Alice Porter 1 year on...

Well it's been around a year since I dragged a bunch of loyal mates to the arsehole of world to brew at one of the worlds finest breweries.

I can confirm that I am still married and the former Alice Porter is in great condition - but what about the beer eh? HO HO!!

Well... Super high marks on ratebeer and beeradvocate, it's also cropped up in various far flung places across the globe and has received some brilliant reviews and been drunk by many, many people in bottle, keg and cask. It's pretty amazing really as this beer was conceived in a truly advanced state of refreshment, but then it was my stag do.

We did have an idea of what we wanted to make, a strong baltic style porter around 6% it needed to be rich and balanced with a porter type tang plus if we could squeeze some smoke in there - all the better. Well hot damn - with the help of the legendary brewery team at Brewdog, it worked!

this is what a legendary brewer looks like

I've saved a good size batch of the original brew with the intention of seeing how it ages. I also bottled a little right from the keg and dosed it with Belgian yeast and a bit of rudimentary brown sugar syrup. More on that another time though, lets stick to the original.

So a year in the bottle and I've got some interesting developments and I'm pleased to say that the beer has improved - it's deeper, better balanced and more intense. There's tons of fruit on the nose and that touch of German smoked malt comes through lovely - something that I have noticed improves with time in the cask.

Please believe me when I say I'm trying to be objective here... But it's just a really great beer despite my obvious bias. It's also much better for a years ageing, the intensity is great and it's still very much a classic porter. I'm very happy with the combination of hops we used; there's some great traditional Fuggles fruity bitterness in there but the stars of the show are the Bramling Cross which gives you all those lovely deep blueberry and soft fruit flavours and of course the Sorachi Ace which we added to see if it would help achieve that porter-y acidic tang. It does add a touch of citric sharpness and also that creaminess which makes Sorachi ace such a difficult hop to like in lighter beers and IPAs but perhaps a really, really great hop for darker beers - take note brewers!!

There's also that touch of vanilla in there and the mystery ingredient just seems to bring the whole thing together (what is it eh?).

So anyway I'll pat everyone who was involved heartily on the back once again and watch as our creation goes global... Alice Porter will be available in a shop, supermarket, bar or pub near you pretty much NOW!

pic courtesy of digital newsroom

A little bit of backbone

Quick one...

I've been stoking up my cellar a bit, firstly because I like a stash of beer. Secondly because I like a stash of beer.

My general opinion of keeping a well stocked larder is that you need enough in it so that when you hit it hard you'll have a job to get through the lot.

I do keep, or rather, collect beers for ageing as I've always been a collector of stuff and beer is much better than the other things I've collected in the past. These being coins, matches, beer mats, stickers, interestingly designed wrappers, bouncy balls, tickets, bottle tops, stones and at at one point in my life you could say I collected experiences.

So anyway I've got a crate going which has recently been full of beers I wish to drink without worrying about them getting better over time. It's full of hoppy beers then, it allows me to forget about the stuff that's ageing whilst still drinking good stuff at home. It got me to thinking about the massive amount of hoppiness going on at the moment in beer and how I've been a little disappointed by some beers that lack body.

Here's something for you brewers out there, IPA needs body and backbone, this is provided by malt and the subsequent sugar it produces in the brewing process. The more IPA becomes a dominant style in craft brewing the more I almost cringe as approach a new one. They get thinner and more bitter and in some cases blacker and I think that sometimes people are missing the point.

You need to balance a beer to make a truly great one and that means malt and hops together. The more bitterness the more sweetness is needed.

I'm drinking a beer right now that exemplifies this balance: Bell's Hopslam.

Donated to me by Michigan (Agent) Al, and I am drinking this in honour of the brief closure of the Beer Ritz bottle shop in Leeds. If you haven't gathered by now it's been closed and now it's open again! Yes shut, the world is a lesser place without it but as much as I mourn its semi passing I celebrate the amount Zak at al have contributed to the cause of beer in the UK and of course my drinking life. If I look at the top beer bloggers in the country I'd say the majority have been to beer ritz and many have been inspired to write by trips to Beer Ritz. I'd also like to add that something of this stature and someone of Zak's expertise will not be held back for long - something new and exciting will come from this no doubt.

Hopslam is more eloquently described my Mr Zak right here but in my opinion it is a tour du Force and rightly rated as one of the finest in the world.

You can smell the hops and honey all round before you even get to drinking. Heavy bitterness on the tongue at first is just chopped neatly down with every second that passes by in to candy sweet honey and pineapple, orange, mango and peach. It's as gluggable and easy to drink as I Hardcore You (which has not yet been beaten in this category for me) because it has that real deep malt and honey sweetness that exemplifies a proper backbone.

Trading on ale

phew...

that was a sweaty night - busy again at North, which is great, there's something to be said for putting everything to one side and just hammering out loads of great beer to happy punters. The last year or so has been difficult for the on trade. Disastrous for many landlords I'm sure but I'm lucky to run two great forward thinking craft bars that can adapt to the new market...

YES the new market. You see the recession has hit pubs and bars just as it's hit everything else, the reliable routines have become erratic and the tea time rush/11pm rush/last orders rush have gone out the window and licensees have been fretting as people just haven't been drinking in the same way as they did in the early part of the 2000's.

For those who haven't picked up on the craft beer boom the recession has been a sorry tale. Yet despite pressure from the Government, the prohibitionists, the scare-story-medical-bandwagon and underhand supermarket 'below cost price selling' tactics, pubs and bars who have embraced real ale, decent drinks, food and service are glimpsing light at the end of the tunnel.

Eyes are open once more to the immense potential of beer and it's wondrous health giving properties! There's a million reasons why the on trade has been in decline but it's a fact that the rediscovery of real beer in its many forms has become a rallying cry and a boon for those who give a shit about pubs and the communities they maintain.

A good time to drink exceptional beer then, tonight I had a good hour or so after a busy night having the obligatory after work bevvy with my staff. I've been fairly exhausted over the last few weeks what with one thing and the other and I've been eyeing the 2008 JW Lees harvest ale, knowing that with 2 years of age on it there will have been some fantastic things happening inside those bottles.

Aging beer can be a little hit and miss, some won't take it - others, especially those with lower ABVs might only improve slightly before dropping off. Even then light, temperature and randomness can damage beer. Not so for the good barley wine of which JW Lees are purveyors of.

Harvest is regularly right up there with the best, a UK beer coming top of the polls in the mainly US based beer advocate. When I first tasted it there was full fruit, massive oloroso sherry-ness and a swish of bitterness to balance a very sweet beer. I caned it occasionally and it occasionally took the wheels off leading to out of hand whisky type incidents that I won't bore you with tonight. Two years in the cellar and it's even more delicious - light enough on the tongue but choc a bloc with amazing walnutty depth, datey sticky toffeeness and yet that tiny bite of bitterness that balances the sweetness. Marvellous.

What to follow that with? Well I'm on the case of a Paradox from Brewdog - Isle of Arran to be precise. It's heavy but the Arran cask that this imperial stout has been aged in has treated it well. You get all the wonderful bitter chocolate and lively espresso flavours that you expect but with a dollop of vanilla ice cream too...

You like the sound of that? If you're a licensee open up you mind and your pub to craft beer - you won't regret it. If you're a punter - don't accept anything less than a really great, satisfying drink, if your local doesn't do good beer, ask why, demand it. You might just be doing them a favour...

NORTH

JW Lees

Brewdog