Friday, 3 October 2025
Hastings Tap Takeover On NOW!
Thursday, 2 October 2025
London Circular Walk: Tower & London Bridges
You could start this circular pub walk at either of the bridges, but I've started this blog at Tower Bridge because my favourite drink of the day was imbibed here, twice. 😉 So, behind Tower Bridge Road in a small back street is The Dean Swift, 10 Gainsford Street SE1 2NE (website), open from 12.00 noon every day of the week, until 23.00, excepting Sundays, when it closes at 22.30. The pub was built in the 1850s, and was originally called The Bricklayer's Arms, but was renamed for the Irish satirical writer and cleric, Jonathan Swift, who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin in 1713, hence Dean Swift, although I can find no connection to Swift locally or to the pub. And I've still not been able to finish reading Gulliver's Travels, ever!
This former Truman's pub, now a freehouse, has 20 'craft' beers available, including 2 cask ales and a variety of crafty keg styles. The cask ales were from Sussex brewery Burning Sky and their Plateau (3.5%), an excellent pale ale with hops from New Zealand and the USA (website), and the ale I drank 2 pints of (2 visits, first and fourth), from East London brewery Five Points Brewing (website), their 4.0% XPA, an American Pale Ale style, brewed with Citra (hopslist), Galaxy (hopslist) and Sabro (Hop Breeding Co) hops. This produces a pale beer with plenty of citrus and forest fruits, particularly grapefruit, bitter with a refreshing dry finish, excellent!
I admit that my record here looks weird as I arrived in London early, and checked on the pubs and took photographs as I had an hour to spare before meeting up, hence the extra pint too. 🍺 But the order here is a circular rout, wherever you start, and The Shipwrights Arms is just along from London Bridge Station entrance, so the best place to start and/or finish, I suggest.
Of course, we passed other pubs too, but time was short, and we wanted to stay sober!
My favourite of the pubs we visited was The Dean Swift, mostly because the 2 ales available were much more to my taste, and on my first visit I chatted with the manager, who is very knowledgeable about his beers, the locale and its pubs. I was a wee bit disappointed with Simon The Tanner, which was the only one of these pubs I'd visited before, and written about a couple of times, on my previous visits it was a little bit rougher around the edges with interesting stuff on the walls, see my older blog, it's a bit more polished now, and sadly there was only 1 ale available this time. The Raven was a bit noisy for me, but they were setting up for karaoke later in the evening, pleasant enough though, and all the pubs had friendly bar staff. As I pointed out, The Shipwright's Arms is closest to the station, very friendly bar staff, but take note that you are provided plastic 'glasses' to drink from if sitting outside, we stayed by the bar and were served in eccentric glass glasses. 😁 Anyway folks, cheers for now, and until the next time! 🍺
Wednesday, 1 October 2025
A Few in the Jolly Fisherman.
Yesterday I visited The Jolly Fisherman, 3 East Beach Street, Hastings TN34 3AR (website), a wee pub that I have written about many times now, for example, the first time for I ever wrote about this pub was in this blog. This visit I drank 2 ciders and 2 dark beers.
My first cider was from Oliver's Cider & Perry in Herefordshire (website) and their 6.3% Making Hay cider. This is a wild yeast fermented still cider that smells like proper cider should, with a slightly sour and apple aroma. To taste it has a very big apple flavour indeed, and very sweet at first, but with a lovely dry finish, I liked it immensely! 🍎🍏🍎
My second cider was from Bollhayes Devon Cider & Perry of Brixham (website) and their 6.5% Farmhouse Dry cider, looking very similar from the colour, but so different! Made with locally grown cider apples from their own South Devon orchard, this has nowhere near as much aroma, and is much drier to taste. I noted "very zider!" Pretty good still, but not as impressive. 🍏🍏
My first dark ale was from Leeds brewery Tartarus Beers (website) and their 4.0% Enfield, a Chocolate Brownie Stout. Brewed with 9 different malts, and with vanilla and chocolate added during conditioning, replicating the flavours of a chocolate brownie (apologies, I cannot discover the hops used). Flavour-wise, is very much chocolate indeed, with a hint of vanilla, coffee and roasted barley, but nicely dries out at the end, thus easy to drink and, for a 'session' stout quite a fair amount of body, which apparently comes from boiling the wort 'for over 3 hours.' 😮
Cheers folks, until next time. 😉
Monday, 29 September 2025
Sheffield Visit
As I often do, I stayed at the Crow Inn, 33 Scotland Street, S3 7BS (website), which I have written about many times before, eg blog, where I met up with one of my friends, more joined as the 'crawl' continued! 😉 And yes, I had eaten at Mama's and Leonies, where I usually eat in Sheffield, eg blog, I took no photographs this time, but plenty of photographs in other blogs.
I spent much more time chatting to the 4 friends I drank with this 'pub crawl' in Sheffield, including the nomadic Steev, who I hadn't seen for many years. Consequently, my notes were very sparse, and so were photographs taken this visit, but careful use of my own 'library images' and knowing all the places I visited very well, will make up for that, I trust. Indeed, all these pubs will have been linked here many times. As you can see, I did take a photograph of one of the ales I drank at the Crow (above), from across the Pennines at Macclesfield brewery Red Willow (website), their Weightless, a 4.2% session IPA, brewed with Mosaic hops (hopslist), which resulted in a lovely pale ale, tasting of citrus grapefruit and tropical fruits, and with a dry bitter finish, excellent!
Monday, 22 September 2025
Hastings Oktoberfest 2025
I hinted in my last blog that I would be visiting Oktoberfest at The Prince Albert, 28 Cornwallis Street, Hastings TN34 1SS, 19-28 September 2025 (facebook), well I did on Friday 😉 and these are the beers I drank, thank you very much! 🍺🎉🍻
I didn't actually drink these beers in the order I'm reviewing them, the order I drank in confuses me, so I'll not confuse you, but here I am reviewing them in order of strength. First reviewing, from Bavaria, and Brauhaus Tegernsee, who see themselves as the 1675 successor to a much earlier brewery of the Benedictine monastery Tegernsee (website), and their merely 4.8% Tegernseer Hell. Pretty much a classic of the style, brewed with Hallertau hops (hopslist), and my notes simply say "clear pale golden colour, plenty of flavour, but light and refreshing and a dry slightly bitter finish" and pretty damn good to start off with, next time for me, and I did! 😉
At 5.9% and a bit stronger than a traditional Munich Helles this was the next up in strength beer I drank, from Munich obviously, a brewery with a history going back to 1397, Spaten Brauerei (website) and their Oktoberfestbier, indeed, the first Oktoberfest bier ever! Sadly, they keep the hops used to themselves, but with a touch of light herbal flavour and very tasty, a slight maltiness to the aroma and a subtle honey to taste, plenty of body, and deep golden colour, you'll have noticed I came back for more of these 2 beers (below), very drinkable and my favourite! 😁
The Spatan, Paulaner and Hofbrau breweries are 3 of the 6 Munich breweries that are allowed to brew a protected Oktoberfestbier brand for Oktoberfest itself. The other 3 are Augustiner, Hacker-Pschorr which I drank last year (blog), and Lowenbrau (Oktoberfest website).
The penultimate beer here, although it was my first beer on Friday 😏 was from Paulaner Brauerei, which has a history dating back to 1634 (website), and their 6.0% Oktoberfest Bier, brewed with Herkules (hopslist) and Hallertauer Tradition (hopslist) hops. This has a slightly deeper golden colour than the others, with lightly toasted white bread in the aroma, and taste, and with a bit of caramel, almond, melon and black pepper in the taste too, plenty of flavour and body, and with a slightly dry bitter finish, nice one! 👍
Finally, the only one of these 4 that I drank at their Oktoberfest last year, also from a Munich brewery Hofbrau Munchen (website) and their 6.3% Hofbrau Oktoberfestbier, another festival 'special' beer brewed with Herkules (hopslist), Perle (hopslist), and Spalter Select (hopslist) hops. This is a pale golden colour with a subtle sweetness and hints of grapefruit and dried fruits to the taste, very refreshing, and 6.3% (!) so dangerous to drink. My notes say "so much better than the commercial lagers brewed over here." So obviously true, no comparison, I could drink this all day, prost! 🍻
I'm adding images of the Spaten Oktoberfestbier and Tegernseer Hell below, as I went back on Sunday and had these 2 beers again, and nice to see them in a glass, although I had already taken a mouthful of Hell before photographing, but you get the message. 😉
Friday, 19 September 2025
Cask Ale Week AND Oktoberfest Together!
Indeed, both on now-ish! National Cask Ale Week 18-28 September 2025 (website) is a time to celebrate drinking cask ales in pubs, so essentially very British, as cask ale is lauded as our national drink. I'll have to drink a few pints of ale this coming week then... 😉
And the 190th Oktoberfest begins tomorrow (20th September - October the 5th 2025), and the beer halls of Munchen will be brimming with beers and unfeasibly full litre steins (website), but!
Whatever you do, have a great weekend and coming week, cheers folks! 🍺
Thursday, 18 September 2025
Ghent Visit 2025
As we were staying in Brussels, on our way to the railway station again we passed through the Parc du Cinquantenaire (Visit Brussels)...
On our way to Schuman Metro Station, and evidence of the EU appears.
We reached Ghent, on the 8th of September, which was declared liberated by the British 7th Armoured Division 81 years ago to the day in 1944 (Desert Rats), 3 days after allied forces had entered the city and the same day the Belgian Government was returned to power (Bulletin). Our first target was the Tourist Office (website), close by the Gravensteen above, the Castle of the Counts (History Hit), which I visited the last time I was in Ghent over 20 years ago.
The first bar I had planned for us to visit wasn't open, despite their website saying it would be, oh well, anyway, we sat down at a table in Vrijdagmarkt, and had a beer from one of the restaurants there, I believe it was Cassis (website), I may be wrong, but whatever... An excellent bottle of Corsendonk Agnus Tripel (7.5%), brewed with Styrian Golding (hopslist), Hersbrucker (hopslist) and Challenger (hopslist) hops, providing citrus fruit, pear, and coriander spiciness to the taste, refreshing and enjoyed immensely, and I was getting thirsty by now! 👌
By the way, the history of Corsendonk and brewing ale goes back to the late 14th century and the Priory of Corsendonk which had its own brewery then, however they were forced to close by Emperor Josef II in 1784, then they started brewing again in 1906, but now they claim to have become 'particularly famous from 1982 onwards' (website).
The name of Gulden Draak (Golden or Gilded Dragon) comes from the legend of the Gulden Draak that originally adorned the bow of an early 12th century Viking Ship, then was atop a dome in Constantinople, from where it was brought to Flanders by Flemish Count Boudewijn in the 13th century ending up in Bruges; and from where it was finally removed as a spoil of war by the victorious Ghent forces following the Battle of Beverhoutsveld in 1382. It has since remained in the Ghent Belfry (above) symbolising freedom and power (visitgent).
The importance to the Brouwerij Van Steenberge of the history behind the Gulden Draak beers, their Titans, has seen the brewery include this on its website. The first Gulden Draak I tasted, was in Brussels near the end of the last millennium, when I called it a "Christmas Pudding of a Beer" - a description my brother (who lived in Belgium at the time) liked enough to use himself elsewhere. So, Gulden Draak Classic, a majestic 10.5%, brewed with Styrian Golding (hopslist) and Brewer's Gold (hopslist) hops, and it still is a Christmas pudding of a Beer! The brewery state this is a Tripel, as you can see though, not a pale golden one, but a darker ruby red colour, rich, full bodied and full of flavour. This time I drank it appropriately close by the Belfry at Bier Central, Botermarkt 11 (website), and we ate here too, tasty food as well, nice one.
On our way to our final bar this trip, and back to the station, we passed Sint-Baafs Kathedraal (St Bavo's Cathedral - website), where a church had been on the site since the 10th century, with the current cathedral building evolving from what was then St John's Church to the current gothic style cathedral in the 15th and 16th centuries.
On our way southwards we followed the same canal (Schelde) virtually all the way to the bar, so I thought at least one photograph of a canal should be included!
And another, and just to prove I was there, my head made this cameo performance! 😉
And wouldn't you know it, the planned final bar of our visit was closed too, despite their website saying otherwise, tut! BUT... Virtually opposite we found what I believe is probably an even better bar, on the canal, on a barge called Kaffee De Planck, Ter Platen 10A (website), and with over 200 beers to choose from. 😁 We didn't meet Odette, who has been the 'driving force behind De Planck' since 1985, but we did meet a very friendly young member of staff, cheers m'dear!
Monday, 15 September 2025
2 Luxurious Stouts from Yonder!
Both of these are from Yonder Brewing of Somerset (website), and are indeed luxurious stouts! The first, at a mere 6.0% is their Pecan Pretzel Pastry Stout, which is sweet, as I expected, very smooth, with chocolate dominating for me in the taste, but hints of toasted pecan nuts and caramel too. Plenty of body, but incredibly easy to drink, with a slightly salty, dry bitter finish.
The next blog will be about Ghent, I promise, a West Coast one to come soon too!
Sunday, 14 September 2025
Another Brussels Visit, September 2025.
Anyway, on my way by Eurostar (website), sadly, no longer bottles of Duvel for sale in the buffet, but Leffe Blonde in tins (website), plus a red wine for me, and a sarnie, etc...
I stayed in Brussels with my sister-in-law and brother, and on the other side of the Parc du Cinquantenaire (above visitbrussels) from the apartment was my first bar this visit, for food as well as drink. Indeed, this was the first bar I ever drank in on my first visit to Belgium many years ago, that is the 120 years old La Terrasse, Avenue des Celtes 1, Etterbeek, 1040 Brussels (website). Excellent food, and the wonderful Westmalle Tripel (9.5%) pictured below, my favourite Belgian beer. Brewed with Tettnanger (hopslist), Saaz (hopslist) and Styrian Golding (hopslist) hops, producing a golden ale, subtly fruity, and a dry bitter refreshing finish, quality!
Westmalle Tripel is a 'trappist' ale, the brewery established at the trappist Westmalle Abbey since 1836 (website), gradually updated over the years, in 1968 their own water purification plant was set up, their bottling plant was modernised in 1956 and again in 2000, and a few years ago a new brew hall was installed. Although the monks no longer brew the beers themselves, they remain in overall charge of the brewery, ensuring tradition is upkept, and pure ingredients used, their own water, 100% barley malt, hops, and yeast from their own culture.
The second bar visited this time was the great Le Cirio, Beursstraat 18, 1000 Brussels (website), next to the old Belgian Stock Exhange, La Bourse (Brussels), a favourite for Dan and me. Here I drank the 8.4% Karmeliet Tripel (website), also brewed with Styrian Golding hops (hopslist), at the Brouwerij Bosteels (website), founded in 1791. Another golden ale, a wee bit sweeter than the Westmalle, plenty of fruit and body, hints of vanilla and citrus, pretty good!
Le Cirio was originally an Italian Delicatessen founded by Francesco Cirio in 1886, and the present interior was redesigned by Henri Coosemans in 1909 in the style of an Arts Nouveau Italian cafe. The narrow doors to the toilets pictured above hint at small rooms, but it is like the 'Tardis' when you enter, so presumably the same in the women's toilet too! 😁 Anyway, the photograph framed above the mirror to the left of the doors includes the famous Jacques Brel sitting in Le Cirio, the Belgian songwriter and singer, whose works include Ne Me Quitte Pas (Don't Leave Me), Le Moribond (adapted for Seasons in the Sun), and Amsterdam.
The third bar was one of the most interesting bars you may ever enter, La Fleur en Papier Dore, Rue des Alexiens 55, 1000 Brussels (website), 'the flower made from gold foil' and still with very friendly bar staff! This really is an 'arts' bar, created by the poet and gallery owner Gerard van Bruaene, and filled by artists and musicians, such as the Surrealists like Rene Magritte, and Jacques Brel again, he did like his bars! Bits and pieces here and there, much unmatched furniture, and pictures and all sorts adorning the walls, and pleasantly laid back. 😎
Here I drank a beer from the Brussels brewery Brasserie de la Senne (website), their 8.0% Tripel Verschueren (Tripel Verschu). As you can see from the photograph, the beer is pretty natural, very suitable for vegans, golden, slightly citrussy and fruity, with a dry bitter finish. Sorry, but the hops used are pretty difficult to find out, but I'd be surprised if the blend used doesn't include Styrian Golding and Saaz hops, if you know, please leave a comment, cheers! 👍
That's it for now folks, Ghent next, cheers! 🍻