Bitter End Lakeland Golden

Bitter End Lakeland Golden [baron rating 3/5] - this 4.3% copper ale has a hoppy yeast smell,strong bitter taste & fading soft sweet finish

Update (11/03/2010): This is the old recipe for this beer, the new Lakeland Golden is rated here: Bitter End Lakeland Golden

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Bitter End ales here

Quartz Blonde

Quartz Blonde [baron rating 4/5] - this 3.8% golden ale has a gentle pale malt aroma,light crisp orchard fruit taste & slight caramel finish

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Quartz ales here

Penlon Cardi Bay

Penlon Cardi Bay [baron rating 2/5] - this 4% amber ale has a yeasty aroma,smooth caramel gentle bitter taste & a light sweetness to finish

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Penlon ales here

Sadler's Thin Ice

Sadler's Thin Ice [baron rating 3/5] - this 4.5% pale gold ale has a lemon zest smell, zesty hoppy cutting taste & a sharp clean finish

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Download flash to hear the audio review

Subscribe in iTunes

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Sadler's ales here

Best Mates Midsummer Madness

Best Mates Midsummer Madness [baron rating 1/5] - this 3.9% copper ale has a very sweet malt smell,sour fruits taste & a yeasty sweet finish

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Download flash to hear the audio review

Subscribe in iTunes

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Best Mates ales here

Update (01/02/2010): I now feel that this bottle of Best Mates Midsummer Madness had gone off or was from a bad batch after a similar message from @BeerReviewsAndy. I'm going to leave the score until I get a chance to re-sample the ale...

Adnams Tally-Ho

Adnams Tally-Ho [baron rating 5/5] - this 7.2% mahogany ale has a smoky roasted smell,rich fruity sweet taste & dark chocolate bitter finish

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Download flash to hear the audio review

This is such a wonderful rich winter beer, and it's best served with some chunks of fine vintage cheddar - it's a match made in heaven!

Best served with vintage cheddar & a roaring fire!

Buy Adnams ale here

Arundel ASB

Arundel ASB [baron rating 3/5] - this 4.5% dark amber ale has a spicy malt smell, a fruity malt taste & a sweet bitter finish

Asda's latest ale offers (20th Jan)

Checked the Asda website tonight and spotted that all the following ales are on for a £1 a bottle at the moment (no indication of when the offer will end):

• Badger Fursty Ferret [baron rating 4/5]

• Badger Tanglefoot [baron rating 4/5]

• Black Sheep Riggwelter [baron rating 4/5]

• Brakspear Bitter [baron rating 5/5]

• Marstons Pedigree [baron rating 3/5]

• Morland Old Speckled Hen [baron rating 4/5]

• Newcastle Brown Ale [baron rating 3/5]

• Shepherd Neame Bishops Finger [baron rating 2/5]

• Shepherd Neame Spitfire [baron rating 4/5]

• Theakston Old Peculier [baron rating 4/5]

• Wells Bombardier [baron rating 3/5]

• Wychwood Goliath [baron rating 3/5]

I'm going to go down to the Aintree store tomorrow to see if I can pick up some Brakspear, Fursty Ferret and Old Peculier...

Update (21/01/2010) : The above are all on offer and in plentiful supply at the Aintree Asda store, all bottles £1 each (except the Brakspear Bitter at £1.03 a bottle)

Get down there and stock up!

Meantime India Pale Ale (IPA)

Meantime India Pale Ale [baron rating 4/5] - this 7.5% copper ale has a high ABV hop aroma,a creamy malt spicy hop taste & spicy hop finish

Buy Meantime ales here

Netto has Newcastle Brown Ale for £1/bottle this weekend (23rd-24th Jan)

This weekend (23rd-24th Jan) Netto have 550ml bottles of Newcastle Brown Ale[3/5] for just £1 each - there's a 12 bottle limit per customer

Purity Mad Goose

Purity Mad Goose [baron rating 4/5] - this 5% copper ale has a gentle hop aroma, a tangy citrus hops taste & a dry bitter finish

Buy Purity ales here

Marston's Pedigree for £1.29/bottle in Netto (from Monday 18th Jan)

Starting on Monday (18th Jan) Netto are selling 500ml bottles of Marston's Pedigree [baron rating: 3/5] for £1.29

Great cheap ale selection from Booths (Windermere)

Mike Nolan (you are a star) picked up a great selection of ales on offer for me from Booths in Windermere. He was up there for the weekend, saw the cracking deals and got in touch with me via Twitter!

Here is my selection which cost just £11 for 9 bottles:

• Adnams Bitter [baron rating 4/5]
  

• Black Sheep Holy Grail [baron rating 5/5]

• Holden's Golden
  

• St. Peter's India Pale Ale (IPA)

• Wentworth WPA

• Wold Top Falling Stone

The Adnams Bitter and Wold Top Falling Stone were just £1/bottle (until the 19th Jan), not sure about the others but Mike did say that all fell under the baron-friendly price of £1.33.  A nice selection with nearly half that I've not tried before, Mike personally recommended the St. Peter's IPA so I'm looking forward to that! As always, 'baron ratings' will follow once they have been sampled...

Thanks again Mike!

JW Lees Brewer's Dark

JW Lees Brewer's Dark [baron rating 2/5] - this 3.5% dark brown ale has a chocolate malt aroma, a thin roasted malt taste & no real finish

Buy JW Lees ales here

Badger England's Gold for £1/bottle in Tesco until 2nd February (Southport)

Tesco (Southport) has 500ml bottles of Badger England's Gold [baron rating coming soon] for £1/bottle from 6th January until 2nd February

Nice Adnams Bitter on in the Hayfield pub (Ormskirk)

Had a few nice pints of Adnams Bitter last night in the Hayfield (Ormskirk), a nice bitter bitter, they also had (untried) Bishops Finger on

A bottle of Tally-Ho from Adnams

Got back from a few days away to find a lovely gift waiting for me, a bottle of Adnams limited edition Tally-Ho:

"Tally Ho is a limited edition Barley wine style beer, brewed at Adnams since 1880. Traditionally a Christmas beer, and brewed in October in limited quantities, many pubs lay a cask down like fine wine and save it for special occasions throughout the year." - from the Adnams website

This hasn't been bottled for years and should have been out in time for Christmas but some labelling and boxing issues pushed it's release into the New Year.

A big thank you to Sean and the rest of the Adnams team for this lovely gift, I'll be trying this ale in a week or two so expect a Baron Rating very soon!

Buy Adnams Tally-Ho ale here

Thwaites Chestnut Dancer

Thwaites Chestnut Dancer [baron rating 2/5] - this 3.7% dark amber ale has a slight malty aroma,bland caramel taste & a toffee sweet finish

Buy Thwaites ales here

Reviews of the first 7 ales of myBrewerytap's 52 Week Beer Club (December pack)

Chris Routledge & I joined myBrewerytap's 52 Week Beer Club in December and so we received our first quarter's ales a few weeks ago.  We decided to split the tasting of the 13 bottled ales into two sessions, the first of which was on Wednesday last week.

We tried seven of the thirteen ales and focused mainly on the bitters, leaving the pale ales for the second tasting.  Here are links to the seven ales that we've 'baron rated':

• Atlantic Red [baron rating 4/5 ♫]

• Dent Aviator [baron rating 3/5]

• Leatherbritches CAD [baron rating 3/5 ♫]

• Leyden Raglan Sleeve [baron rating 3/5]

• Sam Brook's Wandle [baron rating 3/5]

• Three Castles Saxon Archer [baron rating 4/5] 

• Wensleydale Gamekeeper [baron rating 4/5 ♫]   

The bottle of Gamekeeper was our favourite of the night (not quite a 5/5 though) and the Raglan Sleeve our least favourite (but still a good ale).

Overall we were very impressed with not a single bottle below a [3/5] which was surprising to us both.  We are both really looking forward to getting stuck into the remaining six bottles in a few weeks time.

 We also recorded the first few bottles-worth of conversation as an experiment, please let me know if it was interesting/funny/informative and you want to hear more from Chris & I in future tasting sessions:

Wensleydale Gamekeeper

Wensleydale Gamekeeper [baron rating 4/5] - this 4.3% amber ale has a citrus smell, light spicy fruity taste & a fast fading fruity finish Baron Orm

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Download flash to hear the audio review

Subscribe in iTunes

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Wensleydale ales here

Three Castles Saxon Archer

Three Castles Saxon Archer [baron rating 4/5] - this 4% golden ale has a sweet & sharp grapefruit smell & taste with a bitter finish: lovely

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Three Castles ales here

Sam Brook's Wandle

Sam Brook's Wandle [baron rating 3/5] - this 4.2% golden ale has a fruity aroma, sweet banana juicy malt taste & a floral bitter finish

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Sam Brook's ales here

Leyden Raglan Sleeve

Leyden Raglan Sleeve [baron rating 3/5] - this 4.6% dark amber ale has a chocolate malt smell,sweet fruitcake taste & lingering sweet finish

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Leyden ales here

Leatherbritches CAD

Leatherbritches CAD [baron rating 3/5] - this 4% amber ale has a fruity smell, a gentle pale malt taste & a bitter finish - not distinctive Baron Orm

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Download flash to hear the audio review

Subscribe in iTunes

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Leatherbritches ales here

Dent Aviator

Dent Aviator [baron rating 3/5] - this 4% amber ale has a citrus smell, crisp sweet malt taste & a bitter finish, nice but nothing special

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Dent ales here

Atlantic Red

Atlantic Red [baron rating 4/5] - this 5% amber ale has a pale malt aroma,crisp light apple hops taste & dry bitter finish - very drinkable!Baron Orm

Listen to what Chris and the Baron have to say about it.

Download flash to hear the audio review

Part of the superb '52 week beer club' by myBrewerytap
join it now and make sure you say "the baron made me do it"!

Buy Atlantic ales here

Adnams Bitter

Adnams Bitter [baron rating 4/5] - this 4.5% amber ale has a spicy malt smell, juicy hops bitter taste & tangy bitter finish - very nice!

Buy Adnams ale here

Innis & Gunn Rum Cask Oak-Aged Beer

Innis & Gunn Rum Cask Oak-Aged Beer [baron rating 2/5] - this 7.4% ale had a glazed fruit aroma, smooth sweet taste & clinging sweet finish

Note: I tried the regular Innis & Gunn Oak-Aged Beer back in September and didn't enjoy it at all.  I think both of these scores are low for these carefully brewed ales because I don't like sweet fruity beers & I can't stand even the hint of spirits.

I therefore shared the the above bottle of Innis & Gunn Rum Cask Oak-Aged Beer with a friend and he rated it 4/5 - he really enjoyed the smoothness considering the high ABV and said that it didn't have the same 'sherry trifle bitterness' that the regular Innis & Gunn Oak-Aged Beer had.


Cheers to the Source deli in Ormskirk for providing the bottle - thanks Paul!

Morrisons January ale & beer offers (4th - 31st Jan) (Ormskirk)

It's January's new beer & ale offers time in Morrisons so I popped into the local Ormskirk branch today to check them out.  There was only two offers that I could see, the JW Lees Brewer's Dark still reduced to £1 (no date on the label for when this one is going to end) and one other.

Here are the details:

• Thwaites Chestnut Dancer [baron rating 2/5]
  £1

It seems a little odd that Chestnut Dancer is the only offer this month, so I'll report back if any new January offers appear...

Update: I've rechecked since and this is the only offer on this month - poor show Morrisons!

Williams Bros Gold

Williams Bros Gold [baron rating 4/5] - 3.9% gold ale,fresh hops & pine smell, grassy citrus hops taste & dry bitter hops finish

Buy Williams Bros ale here

Williams Bros Hop Quiz

I bought my Dad the Williams Bros Hop Quiz ale pack for Christmas and he was kind enough to invite me to do the quiz with him over the festive period.

The idea of the quiz is to see if you can figure out which of the four beers is brewed with which hops:

It has four numbered bottles and a scratch card to reveal the answers:

Although the pack says that the beers were over-hopped to get the full taste of the hops out, none of the beers were unpleasant, in fact the Goldings and Cascade brews were rather tasty!

It was a great bit of fun on Boxing Day and although we didn't get all four right we had a good blast doing the quiz.

I'd recommend this pack for anyone who enjoys real ale particular ones that like IPAs as the beers are on the hoppy side!

Buy Williams Bros ales here

Southport Golden Sands

Southport Golden Sands [baron rating 4/5] - this 4% pale golden ale has a crisp hop smell, clean bitter hops taste & a tangy bitter finish