Ale appreciation thread (1 Viewer)

[ernesto]

threshers do a 4 for £5 on Ales and they have the usuals - speckled hen, badger, old peculiar etc alongside some local brews and rarities.



I think a thumped meet up at the Ale Festival is a good idea.

Lefty, are you up for it?

sounds good. who are these thresher lads?

oh yeah, cant remember what the hell iwas drinking the other night. some bitter badger felllah and a black sheep i think. they were all very tasty anyway.

 

[broken arm]

sounds good. who are these thresher lads?

oh yeah, cant remember what the hell iwas drinking the other night. some bitter badger felllah and a black sheep i think. they were all very tasty anyway.

threshers is an off licence.

they do three bottles of wine for the price of two and have a big selction of good fairtrade wines.

http://www.threshergroup.com/beers_and_ales.aspx

We have got together with the Society of Independent Brewers to bring you a unique beer offer exclusive to Threshers.

• All products come from local breweries within a 40 mile radius delivered directly to store.
• It’s good for your taste buds, good for the local economy and direct delivery is often good for the environment. And with a great price promotion buying 4 local beers is good for your pocket!
• Where possible we offer our customers a bottle-conditioned beer certified by the Campaign for Real Ale.

 

[TheBeerNut]

tasty.

When and where did you see it last? They stopped sending it round our way and last I heard the brewery's up for sale

 

[Franco]

Haven't seen it in a while, but am from near enough that way so know it pretty well.

Didn't hear the place was up for sale; sad if it's true. Chatted to the manager last year and they'd started a restaurant in the pub to try and draw some more trade. Drink diving / pub downturn has hit the place hard. I thought the sales were doing well though, but it could be awkward enough to find, even around home.

 

[Wobbler]

ive been getting stuck into some damn tasty ales here. sainsburys do a great 4 bottles for the price of 3. deadly. when i remember what the hell i was drinking , ill post them up

threshers do a 4 for £5 on Ales and they have the usuals - speckled hen, badger, old peculiar etc alongside some local brews and rarities.



I think a thumped meet up at the Ale Festival is a good idea.

Lefty, are you up for it?

Yous should be drinking ale on draught in the UK.

 

[nEiLo]

had a bottle of this last night. absolutely gorgeous. it's 7% but not as sweet and syrupy as some of the winter ales can be. highly recommended.

 

[TheBeerNut]

*Sniff*
Didn't like it.

 

[TheBeerNut]

Haven't seen it in a while, but am from near enough that way so know it pretty well.

Didn't hear the place was up for sale; sad if it's true.

Met the brewer at the weekend. Brewing is basically on an indefinite hiatus. He said they'll be doing the occasional brew just for the pub for as long as they still have it, but nothing regular and nothing bottled.

Shame.

Drink less beer made by Diageo, Heineken and Scottish & Newcastle and more made by Irish craft brewers is the lesson here, I think.

 

[nEiLo]

Drink less beer made by Diageo, Heineken and Scottish & Newcastle and more made by Irish craft brewers is the lesson here, I think.

can you recommend a few? and where to find them in dublin!

 

[TheBeerNut]

Sartintly.

You will get Carlow Brewing's bottled O'Hara's Stout, Red and their Curim wheat beer in most any branch of Superquinn, as well as Drink Store in Stoneybatter, Carvill's on Camden Street, and occasional other good off licences around town. O'Hara's Stout on draught is available in Ely CHQ in the docklands and the Bull & Castle in Christchurch (usually). The Bull & Castle carries all three bottled Carlow beers too.

You will get Galway Hooker in the Bull & Castle, the Temple Bar and Nassau Street branches of the Porterhouse, Sin É on the Quays, Bewley's Hotel Ballsbridge and the Dice Bar down Benburb Street way. Last week the Bull & Castle were doing Hooker Brewery's Irish Coffee Porter, but I don't know if there's any still left.

Rebel Red by the Franciscan Well is available in the Bull & Castle where it's badged as Castle Red, and in the Gingerman where it's badged Writer's Red. Rebel Lager is badged as Writer's Block in the Gingerman and is also available in the Bull & Castle under its own name. Both beers are sold in Paddy Cullen's in Ballsbridge but I can't remember if they're rebadged there or not. The Bull & Castle also sells Franciscan Well's Blarney Blonde ale.

Obviously, all three branches of the Porterhouse sell Porterhouse beers, and Messrs Maguire beers are available in Messrs Maguire. The magnificent Black Pearl bottled stout from the Messrs Maguire brewer may still be available upstairs in the Bull & Castle, but I'm doing my best to get through it.

Mao's own-brand lager is Irish made, though I don't know by whom.

I think that's about it. Anybody else?

Edit: Every one of these beers is better than anything made by the industrial brewers, though O'Hara'a Stout and Galway Hooker are particular favourites of mine.

 

[Wobbler]

had a bottle of this last night. absolutely gorgeous. it's 7% but not as sweet and syrupy as some of the winter ales can be. highly recommended.

Try a few more bocks (not too easy to come by unfortunatlly) and you might find nicer ones. Flensburger is nothing special.

Paulaner Salvator is great stuff.

Technically it's a lager, not an ale.

 

[Franco]

Met the brewer at the weekend. Brewing is basically on an indefinite hiatus. He said they'll be doing the occasional brew just for the pub for as long as they still have it, but nothing regular and nothing bottled.

Shame.

Drink less beer made by Diageo, Heineken and Scottish & Newcastle and more made by Irish craft brewers is the lesson here, I think.

That's sad news. It was the first pub brewery in the country.

I guess i'll be sticking to Rebel Red so.

 

[nEiLo]

Edit: Every one of these beers is better than anything made by the industrial brewers, though O'Hara'a Stout and Galway Hooker are particular favourites of mine.

i love galway hooker. there was talk about them getting it into anseo. no sign of it yet.

thanks for the list.

 

[Wobbler]

and more made by Irish craft brewers is the lesson here, I think.

Ideally...but very few exciting beers are made by Irish craft brewers, in my opinion.

Hooker is, of course, excellent. Also, O'Haras Stout is very good but none of the other Carlow beers really grab me. Porterhouse make some excellent stouts but their lagers are rough and their ales are very average. Messrs sparodically make great beers but their beers are mostly ropey.

It'd be great if more people bought more beers from Irish Craft brwers (and certainly less from Diageo, S&N and InBev) but the breweries need to take some responsibility for this, stop assuming that the public only want clones of macro lagers and start producing quality beer.

If I had to choose between London Pride or Chiller, I wouldn't have to think for very long.

 

[TheBeerNut]

Point taken, and I drink more imported beer than Irish for the same reason. But you can't expect Irish brewers to innovate without more of a take-up. Things are changing at the moment, and Galway Hooker, Franciscan Well Purgatory, MM Imperial, Black Pearl, Irish Coffee Porter are hopefully a vanguard leading us away from the Three Basic Styles of Irish Beer. This won't continue if we don't support the people making them.

My general rule is that I drink imports at home but when I'm out I'll drink Irish craft beer for preference as much as possible. That said, with a choice between London Pride and O'Hara's Red, I'll take the O'Hara's.

 

[Wobbler]

Point taken, and I drink more imported beer than Irish for the same reason. But you can't expect Irish brewers to innovate without more of a take-up. Things are changing at the moment, and Galway Hooker, Franciscan Well Purgatory, MM Imperial, Black Pearl, Irish Coffee Porter are hopefully a vanguard leading us away from the Three Basic Styles of Irish Beer. This won't continue if we don't support the people making them.

My general rule is that I drink imports at home but when I'm out I'll drink Irish craft beer for preference as much as possible. That said, with a choice between London Pride and O'Hara's Red, I'll take the O'Hara's.

By the same token, you can't expect brewers to innovate if we doin't distinguish between bland and interesting beer. Only by Irish and imported beer.

I agree with you that things are picking you up. By the the way, what's the third of the three basic styles? Irish Red Ale?

I don't have a general rule with what I drink and I still drink alot of Guinness.

 

[TheBeerNut]

By the same token, you can't expect brewers to innovate if we doin't distinguish between bland and interesting beer.

Sadly, it doesn't work like that. The economics of Irish craft brewing are such that, if we don't buy their beer they don't make something else: they go out of business. All of the Irish brewers I've met have a real interest in making other beers, and when you go to festivals and special events you get to see this stuff, but it's not economically viable to make it for the general market at the moment, and they will remain risk-averse if we don't buy their beer.

what's the third of the three basic styles? Irish Red Ale?

Yes. The other two being stout and pale lager or pale lager-a-like.

I don't have a general rule with what I drink and I still drink alot of Guinness.

I understand that living outside the cities you often won't have the same sort of choice. I feel, however, that I'd have no right to come to places like this and rant about the lack of good Irish beer, without knowing that I'm actively doing something about it by giving the Irish craft brewing industry every support I can give it, starting with buying and drinking its produce. Which, fortunately, is pretty much always better than its macrobrewed equivalents.

 

[Wobbler]

Sadly, it doesn't work like that. The economics of Irish craft brewing are such that, if we don't buy their beer they don't make something else: they go out of business. All of the Irish brewers I've met have a real interest in making other beers, and when you go to festivals and special events you get to see this stuff, but it's not economically viable to make it for the general market at the moment, and they will remain risk-averse if we don't buy their beer.

Of course that's based on the assumption that brewing a bland lager is a good way to start. Small breweries can't compete with their bigger rivals with advertising and if they're aping their products then there's no way they can launch a succesful product.

They can however compete on quality. Galway Hooker have proved that this strategy works.

 

[ernesto]

Yous should be drinking ale on draught in the UK.

i would if i could afford it and if there were any nice pubs near me serving nice ales. but theres not. and im poor.

 

[TheBeerNut]

Of course that's based on the assumption that brewing a bland lager is a good way to start. Small breweries can't compete with their bigger rivals with advertising and if they're aping their products then there's no way they can launch a succesful product.

I'm a drinker, not a brewer. And fortunately every Irish craft brewer who makes a bland lager makes at least one decent beer, so I'm rarely stuck for choice when selecting among them.

They can however compete on quality. Galway Hooker have proved that this strategy works.

'Tis true. And I have recommended to a craft-brewing start-up not to go the traditional-but-dull stout-lager-red route. But I'm just a punter.