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126. Drie Fonteinen Oude Geuze

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Threehundredbeers is a huge fan of Cask Pub & Kitchen in Pimlico. For five years, Cask has been at the forefront of the beer revolution that has been happening in London and beyond. It was the first branch in what became the Craft Beer Co. group, and it’s basically just a great pub.

So it’s a bit of a surprise that not one of the preceding 125 beers has been found there. Let’s put that right by spending a very pleasant Sunday afternoon working our way through the tap lineup and rummaging around in the remarkably well-stocked fridges.

This will do nicely.

Drie Fonteinen Oude Geuze at CASK Pub & Kitchen

That’s Drie Fonteinen Oude Geuze, from the tiny town of Beersel in Belgium, not far from Brussels. You know all about Geuze by now of course, thanks to our visit to Cantillon, and that cracking Boon Mariage Parfait Kriek we had more recently.

There are three Drie Fonteinen beers to track down, and the Oude Geuze is I guess the core of the range. It’s a blend of 1, 2 and 3-year-old barrel-aged Lambics, blended and refermented in the bottle, in this case for about a year and a half, to become a classic, sour, frothy Geuze.

Frothy enough to try to escape from the bottle before we’ve even paid for it, in fact. That stirs up the yeast a little, and so the Oude Geuze pours a handsome, hazy amber colour with a characteristic mountain of white foam that fades quickly.

The aroma is of big, mouth-watering citrus sourness, underpinned with subtle woody notes which I assume to be a result of all that time spent in barrels.

That carries through to the flavour, where the sour is of course front-and-centre, but perfectly balanced by generous mouthfuls of citrus fruit and those years of aging, leading to a thoroughly complex beer. There’s the dryest, longest finish that I can remember ever coming across on a beer.

As refreshing as it is, this is a beer that’s well worth taking your time over and savouring slowly to appreciate all those flavours.

Without wishing to get all philosophical, for me Geuze has become symbolic of the beer journey this ridiculous blog has taken me on. When I tried my first ever example, the Boon Geuze, I apparently didn’t much care for it. With a lot more experience under my belt, it has quickly become one of my very favourite styles.

Fortunately there are a few more to track down, and a glance behind the bar suggests Cask may able to help us out again in the near future.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Brouwerij 3 Fonteinen, Beersel, Belgium
Style: Lambic and Gueuze
Strength: 6.0% ABV
Found at: CASK Pub & Kitchen, Charlwood Street, London SW1V
Serving: 375ml bottle

125. Duckstein Original

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The last Alt beer that we came across—Diebels Alt—turned out to be a very pleasant surprise. I think that’s still the only example of this venerable German beer style that I’ve actually tried, so this one should be interesting.

Duckstein Original Cap Detail

Whilst Alt beers are more typically associated with the Düsseldorf area, Duckstein Original hails from Hamburg. Well, in truth this bottle comes from the internet, and I’ll admit I know almost entirely nothing more about the brewery. We’d better crack on and drink it.

Duckstein Original

There’s that warm chestnut colour again, and a smallish tan head. The aroma is dark and fruity, and unexpectedly reminiscent of a Belgian-style Trappist Dubbel such as La Trappe Dubbel.

That comes across in the flavour too. It’s lower in ABV though at 4.9%, and so a great deal more gluggable than a Dubbel, and very refreshing. It’s a great winter beer all the same, with that fruity warmth from the malts and slightly spicy notes from the subtle hops. There’s added complexity from the beer being matured over beechwood chips.

A very nice beer, all in all, and again it strikes me that it’s a real shame that you very rarely find this style of beer on tap in the UK. I think people would like it.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Duckstein, Hamburg, Germany
Style: Alt and Amber Beers
Strength: 4.9% ABV
Found at: Beers of Europe
Serving: 500ml bottle

124. Concertina Bengal Tiger

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The glamorous, jetsetting life of Threehundredbeers continues as we board a leaking, 30-year-old Pacer at Sheffield station with the feintly terrifying plan of spending a rainy Saturday afternoon at the Concertina Band Club, a rather earthy working men’s club in a former mining village somewhere in rural South Yorkshire.

The reason we’re here is Concertina Bengal Tiger. This is a highly-regarded, award winning IPA that very few have tried. It’s brewed in the tiny cellar here at The ‘Tina, and it’s pretty much impossible to find anywhere else. Even if you could find it elsewhere, it would be an injustice to the Threehundredbeers project and to both of my readers not to make my way to Mexborough and the beer’s source.

The Concertina Band Club, Mexborough

The club itself has seen better days, and initially feels a little intimidating to a southern softie. Yorkshire folks don’t do the red carpet treatment, but the welcome is warm enough. The club is no longer home to an actual concertina band, that once widespread northern phenomenon sadly having gone the same way as sparking clogs and Sheffield United winning the FA Cup, but judging by the trophies, it does still boast a fearsome ladies’ darts side.

Moreover, the beer is of exceptional quality, unreasonably cheap, and served in generous measures. I could get used to this.

Concertina Bengal Tiger

Would you look at that. The head, the colour, even the temperature is mouth-watering. That’s a beer in impeccable condition, and we’ve been served somewhat more than a pint for an unnecessarily reasonable £2.15.

And it’s lovely stuff too. Concertina Bengal Tiger is a beautiful golden colour with quite the finest white head I’ve seen on a beer in years.

I’m expecting a fairly traditional English-style IPA, with big fat malts and modest hop bitterness, but instead I’m hit full in the face by a giant handful of full-on citrus hops, much more in the modern, American style of IPA. I remember having much the same experience with another Yorkshire brew, the Kelham Island Pale Rider, so I wonder if that’s entirely a coincidence.

As an IPA, this one is significantly and pleasingly more bitter, but as expected that bitterness is happily underpinned by big, juicy, mouth-watering malts. There’s booze on the nose, and there’s a giant hamper of tropical fruit in there too, which surprisingly enough reminds me of a personal favourite, the classic Beavertown Gamma Ray.

There’s the tiniest, slightly acetic sour tang at the end, which initially seems out of place, but eventually is moreish enough to send you back to the bar for a second pint. It helps that the Bengal Tiger is served nice and cold here too. This is not your typical warm, flat brown beer.

Instead, Concertina Bengal Tiger is everything an IPA should be, and well worth the trek to Mexborough.

The Concertina Band Club is found at 9a Dolcliffe Road, Mexborough. Daytime opening hours were 1-5pm on the Saturday that I visited, but it may be wise to ring ahead on 01709 580 841. The club is a brief, uphill stroll from Mexborough station, itself an easy train ride from Sheffield, Rotherham or Doncaster. Whilst the establishment is technically a club, my own non-membership was not an issue, although I’m told CAMRA members are particularly welcome.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Concertina, Mexborough, South Yorkshire, England
Style: India Pale Ales
Strength: 4.6% ABV
Found at: The Concertina Band Club, Dolcliffe Road, Mexborough
Serving: Cask, pint

Some Thoughts on Discontinued Beers

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One of the challenges I’m going to have to tackle at some point is the fact that, in the years since The Book was originally written, a handful of the beers on the list have been discontinued and simply do not exist any more.

I haven’t rigorously researched every beer, but it does seem only to be a few. So far I’ve identified the following beers as discontinued, and have where possible confirmed with the relevant breweries that there are no plans to revive them:

  • Black Sheep Emmerdale Ale
  • Castle Rock Nottingham Gold
  • Castlemaine Carbine Stout
  • Gale’s Prize Old Ale
  • Hogs Back BSA
  • Ridley’s Witchfinder Porter

There may be others, and I’ll add them to the list if that proves to be the case.

So what to do about it. Well, I don’t want to rename the blog “Two Hundred and Ninety-four Beers”. Not just because it’s a bit of a mouthful either.

Instead, what I propose to do is swap in substitute beers of my own choosing. I’ll try to make them interesting, and broadly in the same style as the beers they replace. It’ll be a nice excuse to talk about beers that excite me, and perhaps cover some of the fantastic developments that have happened in the beer world since the book was written.

I’ll only do that where there’s clearly no hope. For example, I remain fairly confident that people out there will have bottles of Gale’s Prize Old Ale cellared away. If you do, and you want me to say nice things about you on the internet, do get in touch.

I also won’t substitute a beer just because it seems “a bit hard to find”. That defeats the object entirely.

So hopefully that seems like a reasonable approach. Comments on the matter are of course most welcome.

123. Maredsous Tripel

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Let’s continue a rather productive visit to Lowlander by following the Paulaner Salvator with something slightly stronger.

This is the Maredsous Tripel, an Abbey Beer from Belgium. To clear up any confusion, it was formerly known as Maredsous 10, which is how it appears in The Book. I notice it’s not explicitly listed on the menu at Lowlander, but ask nicely and the staff may just be able to conjur one up.

Maredsous Tripel at Lowlander, London

This is a beer that resides very much in the same category as previous Belgian-style Tripels that we’ve seen, such as the La Trappe Tripel and perhaps the archetype for the style, the Westmalle Tripel.

By way of a recap, Tripels tend to be blonde in colour, but stronger and hoppier than a typical Belgian Blonde. They stand in contrast to the darker, fruitier Dubbel style, for example La Trappe Dubbel.

And so there are no surprises when the Maredsous pours a rich, deep yellow colour, with some light, white froth on top. It looks and smells almost honeyish.

All the expected Tripel flavours are there: subtle dried bananas, Belgian yeast and fragrant hops. At 10% ABV it’s a big old beer, and the alcohol heat isn’t hidden by any means. It’s balanced out by that honey sweetness, though, and the result is a very pleasant beer.

It improves as it warms, as butterscotch notes appear and the hop bitterness becomes more apparent, though that alcohol burn never really goes away.

I appear to have written “better than Westmalle” in my scribbled tasting notes. That’s a bold claim, and it’s one I’ll have to selflessly research rigorously before committing myself to it fully.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Abbaye de Maredsous, Denée, Belgium
Style: Abbey Beers
Strength: 10.0% ABV
Found at: Lowlander Grand Café, Drury Lane, London WC2B
Serving: 330ml bottle

122. Paulaner Salvator

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Without doubt, Lowlander has been a valuable ally on this journey. I’ve found several beers there already, and we haven’t quite exhausted the impressive beer menu just yet.

While many of Lowlander’s beers tend to be Belgian or Dutch, this one from Munich in Germany has recently appeared on the menu. It’s a Bock, and while I still don’t fully understand what that is, I know it’s technically a lager, though nothing at all like the usual pale Eurofizz.

Paulaner Salvator at Lowlander, London

Paulaner Salvator is in fact a Doppelbock, so it weighs in at a quite respectable 7.9% ABV. I’m told that it’s brewed with wheat, though it doesn’t appear particularly cloudy. Instead it’s a warm, rich chestnut colour with the slightest trace of caramel froth on top.

It’s lovely stuff, being smooth and deep with unctuous toffee and butterscotch flavours and sultana-like fruit. There are spicy notes too, similar to those found in a rye IPA.

The full body and richness remind you that the beer was originally brewed by Franciscan monks to sustain themselves through the period of Lent, and only later sold to the public to raise funds for the monastery.

For its fairly hefty alcohol payload, it’s surprisingly easy drinking and slips down a treat. All in all, Paulaner Salvator is a very pleasant change from the usual, and a beer I’m sure I’ll be enjoying again before long.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Paulaner Brauerei, Munich, Germany
Style: Bocks
Strength: 7.9% ABV
Found at: Lowlander Grand Café, Drury Lane, London WC2B
Serving: 330ml bottle

121. Young’s London Gold

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A brief point of order before we begin. This one is listed in The Book as “Young’s Kew Gold”, a beer brewed to raise funds for the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. For whatever reason, that particular relationship ended, and the beer was renamed London Gold.

In a way, the new name is even more misleading, since Young’s haven’t brewed in London since 2006, and instead this one hails from Bedfordshire.

Young’s do still have a large number of pubs in London, though. Conveniently there’s one just minutes from the office: The Windmill in Mayfair. At a loose end for a lunch hour, and—in a scandalous dereliction of duty—not having blogged a single beer yet this month, let’s pick off one of the easier ones.

Young's London Gold

In terms of apppearance, this is very much your standard Golden Ale. It’s the expected gold colour with a minimal white head that at least means we’ve got something close to an actual pint.

I don’t remember any kind of aroma. Perhaps there wasn’t any to speak of because, to be polite, this beer does not overwhelm the palate with flavour. In fact the most prominent flavour in there is that of the water. Maybe if you really concentrate there’s the faintest hint of a microscopic amount of unexciting English hops. Maybe.

It’s in impeccable condition at the Windmill, as one would hope, but that doesn’t make it any more interesting. On the positive side, this is a very easy drinking, sessionable beer, but let’s diplomatically just say it’s far too subtle for my tastebuds to be able to appreciate it.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Wells and Young’s, Bedford, England
Style: Golden Ales
Strength: 4.0% ABV
Found at: The Windmill, Mill Street, London W1S
Serving: Cask, pint

120. Boon Mariage Parfait Kriek

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Oh BrewDog. You mischievous bunch of pseudo-anarchist yet ruthlessly commercially driven scamps. Stop winning me over by actually being really nice guys who genuinely know and care a great deal about good beer.

And stop tempting me back to spend all of my wages at your fancy new Clapham Junction bar with its magnificently cornucopial supply of rare and delicious beers, such as Boon Mariage Parfait Kriek.

Actually don’t stop: this would have been a difficult one to get hold of otherwise.

This is a very special sour Gueuze from Lembeek in Belgium, brewed with no less than 400g of overripe, sour cherries per litre of beer, and then aged in oak vats for many months before being expertly blended and then refermented in bottle for a minimum of two years.

Boon Mariage Parfait Kriek at BrewDog Clapham Junction

Here we have a bottle of the 2011 vintage of Boon Mariage Parfait Kriek. It’s presented in a smart 375ml bottle with a sexy little champagne cork arrangement on top. Full credit must go to the barman for trusting the customer to open and pour this one themself.

It pours a rich, wine-dark red colour with a big frothy pink head which fades almost immediately. The aroma is light and delicate, with modest, fragrant hints of fruit and sourness.

That lightness and delicacy carries over to the flavour. Despite the respectable 8% ABV payload and the huge amounts of fruit, wood and time that have gone into this it’s such a subtle beer. You can taste the cherries for sure, but to call this a fruit beer would be to miss the point entirely.

There’s almost entirely no sweetness there at all, just a huge long dry finish that has you reaching for the next sip immediately. For all that dryness, it’s surprisingly refreshing, and as with the Cantillon Kriek, it’s sour, complex and just truly special.

It may well sound pretentious, but this is a real connoisseur’s beer, and in no way could my clumsy tasting notes and affectionate digs at BrewDog do it justice.

Apparently the Mariage Parfait should age beautifully over quite literally a matter of decades, and so now I’ve enjoyed this one, that bottle of the 2012 I found at BottleDog a couple of months ago can be put aside for a special occasion many years into the future.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Brouwerij Boon nv, Lembeek, Belgium
Style: Lambic and Gueuze
Strength: 8.0% ABV
Found at: BrewDog Clapham Junction, Battersea Rise, London SW11
Serving: 375ml bottle

119. Meantime IPA

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Between visits to Brighton last weekend and now Essex, we’re quite the jetsetter these days. You may remember Essex from such beery adventures as the rare and very tasty St. Sylvestre 3 Monts Bière de Garde.

This time let’s pack a bottle of something from closer to home, and once again call upon the help of friends in working through this formidably-sized, champagne-corked bottle of one of South East London’s most famous beers, Meantime IPA.

Meantime IPA

Meantime IPA pours a deep, rich amber colour with a modest dose of white froth. The aroma is initially a somewhat unpromising combination of root vegetables and wallpaper paste, but as it warms and breathes a little things become more fragrant.

This is an exceptionally flavoursome beer, with prominent zesty lime notes and big piney, oily resins from the hops. Indeed there’s a huge amount of bitterness in there, but it’s successfully balanced out by the malting.

I’d say the Meantime IPA seems to strike a really nice balance between the English and American styles of IPA, with the warm, sweet malts of the former combined with the big citrus hops and higher ABV payload of the latter.

Indeed, at 7.4% this is a big, strong beer, but there’s no harsh alcohol burn. Instead there’s just a huge mouthful of chewy flavour and a long, long finish.

Meantime IPA is actually a great beer, and I’m not sure why I don’t drink it more often. I guess the fact that it’s kind of rare to find on tap, or in a sensibly sized bottle, might partly explain it, but it’s definitely one I’ll pick up again.

I’m also slightly curious to find out how this one would age. Whilst the usual advice is to drink a hoppy IPA as soon after bottling as possible, something about the malts in there, and perhaps the champagne cork sat on the top, suggest this one could mature quite intriguingly.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Meantime Brewing Company, Blackwall Lane, London SE10
Style: India Pale Ales
Strength: 7.4% ABV
Found at: Whole Foods, Glasshouse Street, London W1B
Serving: 750ml bottle

118. Ballards Wassail

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As I mentioned when we met Burton Bridge Empire Pale Ale recently, there might be a little more travel involved in tracking down some of the next few beers. And so it happens that this month’s Official Threehundredbeers Day Out takes us to the south coast for a slightly beery tour of Brighton.

We’re on the hunt for Ballards Wassail, a beer I’ve never even seen in my life. Fortunately the wonders of social media alerted me to the fact that the well-regarded new restaurant Coggings & Co carry an impressive list of local beers, including this one. Apparently they do a fine burger too, so this shouldn’t be too much of a hardship.

In fact, I think this will be the first beer here to be found in an actual restaurant. Clearly, we’re going up in the world.

Ballards Wassail at Coggings & Co

It turns out Brighton is quite the beer city these days. Apart from Coggings & Co, I managed to visit the Craft Beer Co, Brighton Beer Dispensary and the terrific Evening Star (twice) all in one day.

Anyway, to the matter at hand. Ballards Wassail is a deep, honeyed golden colour with very little in the way of froth. It was originally brewed as a christmas special, and it shows: this is a rich, warming beer full of festive fruit and spice flavours along with, at 6% ABV, a prominent but not unpleasant booziness to it.

In terms of style, I’d say this is about halfway between an Old Ale and a Barleywine, with the caramel sweetness of the latter very much present, but without the double figures alcohol payload. There’s a big, bready maltiness and even some herbal notes that remind me a little of the Fraoch Heather Ale.

This may not be a typical beer to choose in the height of summer to accompany a sturdy lunch, but we don’t stand on convention here at Threehundredbeers. I enjoyed it enough that I had a second while I was digesting.

A very nice beer then, combined with a cracking feed including some of the best chips I’ve ever had, and a warm welcome from the lovely staff. I was a very happy camper indeed. I look forward to trying more beers from this brewery, and I can certainly recommend Coggings & Co if you’re in the area.

Facts and Figures

Brewery: Ballards Brewery, Nyewood, Hampshire
Style: Old Ales, Barley Wines and Vintage Ales
Strength: 6.0% ABV
Found at: Coggings & Co, Dyke Rd, Brighton, East Sussex
Serving: 500ml bottle