Birmingham Beer Heroes, No.1 - David Byrne

In this, the first of an unspecific series, we meet the first of our nominated Birmingham Beer Heroes. Birmingham Beer heroes, people who have added a touch of pizzazz to our drinking landscape with their ingenuity, skill and fortitude.  Here then is David Byrne* (@DSByrne), who is on a quest to [literally] drink himself around the planet.  What follows is the text of an actual interview between me and him.  It's like real journalism, isn't it?

"

So tell us about your project - you're aiming to drink at least one beer from each of the countries in the world, is that right?

Yes, the aim is to drink 280 beers: no more than one from each country, each state in the USA and each county in England.

First question (the obvious one) - Why?

A personal challenge, and something to encourage me to try different beers. Just a little bit of fun really.

So that's your answer and you're sticking to it, but honestly, what drives you to do this - is it a love of collecting/documenting, or an appreciation of World beer heritage?

Mostly I like drinking beer and trying new things. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a collectors streak and this is something to spend my money on other than late 80s alt-rock records.

Presumably you keep notes, photos details of each beer as 'proof'?

Of course, every beer is documented on twitter with a photo and it’s number in the challenge. I’ve got a scratch off world map and have documented on a map on the internet as well. Initially I considered a blog, but it turns out drinking a lot of beer and then making time to write it isn’t so easy!

You're a ticker.  We all are.  It's what makes us sane.  How far are you along?  Have you nearly finished?

I’m about 130 beers in. Just less than half way numbers wise... not in time though!

OK, so stating the beetling obvious, but some countries must be easier to tick off than others?

Obviously it’s getting progressively more difficult. I’ve exhausted anything I can get in supermarkets, specialist off-licences and it’s even getting tricky on online specialists.

Of the ones that you have not done, what are the common factors - small countries?  Far flung? No beer heritage in that country?

A number of factors: prohibition (although this hasn’t stopped all), no exports or small far flung places which the UK just doesn’t trade with. There are a couple of annoying countries which have alluded me – who knew South Africa was so hard!

How will you tackle countries where alcohol is actively discouraged or banned?

I’ve had to accept that some of my beers with be non-alcoholic. I’ve recently had UAE and Iran – there’s just no way around that.

I know the answer to this one, but will ask anyway..... what type of beers are you mainly getting hold of from these varied locations?

I’ve had flavoured “malt” drinks which are advertised as beer (and acknowledged as beer on Ratebeer). One was lemon, one was apple. Not the same as a proper beer but fairly drinkable.

Hmmm.  you must now be an expert on Pale Lagers - are they much of a muchness or have there been some standouts?

I’ve gone for – wherever possible – a range of different styles of beer. There have been a lot of pale lagers. A lot of the asian beers have been fairly poor lagers, but I do really like the robust Eastern European beers such as Zywiec and Viru.

Time to put your money where your mouth is - what is the best beer you have tried during this project?

By far and away my favourite beer has been Einstok Toasted Porter from Iceland. I’ve gone on to try all of the Einstok range of beers which I can recommend highly.

And what was the worst?

Uinta Brewing Company XVII anniversary Barley Wine Ale from Utah. Who knew an almost entirely dry state made such bad beer?! It may well be to somebody’s taste, but it tasted to me like someone had spiked my beer with vodka.

A project like this requires a strong support team; who have you enlisted to help out?

My girlfriend has helped a lot – she’s a serious cataloguer/organiser and I quite often find her trawling the internet for beer. She also managed to persuade her friends and family to send beer from holidays and travel – managed to get Cape Verde and Tanzania this way! My friends have been great too – helping with making my incessant online ordering a little more normal and of course stopping me from having to drink all on my own – so thanks to @grammaticalrecords and @natef15her.

There must have been some moments of euphoria, as you located a new country.  What has been your greatest moment to date?

After having bought Nogne #100 (Norway) quite early on, I managed to save it to drink as my 100^th. Not a bad beer, but a great feeling of achievement.

There must have been some surprise finds too...... tell us about them.

The biggest surprise was finding the non-alcoholic beers – mostly because it was a find that I wasn’t looking for it. One of the most satisfying finds was finding a South Korean supermarket and realising they stock South Korean beer (Hite – and very reasonably priced too!). It’s lucky we live in such a multi-cultural city.

Will there come a point where you give up or will you still be doing this in 30 years time?

I don’t intend to give up until it’s a completed project – however the pace of new beers slows quickly and I imagine it will continue to do so.

Has this project changed you?  Will you ever be able to enjoy beer like you used to?

The project was more a sign of how my beer drinking had changed, rather than the other way round. When I first started drinking, I only drank premium lagers such as Stella or Kronenbourg. However, during my early twenties I started discovering ales and stouts.

And what beers would you like to drink were you not on this mission?  What is your favourite style(s)?

Guinness would be my “go to drink” or often whichever guest ale I haven’t previously tried.

Mediocre Beer Adventures loves this project.  I use Ratebeer to keep track of my finds in exactly the same way, and as is well documented, I love to visit small off licences, looking for obscure beers.  We are brothers.

Thank you for you time - any closing remarks?

It’s good to see that with the help of Stirchley Wines, Cotteridge Wines, Rai Wines, as well as pubs like The Post Office Vaults and The Wellington it’s now really easy to get good variety of quality beer.

"

Couldn't have said it better myself.  If anyone spots beer from any obscure countries, or is going on holiday to Bhutan, perhaps they could drop David a line, via Twitter. 

*This link is a hoax.

The Highest Form of Beer? (An attempted Beerage)

When you don't blog for over a week, there is always the danger that one will lose the essential thrust, the purposeful desire.  Here then is a sketched discussion, as a means to stimulate the creative juices once more.

I was sipping a sour beer this evening in the Post Office Vaults, a Petrus Aged Pale to be precise.  It was delicious, but then again all "Sour Ales" are, aren't they?  And if indeed this is the case, are Sour Ales an inherently prestigious style of beer, a style which is automatically enjoyed by beer fans because of their provenance and heritage?  Perhaps, in order to obtain status within the beer drinking fraternity, appreciation of the more 'refined' beer styles is a sort of marker on the path to enlightenment, a bit like moving along Scientology's Bridge to Total Freedom or whatever.

Now this is an interesting discussion in itself, but what I really wanted to have a bash at here, was a sort of rough outline of where some beer types might feature in a hierarchy of styles.  If the average lager lout thinks John Smiths Extra Smooth has too much flavour, then Lager must be lower than John Smiths according to a/the/my theory of beer appreciation.  But then again, even lager fans recognise higher forms of lager - Becks or Peroni, as opposed to Carling or Stella Fosters.  The status quo is constantly rocked by trying new beers.   All beer fans have gateway beers - beers which perhaps move them a notch up the beer hierarchy.  For my part, I tried Hoegaarden and it made me want more flavour.  Later I tried Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and it opened my eyes to new hops.  See what is happening here?  One's palette is developing and this leads to appreciation of styles which are seen as 'better'.  But what is the prescribed/recommended consensual route up the ladder?  And what's at the top.

Using my general observations and with an eye on the Ratebeer rankings, here then is my peerage, or, if you will, my beerage.

1. Abt/Quadrupel

2. Gueuze, Barley Wine, Belgian Strong Ale

3. Imperial Stout

4. Sour Ale, Doppelbock, Double IPA

5. Tripel, India Pale Ale, Smoked, Berliner Weisse

6. Saison, Dubbel

7. Kolsch, Alt, Lambic (fruit), Porter, Stout

8. Marzen, American Pale Ale, Belgian Wit, German Hefeweizen

9. Bitter, Mild, German / Bohemian Pilsener

10. Pale Lager

11. Low Alcohol

(n.b. levels are indicated by numbers, with most prestigious at the top, duh.  Styles which are of roughly equal standing, stand next to each other, duh).

So how does that look?  An initial examination for sure, but does it strike a note of sanity, or is it complete cobblers?

p.s. If someone could put this into a Powerpoint style organisational chart, I'm sure this idea could be presented in a much more illuminating way.

p.p.s. Someone (maybe lots of people) have probably had this same discussion, many times before.  A cursory Google search didn't reveal these discussions, but if they do exist, and I have subconciously pinched these ideas, then I apologise.  

The Lager Trilogy - Part II

Previously I revealed the 10 Premium Lagers which I've rated highest on Ratebeer.  I also looked at the fact that the most famous lager brands always taste better in their home country.  All very obvious stuff really.

This post is a lot less wordy, but will contain a greater density of lists, so look away now, if that grinds your gears.

First off, I should previously have attempted to explain the differences between Pale Lager and Premium Lager according to Ratebeer.  But better (and quicker) still, just click the aforelinked phrases and they can do it themselves.

Just out of interest, my 10 highest rated Pale Lagers are:

1. Dent Rambrau
2. Radegast Premium
3. Borsodi Sor
4. Cains Finest Lager
5. Obolon Lager
6. Hancock Høker Bajer
7. Bali Hai
8. Vratislav Premium
9. Fischer Tradition
10. Kronenbourg Kanterbrau

Now, more importantly, onto the meat of the matter.  In the grand scheme of things my top 10 Pale Lagers are beers I enjoyed in spite of myself.  But German Pilseners... well now you're talking my language (English).

First sampled in Berlin in 2001 and then eagerly sought out in the UK, this is a Ratebeer style that does get me purring.  Lager as artform, cultural lubricant and liquid evidence of German precision.  These are beers that taste marvellous in the bars of Munich and Hamburg, and thankfully, they also travel well.

1. Jever Pilsener
2. Furstenberg Premium Pilsener
3. Veltins Pilsener
4. Keesman Bamberger Herren Pils
5. Augustiner Pils
6. Wernesgruner Pils
7. Bitburger Premium Pils
8. Warsteiner Premium Pils
9. Rothaus Pils Tannen Zapfle
10. Eichbaum Pilsener 

German beer hit me like Thor's hammer, when I first stuck my nose in the trough a decade back.  Each of the ten above are masterful examples of grassy, golden fluted clarity.  For me, Jever is clearly the toppermost of the poppermost, but the thought of both Augustiner and Warsteiner, sampled in a Munich biergarten or a Kreuzberg hipster joint leaves me equally inflated with joy.

I didn't imagine any lager could pip the Germans, even though I regularly enjoyed several pints of Staropramen at the Hogshead each and every Friday evening, throughout 2003.  However, it was when sampling Czech goods in Prague a year later, that I had my most sustained and pleasurable lager epiphany.

Czech beer.  Boy of boy.  Yet another example of beer tasting better in it's home territory. And then some.  The beers in the following list induced tremors of ecstacy and squirrels of disbelief as I eagerly scoffed them by the vase in Strahov, Josefov and Vinohrady.  Ratebeer (pleasingly) separates Bohemian Pilsener as another lager off-shoot, here are my premiere dix:

1. Pilsner Urquell
2. Bernard Světlý Ležák 12° (Premium)
3. Gambrinus Premium Svetlý Ležák 12°
4. Starobrno Premium Lager
5. Budweiser Budvar (Czechvar) 12°
6. Krušovice Světlé 10°
7. Kratochwill Svetlo
8. Kozel Premium Lager 12°
9. Hostan Praga
10. ’t IJ Plzen

Strangely enough, a Slovenian beer sneaks in at 7, and a Dutch one at 10, but still.  Here are some blatant examples of lager that transcends: nectary, light, bubbly, ethereal, firm, yet insistent.  Light years from Carlsberg (Export or otherwise) on tap in the hotspots of Brum.

The final list today is my top 10 Dortmunder/Helles beers.  I'll be honest: my brain has addled and I can't really remember what separates a Dortmunder/Helles from a German Pilsener or indeed a Pale or Premium Lager, but that's beside the point.  Here:

1. Augustiner Lagerbier Hell
2. Kaltenberg Vilagos
3. Weltenburger Urtyp Hell
4. Airbrau FliegerQuell
5. Recken Export
6. Andechser Spezial Hell
7. Thurn und Taxis Hell
8. Spaten Münchner Hell / München / Premium
9. Hofbrau Munchen Original
10. Andechser Hell

Well that final top 10 certainly raised the dribble quotient somewhat.  I'd forgotten just what lovely beers reside in the Dortmunder/Helles category.  In retrospect, German lager is undoubtedly so good, that they deserve two style categories to themselves.  Sorted.

My visits to Germany and Czech Republic occurred at the height of my beer travails.  In fact, somewhat serendipitously, they also coincided with the period of my greatest European frontier pushing generally: my beer world got bigger as my physical boundaries became looser. Quite poetic really.

But after Germany and Czech Republic, where is there to go for good lager?  The peaks have been scaled, the best have been discovered.  What is left?  Excess.

In my final lager post, I try to extrapolate my top lagers (irrespective of style) and I puzzle over what lager challenges remain (if any).

Best.

One: The Lager Trilogy

It seems apt to talk about lager now, as at this very moment the BBC is reporting that sales are in the down position.  

For a long time, I've been off lager.  It's attraction, so often linked to convenience, weather, or some desire to be contrary finally wilted about 2 years ago, even though I didn't actually notice until recently.  Lager seemed to represent the antithesis of my beer world view: we never purposely frequented the same pubs anymore.  But it hadn't always been that way.   

I wrote about Mild this week, with which I had a very positive, finite relationship.  My lager story is slightly more quixotic: I'm not sure it's been as productive or cheery.

Because Ratebeer's classification of Lager styles is very extensive, I've chopped this post into three parts, to avoid a mind numbingly thorough brick of text.

One of the most important beers in my life was a lager - Fosters in fact.  When I finally tired of being the only cider drinker in each and every social group I was a part of, I knew that I would have to dive right into lager and get it done. Fosters was a good choice for this, cos it didn't have an overwhelming (or indeed any) flavour.  I liked it, I could drink it, and it was ubiquitous.  It served it's purpose, as I broadened my beer knowledge.  From there, it was an easy road to Budweiser, Rolling Rock, Becks, Grolsch, Stella et al.

In the years between 2001-2003 however, I noticed something - namely that when I travelled to continental Europe, the lager there (Berlin, Amsterdam, Brussels etc) tasted better than here.  I initially put this down to different lagers being available; but sometimes even the same beers tasted better in other countries, than they did here.  Thus a bipolar relationship with lager was born.

I was already a victim of lager branding, being sucked into spending extra ££ on bottled Sagres, Castle, Nastro Azzuro et al, rather than Castlemaine XXXX, but my travel was amplifying this lager hierarchy.  I loved Jupiler and Maes when fresh in Antwerp, I even loved Stella, when sampled in Leuven; but in the UK, I would run a mile from these same brands.  In short, lager in UK = raspberry noise, lager abroad = comedy hooter. 

So the lagers I enjoyed were determined not just by by the brewery, but by the circumstances of the sample. Obviously this is the same situation with real ale, but seems a little more twisted, given that lager is a pretty steady product.  In my personal beer ranking taxonomy, this presents a problem...... what is a good lager?  Ratebeer seemed (and seems) to have the same problem, which it solves by classifying Pale Lagers and Premium Lagers separately.  It also makes distinctions between Bohemian and Classic German Pilseners and Dortmunder/Helles.  Clearly lager is a beer style with self worth issues, perhaps even schizophrenia.

Therefore my story of lager, by which I mean the lagers I have the fondest memories of [rated the highest] is shaped, perhaps even predetermined by the need to preamble, to over explain.

This has already gone on too long, so lets just plonk down a list.  Here are my top ranked Premium Lagers:

1. Kulmbacher Monchshof Maingold Landbier
2. Thisted Thy Økologisk Humle
3. Svyturys Jubiliejinis 1784
4. Hepworth Blonde
5. Lech Premium
6. Williams Brothers Caesar Augustus
7. Kona Longboard Lager
8. Samuel Smiths Pure Brewed Lager
9. Tatra Jasne Pelne (Pils)
10. Zubr

So what do I learn from this?  Well numbers 1 and 6 are arguably not lagers at all; 2 is Danish, 3 is Lithuanian, 4 & 8 are UK real ales, 5, 9 & 10 are Polish and 7 is Hawaiian.  Aside from the fact that very a lot of the top 10 are lagers that masquerade as not lagers at all, the most striking thing is that I obviously enjoy East European lagers - and that is true.

So much so that I have spent the past few days hunting down some of the more obscure bottled and canned continental lagers, which have snuck into Birmingham under the radar.  Places like Lithuanica and Casper are great for this, and there is still something about finding a new lager which excites me more than it should.  Perhaps the very phenomenon that I referred to above (i.e. local lager tasting best in situ) has encouraged the economic migrants entering the UK from Europe to demand that their lager follows them.

People think I'm joking, but honestly, lagers from Poland keep tempting me back to the genre in a way that no amount of special/cut-price/BOGOF deals in supermarkets can do.  Why is this?  Well perhaps it's a reminder of my days of travel, a taste of the [relatively] exotic and the thrill of discovery.

As for lagers that are unarguably tasty, Part Two of this trilogy will look at the best of the best.      

    

Ratebeer Best 2012 - Part Two

OK, just a quick post, as promised to wrap up the fascinating results of Ratebeer's annual beer survey.

Looking at the different beer styles, it's clear to see that US beers dominate across a lot of the categories. This is the case with English Style Pale and Bitters where 2 of the top 4  are American.  Thankfully, 2 of my favourites feature in the top 10 also: Citra and Taipan, both from Oakham.

Some familiar names pop up near the top of various charts e.g. Ayinger Celebrator is top of the Bocks, Stone scoop the 3rd and 10th best IPAs, with Founders taking the top 2 Stout positions.  The Belgian Strong list is crammed full of familiar names like Chimay, Westvleteren and Rochefort, whilst the appearance of Orval at number 3 on the Belgian Session list, is two spots too low as far as I'm concerned.

Of course, for most of the style categories, we have little chance of seeing the winners in Birmingham (based on current form), however we are pretty well served for Belgians, between Stirchley Wines and Post Office Vaults, so things are moving in the right direction.

Finally, a glance at the list of the World's best beer bars is enough to make you dig out your passport.  Top spots feature in Amsterdam, Antwerp, Brussels, Rome and Prague - all within reach of budget airlines.  Unfortunately for the UK there are only two venues which make the cut: CASK Pub and Kitchen and Craft Beer Co - both in London and both owned by the same company.  These are certainly two fantastic venues, but sadly for Birmingham, our representative on the list, The Wellington disappears, after making the cut in 2011 and 2010.  This is a bit of a downer, but is probably not a real reflection on the Welly, just that the levels are constantly rising and that a beer bar has to go even further now, to stand out from the crowd.

p.s.
On the lookout for obscure facts?  How's this for you: I have on top of my fridge a bottle of Canada's 49th best beer Charlevoix Vache Folle Imperial Milk Stout. Fascinating eh?

Ratebeer Best 2012 - Part One

For the uninitiated, Ratebeer is a worldwide beer 'rating' website, where users score and review the different beers they have tried.  It's a fascinating mine of beer information, not just on individual brews, but also on the places to drink them.

Last week Ratebeer released the results of it's annual 'Best' awards, where they agglomerate the scores entered during the past 12 months, run whatever algorithms they run and then proclaim which beers and beer bars are the best in the world, by region and beer style.

It's all fascinating stuff, especially for a sad git like me, who revels in statistics and chompable lumps of data.  But for those who take a more pragmatic view of 'this sort of thing', here is an abridged version if you like, with some highlights handpicked by moi.

First off, lets look at the overall list of the 50 best beers.  The number 1 is Westvleteren 12, a very famous Belgian Quadrupel, which is usually there or thereabouts in polls such as this.  Other familiar faces include: Rochefort 10, Pannepot and St. Bernadus 12, two of which are available at Stirchley Wines.  A lot of the remaining 50 are American, from big-name brewers such as Alesmith, Russian River, Bells, Stone, Goose Island and Founders.  The number three beer on the list: Goose Island Bourbon Stout was purchased by me on Monday (and I cannot wait to try this 13% beast); but a lot of the others are either not available in Birmingham, or not available in the UK at all.   

Another prominent name on the list is Danish brewer Mikkeller, who are now [thankfully] available in Brum, and are well worth seeking out for their large and interesting flavours.

Moving onto the list of the Best Brewers: the top spot is taken by Three Floyds, of Indiana, with the top UK brewery being The Kernel at number 39.  The other two English brewers on the list are Samuel Smith and Thornbridge, with Brewdog and Harviestoun there to represent Scotland.  Again, as Ratebeer is a US-based site, there are a lot of North American brewers on the list, but I'm glad to see one of my favourite international outfits - the Norwegian brewery Nogne, right up there at 41.

As a more interesting exercise and rather than me just commentating on the results, I thought it would be interesting to continue a previous blog post and examine the list of Top 50 UK beers in a bit more detail, to register which ones I have spotted in Brum. 

So, of the top 50, 21 are the work of the Kernel, and a good few of these will have been available at SWS.  There are then: 4 Magic Rock, 2 Brewdog, 3 Thornbridge, a Fullers, a Brakspear, a Theakston, 2 Oakham - all of which should (should) have been in the City at some point.  In the case of the Magic Rock, their appearance has only been within the last couple of weeks.  I think we've probably had a least a couple of the Buxton and Marble beers on offer, but I'm really not sure about the Arbor, Tempest, Old King Henrys or the Redemption collaboration.  All in all a pretty heartwarming hit rate for top beers having popped up in our locale, but then again it has to be recognised that most of these have been witnessed in bottled form, in one single location.  If we were ticking off the ones spotted on tap in City pubs, there would only have been a handful.  So consider the backslapping tempered slightly. 

The most interesting inclusion is from local brewery Sadlers, whose Hop Bomb makes an appearance at 31.  This is a marvellous beer, which caused me to dribble all down my front when gladly devouring a foaming pint at Sadlers' brewery tap - the Windsor Castle in Lye.  It is a massive achievement for one of our local breweries to be mixing it amongst the nationally feted company described above.  Bravo!    

Tomorrow I'll have a bit of a nose through some of the other categories, but right now, I'm cream crackered, so I'm off to bed.  I'll keep it short tomorrow, so don't worry.   

Hello.

I probably should have introduced myself earlier.

I'm Dan. I love trying new beers and I love visiting good pubs.  What do I mean by good?  I generally mean pubs that serve a good range of good beers.  What do I mean by good beers?  Oh I don't know, probably I mean beers that are brewed with integrity and passion, which have interesting, distinct flavours.  Usually I also like beers with lots of hops.

Since 2003 I have also been rating beers.  Here's my page on Ratebeer. I had a break between 2007-2010, but I have resumed my duties now.

I also like putting together Beer Maps >>>> here's one for Birmingham.

Given half a chance, I'd spend every other Saturday gallivanting round the country sampling the wares of hot new brewers, but on balance, it's probably better that I behave like a responsible parent.  

Sorry, this post was a bit functional wasn't it?  Probably necessary though.

(occurrences of the word probably in this post - 4)