the taste. Lemon citrus with honey notes again and an underlying hoppiness not quite getting through as well as it might have. The lemon flavours are maybe short of some crispness and bite that would have really lifted the whole bundle, but that's just my taste. The finish is more of the same: lots of soft, lemony loveliness but not enough bite for my taste and kind of tapering into nothing a bit too quickly.
Score: 3/5

Drovers 80/-, Tryst Brewery, heavy ale, 4.0%, Scottish Real Ale Shop
A classic example of the style known in Scotland as heavy, this 80/- pours a lovely dark, nutty brown, rich and silky. Drinking chocolate and molasses and toasty malt on the nose - utterly lovely. Once you get a mouthful, it's off in another direction. Plenty of sweet maltiness, yes, but the almost overwhelming sweetness on the nose is gone and you're left with a rich, deep, multi-layered delight bouncing between more bitter dark chocolate, some coffeee, a bit of orange and maybe some toasted nuts. It's quite light in the mouth at 4% so this plethora of potentially overpowering flavours just ends up filling your tastebuds with really well-balanced flavours. The finish sees an initial hop burst that than fades up against the stramash of flavours before tapering off slowly and leaving a lingering glow. My only very slight issue was a lack of tightness and shape in the finish but this ale is what an 80/- is all about for me.
Score: 4/5

http://www.trystbrewery.co.uk/

Keeping it local

While 'local sourcing' might be the buzzword of the minute for everyone from global lager giants to national supermarkets, the real ale brewing industry has always had locally-sourced product at the heart of what it's all about. OK, a chunk of hops might be flown in from Eastern Europe and further afield but most of the barley and all of the water is locally sourced - and it's maybe something that small brewers should be making more fuss of when talking to consumers.
So it's great to see some small brewers across the country working a bit harder to a) source more barley locally and b) let the world know.

St Austell head brewer Roger Ryman (2nd left) in a
field of Maris Otter. With some farmers.

The biggest brewer in Cornwall, for example (St Austell) has announced that it intends to increase its use of Cornish sourced Maris Otter barley from 20% in 2009 to 60% by the end of this year (representing about 1,000 tonnes of the stuff). Up near Kidderminster, Hobson's Brewery contracts with a collective of 12 local farmers with the area given over to Maris Otter rocketing from 40 acres in 2008 to 90 in 2009. This year they are looking at 300 acres, all within 10 miles of the brewery. And being in prime hop-growing country, the brewery also sources hops locally.

What's not to like about lovingly crafted beer, made by people who care about the quality of their produce using ingredients sourced from within a few miles of the brewery? And this is the way it's always been done, not simply because local sourcing is now trendy.

Down among the big boys

Chuffed to see Fyne Ales scoop a design gong last night for the redesign of their range on a shoestring budget, if you call almost £7,000 a shoestring. The microbrewery picked up a Gold award at the Design Business Association's Design Effectiveness Awards for producing a design that was "more commercially effective" than that produced by a host of big household name brands. Always good to see the little guys sticking it up the big guys. Fyne Ales boss Jamie Delap says the redesign (by Glasgow agency Good Creative) of the bottle labels was a major factor behind driving an almost 50% growth in sales last year to over £820,000. They've now got listings for their filtered bottled ales in the likes of Waitrose and Oddbins while they're selling the cask stuff in Wetherspoons now too.

Brewing up a storm

You've really got to hand it to those pesky critters at BrewDog - they reach the parts that other beer companies dare not reach.

Take this latest pop at the mainstream lager boys, issued with a press release just this very day....

There's a lot of work gone into producing that visual, too.
Theirs must be the busiest legal department in the craft brewing industry, I reckon.

Having said that, they do make some rip-snorting beers - including the Punk IPA taking centre stage here, which in true BrewDog wave-creating style you can now get in cans...

CAMRA's top battle cruiser

Unlikely as it seems, CAMRA is celebrating its 40th anniversary by naming a London pub as its National Pub of the Year, the first time a pub from the capital has ever bagged that particular gong. The Harp in Covent Garden is apparently one of those old style pubs that go down well with real ale drinkers - me included - so no intrusive music or TV and a good selection of beers including milds, porters, local ales and even one or two craft ciders and perries. (Is 'perries' the plural of perry? Doesn't look right...)
If you fancy a nosy, The Harp is at 47 Chandos Place.
Can hardly wait to see how all those sandals and cardigans are going to go down in trendy Covent Garden now that the secret's out...

My local....

Nothing like a few decent beers to chose from at your local. And unfortunately this picture does not show my local. It's actually SIBA's craft beer bonanza held in Nottingham this week bringing together a frankly staggering collection of cask, bottled and keg beers from its member brewers.
That includes 50 keg beers and 56 cask ales. Kiddie-in-a-sweet-shop material, that.
The 10 category winners and the Supreme Champion will be unveiled to a thirsty world at SIBA's Annual Conference in March in Stratford-on-Avon. 

Doom Bar beached?

Ok, it's a bit wanky and pointless to lament the passing of another independent brewery (and a beer I really like) into the hands of another global soul-less behemoth, but I'm going to do it anyway. Doom Bar is a lovely  beer, full of character and the reason why its sale last week deflated me so much is that, somewhat oddly, just a week or so before I had done the double of enjoying a pint of it on draught in the afternoon and a bottle of it later that same evening. (All of this took place In Frimley Green, west of London, watching darts for the first time in my life - which I can heartily recommend to anyone, incidentally - but that's another story...).

Sharp's Brewery, which makes Doom Bar, was only set up in 1994 and while you can't be too upset at the entirely understandable desire of the previous onwers to cash in, it's still just a wee bit sad to see the brewery acquired by brewing giant Molson Coors (UK).

Based at Rock in Cornwall, Sharp's was the  biggest cask beer in the South West and Doom Bar was the number one selling cask brand in the South West and Wales - and the fastest growing cask brand in Greater London, apparently.

Me and the population of the South West and Wales see Doom Bar as a lovingly-made drop of beer.  Molson Coors sees it as "a tremendous opportunity for growth in volume and distribution".
And it's not romantic idealism at work here. It's just my cold, hard contention that the folks at Sharp's make beer for a different reason from the guys at Molson Coors. Crudely you can sum that distinction up as love v money.  I can't see that the brewery will be allowed to carry on exactly as was. I might be wrong, but I doubt it.
Of course, that's what Coors is worried that lots of Doom Bar drinkers will think. Hence the quote in the press release from Molson Coors UK Mark Hunter that he "respects and wants to preserve the unique culture of Sharp’s Brewery and the special appeal of their brands to beer drinkers.”  Not unsurprisingly, given that it will have been a condition of the sale, Sharp's MD Nick Baker, is equally positive (at least in the press release), stating: "It was, and is, important to us to know how Molson Coors will manage Sharp’s and their plan to invest in developing the brewery at Rock and the Doom Bar brand is spot on.”

But the thing is, once you've sold the business, you don't typically get much of a say in how it develops, no matter how 'important it is to you'.
I also suspect that Molson Coors won't want to advertise the fact that they've bought Doom Bar to Doom Bar drinkers, which tells you something.
All we can hope is that the quality of the beer doesn't suffer from being part of a global business where profit is all. But I won't be holding my breath, and probably like a lot of other beer drinkers, I might be less inclined to plump for a Doom Bar in future now that its heart is no longer in the same place.

Stella's Cider satire

Cider is clearly not an appropriate topic for a blog named BeerBelly but you've got to check out beer blogger extraordinaire Pete Brown's fictitious interview with Stella Artois about the launch of Stella Cidre...

A work of minor genius: http://petebrown.blogspot.com/2011/02/some-cheap-shots-and-infantile-musings.html.

Accordiing to Pete, the genuine interview that AB-Inbev's UK boss Stuart MacFarlane gave later was even more hilarious...

Tasting Notes: double droppers

Butterscotch: that's the most intriguing word you see attached to most discussions of the age-old 'double drop' fermenting system. According to the received wisdom, butterscotch notes are what you get get when you allow the wort to ferment in one tank for 16 to 24 hours before dropping it, quite literally, from one fermentation vessel down to another below, making use of the marvellous properties of gravity. The beer then spends another day or two in the second fermenter and the result is double dropped beer. By doing so you achieve a couple of things: you lose some of the yeast (the stuff that settled at the bottom of the top tank) and you add a lot of oxygen into the mix - and it's this oxidised diacetyl in the beer that gives the distinctive butterscotch flavours.
Double drop brewing is a very old and traditonal method but has largely been abandoned, no doubt at least partly to avoid the extra costs that come with two sets of fermentation vessels instead of just one. Back in the early 20th century it was the most popular method of clearing English ales but them days are long gone.
A few breweries persist in the practice however, or something similar to it, including Brakspear and Marston's, whose ales are on the menu this outing: Brakspear Bitter and Marston's Double Drop.
Technically, Marston's use the famed 'Burton Union' system, a very particular version of double drop brewing based on a mammoth network of interlinked Victorian kit including oak casks, pipes and troughs that's absolutely worth making time in your life to go and see. Think Willy Wonka on beer. An awe-inspiring bit of British eccentricity that makes you proud to drink beer.
And yes, I'm aware that Refresh UK (the company that produces the Brakspear range) is part of Marstons plc, the humungous outfit that produces a raft of ales in Burton Upon Trent and elsewhere, so we're really looking at two parts of the same company but the bulk of the kit (and the yeast strain) used to produce Brakspear's version is the original pre-Marston's-takeover kit and that's good enough for me.
[An abbreviated history of how that came about: in 2002 the Brakspear Brewing Company sells its Henley brewery site to a developer and sells the brewing kit to Refresh who break it down, move it to the Wychwood Brewery in Witney in Oxfordshire which it already owns, rebuilds it and normal service is resumed. Critically, they remember to take the Henley yeast strain with them and still to this day use the very same Maris Otter malts and Fuggles and Goldings hops. A fairly serious and not inexpensive attempt to retain authenticity. We like that.]
Interestingly, the science is very far from clear on the merits or otherwise of double drop brewing, but that's probably why it's such an endearingly madcap British concept. But how do the beers themselves stack up? Well, try as I might I couldn't find them darned butterscotch notes....

TASTING NOTES, AFTER A FASHION:
Marston's Double Drop, Marston Thompson & Evershed plc, bitter, 4% abv, Morrisons, £1.75
A straw gold with a short-lived head, it's nice and clear and bright, though several degrees lighter and a good deal less pretty in the glass than the Brakspear offering. The most noticeable aspect of the nose is how dry it comes across. A little malt discernible if you sniff hard and a lot more hops but the dryness is aggressive and comes in big waves after you give the glass a good swirl. Maybe a touch of creaminess? In the mouth it's lots more hops with quite a fierce, dry bitterness. Some sweetness lurks underneath if you go in search of it. Feels quite light in the mouth, even for a 4% ale. The finish is predictably dry but not a lot else going on. Not my bag, I'm afraid.
Score: 2.5 / 5

Brakspear Bitter, Brakspear Brewing Co, bitter, 3.4% abv, Morrisons, £1.75
Glorious, deep amber in the glass, Brakspear's double dropped ale is a beautiful, bright and lively beer that also gives your nose much more to work with. There's a lot more sweet maltiness in there with maybe some restrained Xmas cake notes - raisins and sultanas mainly. The dryness is still there but it's not quite as gobsmacking. Taste-wise, there's the most delicious, subtle sweetness up front with more sultana notes that slowly, teasingly give way to a very powerful dry bitterness, but one that works much more in harmony with the rest of the flavours present, rather than battering them into submission. The finish is similarly more balanced and less aggressive than in the Marston's and it slowly and happily tapers away to leave just a hint of hoppy, malty perfume on the breath. A really well created brew - and not the sort of thing that normally appeals to me - but a lovely beer with so much going on and lovely body, remarkable for a brew coming in at just 3.4% abv.
Score: 3.5 / 5

http://www.marstons.co.uk/brands/marstonsbeercompany.asp
http://www.brakspear.co.uk/our_beer/

Tasting notes: California Common - take two

Steam beer, or California Common as the style is officially known, has a fascinating history. It's often touted as America's only truly native beer style (though US beer geeks will throw Kentucky common and cream ale in your face - metaphorically if not literally - if you make that claim) and in basic terms it's really just an ale made using lager yeast but brewed at ale fermentation temperatures, which are higher. If you want to read the technical detail, this article gives you all you need and more: http://brewingtechniques.com/library/styles/2_1style.html.
The reason the style came about is almost certainly more through necessity than desire, which also explains why steam beer has historically been seen as somewhat agricultural, a rough drop for the blue collar boys after they'd worked up a thirst. Mid-19th century gold rush Californians wanted to brew beer but didn't have access to the ice or cold water they needed to brew at classic lager brewing temperatures (55 to 32 °F) so they did what all right-minded people would do and carried on regardless by brewing their beer at higher temperatures anyway. What's not to like about that bit of pragmatism?
Oddly, nobody knows for sure what the word 'steam' refers to, not even the Anchor Brewing Co that trademarked the name 'Steam Beer' in 1981. The Anchor company is interesting in its own right because it is widely credited with spawning the craft beer industry in America, having been bought by former dairy farms magnate and subsequent brewing guru Fritz Maytag in 1965, though he sold it last year to Keith Greggor and Tony Foglio, the guys behind Skyy Vodka.
It's worth noting of course that no recipes or even precise brewing method specifications exist for the original 18th century steam beer so Anchor's take on it, Anchor Steam Beer, is very much a modern one.
To contrast with this well established classic, we have fledgling Edinburgh brewer Knops Beer Company's version, somewhat confusingly entitled California Common, the 'official' name for the style, since Anchor have exclusive rights on the term steam beer. A really interesting company, Knops has only been on the go for a few years and only makes a couple of beers but both with a strong historic flavour to them. California Common is cuckoo-brewed at Traditional Scottish Ales in Stirling, or it was last time I checked.

TASTING NOTES AFTER A FASHION:
Anchor Steam, Anchor Brewing Co, california common, 4.8% abv, realale.com (gifted)
Pretty little amber beer in the glass with a lively if short-lived head. Florally notes on the nose with a bit of sweetness giving way to pronounced hops. In the mouth there's more to it than what you'd expect from a hybrid of a lager and a darker ale, but a lot of the nuances are very subtle. Malt and a nutty sweetness and some more floral notes are quickly swamped by a powerful, crisp hoppy bitterness. Finish is more of the same but lacks substance and depth for my taste although the subtly perfumed aftertaste it leaves behind is really rather delicate and special. For me, however, the idea and history behind the style is more intriguing than the ale itself, or this one at any rate.
Score: 2.5 / 5

California Common, Knops Beer Co, california common, 4.8% abv, Peckhams, £1.89.
Disconcertingly similar in the glass to Anchor's version, the two are virtually identical to the eye in terms of colour and head density and length - though an entirely different kettle of fish once you get closer. Gloriously malty and toasty on the nose with maybe a touch of dried fruit and perhaps a little spice on the nose, it's an explosion in the mouth and on the tongue. Far heavier and denser than Anchor Steam, it's much nearer the ale end of the spectrum than the lager end, though it retains a lagery crispness and dryness. More malty sweetness with big blasts of alcohol-soaked dried raisins, like my granny used to make at Christmas. But with the sweetness and fruitiness comes a steady layer of hops that balances the ale just perfectly, leading into a nice, full finish that leaves the loveliest glow in the mouth. Cracking drop.
Score: 4/5

http://www.anchorbrewing.com/
http://www.knopsbeer.co.uk/

Tasting notes: A Fyne old romance

Having once lived in Arrochar for 7 or 8 years, just around the corner from Loch Fyne, I have a long-standing soft spot for the fine brews concocted by Jonny and Tuggy Delap. Countless pints of Maverick and Piper's Gold in the Village Inn and even a wee guided tour or two of the brewery mean there is very little chance of an unbiased appraisal here. And that's one of the many lovely things I like about beer: the colourful tales that lie behind the brews. [If you ever do find yourself in Arrochar, do drop into the Village Inn - www.villageinnarrochar.co.uk/ - and if you need some company, nip next door (literally) to my mate Tom's pottery and studio - www.tombutcherceramics.co.uk/ - and if he's around, you couldn't find a better beer-loving guy to prop the bar up with. As a conversational starter for 10, ask him about his theory on why men's urinals in pubs are shaped the way they are...]
So, founded in 1991 in what used to be a milking parlour, the very first Fyne Ales commercial brew to see the light of day did so on St Andrews day that year. The core range now runs to 8 beers. The two I'm test driving here are Vital Spark, a 4.4% mild, and Holly Daze, a really rather dreadfully named 5% premium bitter. Both are new to me in (filtered) bottled format though I know Vital Spark well in its cask guise.

TASTING NOTES, AFTER A FASHION:
Holly Daze, Fyne Ales, premium bitter, 4.4% abv, Oddbins, £2.50
Trying my very best to ignore the punny name, the beer looks lovely in the glass, a nice dark amber just as it says on the label with enough fizz in it to keep it lively. The nose is all hops and citrus with the zestiness balanced nicely by the underlying malt. Sweetish, toasty malts arrive first in the mouth with caramel and then loads of hops, something you see in quite a few of Fyne Ales' beers. The finish is a big, crisp hoppy one with good length, well balanced throughout. Not the most complex beer I've ever tasted but a really refreshing, hoppy drop with nice straightforward likeable flavours and cracking balance start to finish.
Score: 4 / 5

Vital Spark, Fyne Ales, mild, 4.4% abv, Oddbins, £2.50
Having really looked forward to renewing my acquaintance with this ale, I was a little underwhelmed - though I'm unsure whether that was because I remember it in cask from the Village Inn, or whether it was following Holly Daze that really worked for me. A very dark brown with a red tinge in the glass, it poured well with a nice clean head. Rich, roasted malt on the nose with hints of what struck me unmistakably time and again as diesel. Yes, the stuff you run tractors and sales reps' Vauxhall Vectras on. In the mouth it was full of fruity malt with a lovely positive bitterness and maybe just a hint of coffee. Hops are in there but not in your face and the finish was likewise not overly hoppy with the hops coming and going. Good strong bitterness and wee citrus notes made the finish a highlight though. So all in all a tasty mild with pronounced bitterness and restrained hops - my gob remained unsmacked but Vital Spark on tap will always be spot on for a couple of pints after coming down off the hill. (And if you want to try that theory out, don't do The Cobbler like everyone else, try Beinn Narnain.)
Score: 3.5 / 5

http://www.fyneales.com/