Another New Micropub for me!

I recently visited my fifth micropub, that is, the first micropub in Bexhill on Sea, Brickmaker's Alehouse, 27 Sea Road, Bexhill, East Sussex TN40 1EE (Tel: 01424 602778 - website), opened a couple of months ago by owners Martin and Robin.

The building has earlier incarnations, including a tea-room, restaurant, wholefood shop, and, back in the 1930s the fine mosaic doorstep reminds one it was used by the local Lunsford Brick and Tile Manufacturing Company, which since 1965 has been called Ashdown Brickworks (history - Rotary Club website). Indeed, I received a warm welcome when entering!

The interior has been sympathetically decorated and refurbished making it feel like a comfortable pub, well designed guys. At the end, down there on the left, are the toilets, nice and clean and tidy, and the small bar is to the right just behind me as I took the photograph above.

Oh yes, and beers? The ales and ciders are to the right of you as you enter in a temperature controlled glass-fronted environment (see above photograph), and served by gravity. There are usually 4-6 regularly changing real ales and 4 real ciders, including locally sourced, indeed, on my visit it stretched to 7 real ales as one finished whilst I was there. I started off with the lower alcohol ale from Downlands Brewery in West Sussex (website) Root Thirteen, a 3.6% pale ale brewed with Summit, Cascade and Chinook hops. Hint of malt in the aroma and taste, a pale bitter, easy to drink and not overly hoppy. 

I then tried the Mancunian brewery Marble (website) Pint (3.9%), a session ale brewed with hops from New Zealand and the USA, and labelled 'vegan.'  Now, I first drank their ales when they were still brewing in the pub, The Marble Arch Inn (website) which is well worth a visit when in town, and they were one of the first brewers to produce 'vegan' ales that I was aware of. Indeed the Pint was labelled 'cloudy' but it was clear, vegans really can drink clear bitters! Oh yes, and a very pleasant session bitter for me, indeed.

Then I went for another northern brewery, this time from Yorkshire, Northern Monk (website) Session IPA (4.5%). The Simcoe and Centennial hops producing a tropical fruit aroma, and hints of tropical fruits and citrus in the taste too. Another 'clear' vegan bitter too. This was not quite as pale as some of the other ales today, but had a pale amber colour, and had a dry bitter finish, and an aftertaste that I couldn't quite work out, but not a bad bitter at all.

Next was another vegan beer, I see a pattern here, this time from Bristol based brewery Arbor Ales (website) Blue Sky Drinking (4.4%), which I noted as a traditional best bitter colour and tasting like a 'traditional bitter,' so no surprise that looking at their website it is brewed with English hops, though I didn't grasp the 'delicate citrus notes.' No, I wrote 'slightly sweet at first' (perhaps the delicate citrus?), but a traditional best bitter, and not bad at all.

Oh, and many thanks to Howling Hops (website) for the image above, and a London based brewery new to me, although they appear to have been brewing for getting on for 9 years, and their 4.8% porter New Old London, which was my final and favourite ale of the day. I have written many times about porters, stouts and milds (eg blog) and their differences, or not, this is called a 'porter' and I thought it a stout, very dark with a light brown head, and with a hint of liquorice in aroma and taste, and roasted barley too. Plenty of body, as you would expect, a bitter-sweet taste with a dry finish, and very decent indeed!

Real Ciders too

So, also real ciders (above), some spirits and wines too, tea and coffee, canned Gun lager, more cans and bottles to come, and a facility for 2 pint 'carry outs.' Crisps and nuts as bar snacks, but with plans for more exciting food. Oh yes, and a Battle Brewery (website) 'tap tasting' will be held this Wednesday the 29th January (website).

I'll be back, cheers!

Hastings: The Tower Beer Fest 2019

Last weekend I wrote a blog about the ale and cider festival being held this weekend at The Tower in London Road, Bohemia, Hastings & St Leonards TN37 6NB, and yesterday I put in a couple of hours voluntarily working at the festival bar. This is one of only 2 pubs I am aware of in Hastings that serve all their ales in over-sized lined glasses, which means a full half or pint every time, and, for their what is now an annual festival, they use bats with 3 thirds of a pint glasses, if you want to try a large number of the ales on offer, cheers Louisa! 

Sorry about the quality of these last 2 indoors photographs, but above is the pub's bar which had 6 of the stronger ales available, out of 18 being served at any one time, plus 7 real ciders and a perry. I only drank 1 of these yesterday, though I have enjoyed before the excellent pale dry hoppy bitterness of Burning Sky Aurora (5.6% - website), and the wonderfully full rich dark Gun Brewery Whisky Imperial Stout (7.4% - website), both from Sussex breweries. Yesterday I tried the Cwrw Ial The Apache Line (website), a 5% pale bitter, with a huge fruity aroma, mango and citrus in the flavour too, not so bitter and dry, but very easy to drink!

And at the bar where I worked as a volunteer for a couple of hours, 12 of the less strong ales were available, plus the excellent stew was served here too. I'll start with the weakest I drank, the 3.9% Salopian Push, and I have to admit a little disappointment, as I'm usually impressed by Shrewsbury based Salopian's ales (website), though for many others it appeared a favourite; exactly why drinking ale is so much fun, nearly an infinite number of possible recipes and something for most! Push is a quite dry bitter ale with hints of fruit and sweet to taste at first, though not quite enough flavour for me, though regular readers will appreciate that I am, and have been called, a "hop monster." Not enough hops for me, certainly not as many as expected.

I then tucked into Yorkshire based Great Heck Brewery Proverbs (4.5% - website), with 2 excellent hops, Citra and Mosaic, used in the brew, which provided a lovely fruity and citrus aroma and taste, and lovely dry bitter finish.  Sticking with the Mosaic hop I enjoyed drinking the single hopped Downlands Mosaic (4.8% and does what it says on the label - website) from West Sussex, a vegan friendly beer, so a wee bit hazy, as no finings used, and with a very BIG aroma, fruitiness bursting up into the nostrils! At first taste I caught a slight sourness to it, but this disappeared as I drank more of this pale golden ale with its lovely dry bitter finish.

The final 2 ales I tried were the Scottish Redcastle Brewery Tower IPA (4.8% - website), a new brewery for me, and apparently using a mix of hops from Britain and the USA; this had a slightly fruity and caramel aroma, with malted biscuit in the taste and a nice dry bitter finish, very enjoyable. The other was the local Sussex Long Man Brewery Special Tower APA Brew (4.8% - website), which I'm guessing was a dry hopped cask of their usual APA, with Willamette and Cascade hops used, hint of citrus fruitiness, and very dry bitter finish.

My favourite ale of the day? Close, but the Downlands Mosaic, cheers Lou!

Ale & Cider Festival Final Day!

OK, it's the final day of the first ale and cider festival at the Tower (also see previous blog) in Bohemia, St Leonards, and I'm hoping they have many more festivals, a great show Louisa! I worked as a volunteer there again earlier today, but drank just 3 different ales this time and, sadly, the excellent Downlands Mosaic had already sold out (see Steve on Hastings blog). However, the Salopian Matrix (4.2%) was very good too, a pale golden ale with a fruity aroma, citrus taste, grapefruit and something more exotic, with a dry bitter finish, and...

Well, the Kent brewer Old Dairy provided another excellent ale to enjoy, that is, their session 3.8% What the Heck! Described as an 'orange pale ale' and it did what it said on the label, an enormous orange aroma, and taste too. This was beautiful, pale, dry and bitter, just what I love... oh yes! If you want to sample the ales, it'd be best to get there today, as they're fast running out, but, if you cannot make it, you never know what good value prices you may get tomorrow, if you're lucky enough that some of these ales are left, if not, still great ales every day anyway, starting at just £3 a pint, cheers!

Ales on the Dark Side...

Apologies for not writing for so long, I've been a bit caught up with my other blog about Hastings, and other stuff, but I have promised to write about darker ales since I wrote about the Milestone Plum Porter and International Stout Day (blog). Since when, I've had a few goodies!

OK, I said "goodies" but actually I meant VERY good darker ales! Staring off with the excellent Black Pig (4.8%) from the 12-barrel plant of Kent brewer Wantsum (website). Described as a "Smooth, Dark Russian Porter", it has a very deep and dark red/brown colour and a hint of liquorice in its aroma, and liquorice and chocolate in the flavour. This is rich, smooth and full bodied, and very drinkable, loved it!

I thought, there's no way I can have any more this year as good as those previous two, but then I had this stout, from Yorkshire brewer Revolutions (website), the excellent stronger Belgian Stout (7%). What can I say, I was only going to have the one pint of it before leaving the pub, but stayed on for a couple more and floated home afterwards! Again, a very deep red/brown colour, a slight liquorice aroma, rich and full bodied, with a hint of roasted malt in the taste. I'll censor how I described it, but suffice to say I thought it was very good... 😉 

Then I found a porter with a difference, from the Sussex brewery Franklins (website), whose pale hoppy ales I regularly enjoy, but this was a very different 'special' from them! Their 5% Smoked Chilli Porter, with beech-smoked malts and chipotle chillies providing the difference, was an amazingly subtle and flavoursome ale. I could taste the chilli, but it was not overpowering, though I can think of a few people who would find it overpowering, no doubt. Actually, it was very easy to drink, so I didn't just have the one pint of this either, VERY nice!

Now, I don't know what you think about chocolate and ale going together, not to everyone's taste I admit, but I have fond memories of eating chocolate fudge cake whilst drinking at the Double Locks (website) on the Exeter Ship Canal, when I lived down there. Also, I used to enjoy drinking Young's Double Chocolate Stout when you could get it on draught from the Ram Brewery in Wandsworth, sadly demised. Anyway, I digress... 

So, my most recent darker ale was from another Sussex brewer, Downlands (website), from whom I had to p..p..p..pick up a Penguin! This 4.7% 'Christmas' ale tasted of chocolate, indeed, with hints of spirit, vanilla and spice, but essentially chocolate+++, rich and smooth, my tasting notes state "gorgeous!" There you have it and, yet again, I drank more than just the one pint...   

Consequently, 5 excellent darker ales were enjoyed recently by Hophead Steve, one of my other nicknames! Quite different, but well worth the change of style from my usual pale hoppy bitters, though I have been drinking many of them recently too, more of very soon, and I will do my best to keep that promise this time. Seasonal greetings and cheers!