Thread: Beer with me
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Old November 9th 18, 08:32 PM posted to rec.photo.digital
alvey[_2_]
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Default Beer with me

On Fri, 9 Nov 2018 13:51:25 +0000, newshound wrote:

On 09/11/2018 03:23, alvey wrote:
On Thu, 08 Nov 2018 22:03:13 -0500, Tony Cooper wrote:

On Fri, 9 Nov 2018 12:28:23 +1000, alvey wrote:

On Thu, 08 Nov 2018 19:54:54 -0500, Tony Cooper wrote:

On Thu, 08 Nov 2018 19:51:01 -0500, Tony Cooper
wrote:

In the US, a person who orders a beer in a bar

You can ignore this thread.

Why? It's more interesting than a lot of the usual drivel.

Anyway, to posit an answer... There's far more choices of beer in the UK
than there are in the USA and it's not uncommon for drinkers to have
different beers in different pubs. Or even in the same pub. The UK pub
scene is grand. There's usually a vast choice within walking distance of
home and the tone is much more relaxed and happily sociable than any other
country I've drunk in.


I've been to the UK several times, but always had a problem knowing
what beer to order. When I found one I liked, the temptation was to
order that same one again, but the other temptation to try something
else looking for one even better.


It's difficult to find a bad one. On one trip I was (mostly) there for 3
months and set a goal of trying 100 different beers. Made it to 97 and only
had two that were ****e; Wandsworth 6X and something that I can't recall
but do remember returning it orally to where I suspect it originated, the
Shipping Canal in Manchester.


A complication for the UK beer drinker is that the *proper* draught
stuff is unpasturised and un-filtered, so that there is much more chance
of infections causing "off" flavours if either the brewery or the pub
landlord are not sufficiently careful. This also means that unless a pub
has sufficient turnover, you may well get a pint that is past its best
even if it hasn't reached the stage of having a detectable vinegar aroma.

When I started drinking 50-odd years ago, if three or four lads went
into a pub, even their "local", they would each start with a half of
something different, to decide which was the best on the day.

Visiting a strange pub, the experienced drinker will try to figure out
what the locals are drinking before ordering. It's not wise to ask the
landlord what he recommends, because that will often be a barrel that is
moving slowly.

In the old days, a bad pint of Wadworth's 6X was virtually unknown,
because it was produced by a relatively small Somerset brewery and not
shipped very far. Now it is produced by one of the big brewers, and
afficionados do not consider it to be the same thing. I still fondly
remember my first pint of 6X, not least because the landlord actually
apologised because it was "from the wood", this being in the days when
"keg" beer (i.e. pasturised and filtered and shipped in metal barrels)
was considered modern.

I think there is less "bad beer" around now than there was "back then"
because standards have risen. But I'd still consider about one pint in
ten to be unsatisfactory.

Less beer is being drunk too. In the old days many breweries would
deliver to their local pubs in 36 gallon barrels, and these would be
drunk in a couple of days. Now, you only sometimes find "18s" and a lot
of beer is delivered in "9s". (These used to be known as a barrel, a
kilderkin, and a firkin respectively).

The English gallon is of course larger than the American one, at 4.6 litres.


Thanks newshound. Most informative and interesting.



alvey



alvey