h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

There are so many regional varieties and tiny breweries, and what we get outside Germany is usually just your standard Becks-type mass produced lager, that's the thing. They are refreshing enough drinks on a hot day, and by no means the *worst* mass-produced lagers, but there's not a lot of character to them.

I had a very unlucky start in beer - Watneys Red Barrel and Ind Coope Double Diamond It wasn't until I went to Manchester and started drinking Boddingtons, Robinsons, Holts and Marstons that I discovered what beer should be like. There just wasn't any cask beer to be had where I grew up, but that's Romford for you - even Youngs and Fullers couldn't be bothered to open a pub there, but there was (and still is) a free house about 20 minutes drive from where we lived that had hand pumps on the bar as well as keg taps

I've had quite a bit of Adnams, and at the brewery tap. I have some friends in Lowestoft who I used to visit often and most of the pubs near where they live are Adnams, plus we'd often go to Southwold for the day. Very good beer

I don't know what the UK prices are like for Belgian beers but they're not too expensive here. Often they're cheaper than comparable American beers. There's a brewery in Austin already mentioned above - Jester King. They've fashioned themselves as a farmhouse brewery so they lean towards sours, saisons, provision beers, and just recently they started their first batch of lambic, although their first beer was an English dark mild called Commercial Suicide, and they make a Russian imperial stout and a rye IPA. Some of their beers are relatively cheap, but some of them - the sours particularly - are more expensive than a lot of very good Belgian imports such as Rodenbach Grand Cru or Lindemans Cuvee Rene Gueuze, and by as much as 50%, so as much as I'd like to support the local brewery I'll often buy the Belgian.

One of my two favourite summer beers is one of theirs - Le Petit Prince, a 2.9% table beer that you can drink all day with getting bladdered, and it's delicious.

I used to think that Germany meant nothing but lager until I came to Austin. The biggest selling beer in Texas that isn't an American adjunct lager like Lone Star of Budweiser is Shiner Bock. I'd never even heard of bock, a dark, malty lager. I had my first bottle of it after only three days of living here. The I found out about an Austin brewery called Live Oak who specialise in German and Czech styles, none of which are a Becks/Stella/Heineken style lager thank Bob. Live Oak Big Bark amber lager became my favourite beer for a while, until I found Live Oak Pilz, a Czech pilsener, and my *other* favourite summer beer

Why do I keep typing 'of' instead of 'or'?

Well as you know, the back-end-of-beyond-and-then-some I am from, is near* Lowestoft... just the side away from the sea ... There are still a few loverly pubs left there, but they are getting less common, sadly; I had a very unfortunate time there, at Christmas, beer-wise. A few of the pubs, in Oulton Broad, traditional type 'pubs', the beer was off... On several differnt occasions, and differnt beers; Yet they were selling it... and, seemingly, a lot of people were drinking it

Then, in town itself, new years eve, we went into a couple of pubs, and the same thing... The beer was totally off; In one, even getting a Guinness as a substitute, and it was off

The strange thing is, there are several 'wine bars', now, in Oulton Broad, and actually, their decent beer, is really well kept and very drinkible, often Adnams as it happens, and very well kept Just means your sitting in a trendy wine bar, rahter than a proper* pub

Luckily here, in Cambridge, there are a fair few very good real ale pubs, and at least three within spitting distance of where I live; Though sadly they're often just so* busy that they're uncomfortable to be in... especially in the winter, where you can't use the outside areas

I must switch to some less strong beers... I don't drink regularly enough anymore to have much alcohol tollerance, and my recent taste for very dark, very strong stouts and porters, I just get too* drunk, and then really suffer the next day So maybe a nice long summer, of light, and lower-strength beers will be a good idea (err lower strength I mean under about 4.5%)

I think you're in the wrong place to be getting 4% or less tasty pale Ale 2 Legs. Up here around the Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds etc, it's what the breweries just get on churning out and they taste grand. Marble Pint (3.9%), Magic Rock Curious (3.9%), Buxton Moor Top (3.6%), Thornbridge Wild Swan (3.5%), Hawkshead Windermere Pale (3.9%), Leeds Pale (3.8%), Liverpool Organic Pale (4.0%), Redwillow Headless (3.9%), Millstone Tiger Rut (4.0%), almost anything by Mallinsons brewery

And that's just the ones I can think of right now!

I need to find a decent, locally available session beer for my motorcycle club's annual rally (drunkfest). I've made the mistake in the past of bringing really good but high octane beer and blattering myself before all the fun stuff happens that I hear about afterward.

(Note, Belgian style ales are not session beers. Something I learned after twice diving headfirst into my ice chest.)

I refer the honourable gentleman to my earlier comments about Jester King Le Petit Prince (2.9%) and Commercial Suicide (3.5%), although those might not be as easy to find in Houston as they are in Austin http://jesterkingbrewery.com/beers/

Phil, have you any idea how thirsty, not to mention you're making me? And it's only 9.30am

Our local has beers from all over the UK, so a couple of those I've seen before... Last night I had a couple of beers from the Colchester brewery, both at 4.5%, I had the 'double brown' which I prefered, but they ran out of that so I had their Mild instead... So, not quite managing to get lighter, pale hoppy beers, last night managed to avoid the worse bits of the hangover today, which was good for a change

Le Petite Prince was available on tap at a new place down the road from work called Nobi. Neat place. Beer and mostly Vietnamese food. They have around 30 taps and over 100 bottled beers. I've had their grilled chicken spring rolls and grilled pork w/vermicelli.

I can't bring myself to go there for lunch as the beer is too enticing.

Sounds a bit dangerous... nice food.... yum.... but tricky to avoid having a beer at the same time

I've still not gotten to try any of the beer from 'The brew house', the renamed 'bun shop', a pub in town here, which brews its own beer... I think they opened this or last year and I keep getting very beer envious, reading the tweets from the Milton brewery, and their pubs, listing the beers they've got on.... actually with the brewry, an dpub tweeters I follow, its like a beer porn stream, just seeing the beers listed, and not being able to have them

It's tough to find what most of us would think of as a session beer - under 4%. I just checked the Independence website and even their, shall we say, everyday beers like Bootlegger Brown, Independence Pale and Austin Amber are a few degrees either side of 5%. Austin Beerworks have nothing under 5%, nor do Real Ale or Hops and Grain. Circle's beers are all between 4% and 5% but they're draft-only and you probably can't them in Houston anyway. But you've got Saint Arnold Fancy Lawnmower at 4.9%.

I wish this brewery would expand its distribution to Texas *sigh* http://www.notchbrewing.com/

Hmmm... $72 for a case of Le Petit Prince (12x750ml)...

That might work. I could alternate between that and something around 6% remain compos mentis and non vertically challenged.

What's the format for this bikers' junket? Do you all ride out to a field somewhere and get blotto?

OK... I think I know my plan now. I'll get a few bottles of the Le Petit Prince and stick to my old standby, cans of either Boddingtons or Belhaven Scottish Ale topped off with Dundee Honey Brown lager. That'll keep me below 5%.

Quite a lot of pubs will do sub 4% beer in these parts. Large swathes of Manchester are still dominated by the local family brewers (Holts, Hydes, Lees and Robinsons) who all produce at least a cask bitter and usually mild. The biggest problem is they're not very exciting and often aren't kept as well as they could be, with most people opting for mass-produced, mass-carbonated lager or nitrokeg smooth bitter or stout.

Now this evening I'm off on a trip up to Blackburn to visit Thwaites' brewery. Their core range like most regionals isn't great but they have been doing some interesting stuff on a small 'craft' plant within their main brewery. Fallen Nun, a black ipa, won the peoples choice award at the last national winter ales festival (which is why a bunch of us have been invited up there) and most other stuff that has come out as part of that range has been more interesting and flavourful. I hope that trend continues

When I lived in Accrington I drank Thwaites Mild almost every day, and Holts Mild or Robinsons Mild when I lived in Moss Side

Well, Spec's let me down. I dropped by one of the local Spec's last Saturday to a) to see if they just possibly had the le Petit Prince (highly unlikely) b) order 6 bottles to be sent down from their downtown location.

They didn't have it as I expected, but I had checked their website and they did have some downtown. So, I ordered it.

I didn't hear anything Monday, so Tuesday I called to check. They don't get their weekly shipments until Wednesday, I was told, so I said thanks. Yesterday, I stopped by on my way home from work eager to take it home. No Luck! What? Why?

I didn't get a satisfactory answer. I got some hemming and hawing about authorization or something. I guess Spec's just isn't the same as the once were. They've expanded greatly since I last dealt with them other than to just drop in and pick up stuff. Back when the nearest one was a few towns up the freeway (and none were outside of Harris County) they prided themselves on offering to have anything from downtown sent to your local store the next day. I'm guessing that maybe this "authorization" may have something to do with non-compete agreements between suppliers and distributors or something. All I know is I'm not ing happy about it. I can understand that they couldn't get it shipped down, but why did they let me think they could? Or if they weren't sure, why didn't they call me when they were? But more importantly, why didn't they even seem to know ANYTHING when I stopped in and asked them? They just ed.



I've thought of calling them today to find out exactly what happened (or didn't happen), but it would do me no good now anyway.

Oh, well.

I've noticed an increasing dissatisfaction with Spec's in the local beer geek forums lately, but to be fair, Jester King's distributor is also getting a lot of criticism. There could be a mix of both in this.

As far as Spec's is concerned though, the degree of one-hand-not-knowing-what-the-other-is-doing always increases (sometimes exponentially) as a company gets bigger. To an extent I can understand it - an organisation inevitably gets more complicated, officious and inflexible as it gets bigger, but there's an easy way to take the edge off this - keep everything as local as possible and give localities a high degree of autonomy. I've experienced something like this too, with beer but not from Spec's.

Le Petit Prince WAS listed as discontinued in their computer. I don't know if that affects things or not. But, like I said, I'm less upset that they couldn't get it shipped down than I am for them not giving me a reason nor calling to let me know this or explaining the issues when I ordered it.

It must have been more than 10 years ago since I was told by the local Spec's manager that they could get ANYTHING from the downtown store next day. Back then, I think there might have only been a dozen or so Spec's locations and all of them were in the greater Houston area within Harris Co. Back then, it wouldn't have been a big deal to have a driver go to each location each day. Now it's a lot different and the local only getting deliveries on Wednesdays is a good indicator of that growth. The thing is, Spec's now has a strangle hold on the market and I don't see anyone else being able to compete for selection. I've also noticed less selection and quality at the local level of Spec's lately as well. The one I went to is one of the worst. It's fairly small and getting a bit 'decrepit' looking.