The cask task

JD Wetherspoon Real Ale Festival: are any words more stirring to the human soul?  Late October means it's time for my annual ritual of cycling out to the South County coast and seeing what's on the pumps in my two locals. I usually stop in Blackrock first but decided to start in Dún Laoghaire this year, to catch the cavernous Forty Foot before it got loud and crowded. As in recent years, English hops was the theme, with every one of the 30 festival beers using nothing but.

An awkward five new ones were on the wickets and I began with three thirds. Banks's Gold Ingot certainly looks the part: a perfect blingy gold colour. Spicy and citrus is promised on the clip but that's a bit of an exaggeration. It is plenty bitter though, the grass and metal of down-home English hops, with East Kent Goldings, First Gold and Flyer being the varieties billed in the programme. A light biscuit malt sits behind this but that's about your lot. The galvanic pencil sharpener metal is the last bit to fade from the palate. It's certainly punchy and invigorating, but very much in an English way, a flavour which precludes modern fripperies like citrus.

Bigger things were expected from the first of the international collaborations, Hop Session, brewed at Everards with Afro-Caribbean Brewing of Cape Town. It's a slightly darker gold than the previous one, though the same 4.3% ABV. There's a little bit of a tropical buzz here, achieved with Bramling Cross, Challenger and Cascade. Not quite pineapple and passionfruit, but definitely something approaching a mango, set against harder grapefruit and spinach. The malt is an afterthought but there's just enough of it to keep the hops buoyant and, if not in balance, at least not harsh. While almost passing for a new world beer, its roots show at the end, however, with an earthy metallic twang.

And thirdly of the thirds, Theakston Vanilla Stout, ratcheting up that ABV to a hulking 4.5%. It tastes like more, though: thick and rich and sweet. A bitter treacle overtone shows the hops working in the background while the main action is a dialectic struggle between sticky vanilla and dry roast. While I enjoyed it, a third was plenty.

The last two weren't actually part of the festival line-up, but that's no reason not to tick the buggers. Next is Blondie by Nottinghamshire's Grafton Brewery. Closer to copper than blonde, by the looks of it. It's sweet and tart, like sour candy with a hint of strawberry shortcake. Summer fruit is definitely what I found in the aroma when I'd sipped down far enough to smell it. An out-of-keeping putty bitterness is where the flavour ends. Not a bad beer overall, and rather more interesting than I was expecting.

We stay in the Midlands for the last round: Sadler's Peaky Blinder black IPA, brewed with today's craft-beer-inclined Brummie gangster in mind. It's fully black and smells powerfully of cabbagewater, molasses and sherbet: a combination which promises complexity, if not actually a good time. And so it is in the flavour. It has a soft effervescence and strong herbal-floral taste that probably looked lovely on paper but ends up tasting like old bathwater. There's an intensity which I'm sure comes from the hops but which doesn't deliver proper hop-like flavours. It's extremely rare for me to be saying that a black IPA needs extra bitterness but I think this one does. I love black IPAs that are sweet and tropical and also enjoy the extremely green and vegetal ones. This takes a third path and I don't really want to follow it.

Time to turn the ship around and make for Blackrock. The Three Tun Tavern had its new Cask Marque cert propped on the bar. Well done to them and, with the system seemingly live in Ireland, I hope some of the non-Wetherspoon cask-serving pubs will take advantage of it.

Another round of thirds, starting with Tring's Warrior Queen, a 4.6% ABV pale ale. Not much of an aroma from this but the flavour is a weird squeaky green bean thing, all sharply tangy with a chalky mineral backdrop. It's very odd. The literature tells me that Fusion is the hop what done it. Use with caution, I guess.

Next it's Epic Brew from Wadworth, a golden ale brewed with Epic hops. It's only 4.5% ABV but very thick and sweet with a floral sort of spice. After a few minutes of trying to place what it reminded me of I came up with honey: it's that specific mix of summer meadow pollen and sticky sugar with an edge of waxy bitterness. It finishes quickly, adding a lager feel. Epic is an overstatement but it's decent stuff, for one at least.

Old Crafty Hen is next, a Greene King brand extension I've seen many times in clear glass bottles and would normally have passed over except the programme mentioned it includes Greene King's near-mythical 5X strong ale in the blend. I'm in. This occupies the madman slot in the Wetherspoon festival line-up: there's always at least one big strong beer, though at just 6.5% ABV OCH is lighter than usual. It's lovely, though: a big juicy tannic raisin thing, soft and sumptuous. I expected building sweetness but it doesn't do that, staying dry and clean all the way down. I'm really surprised at how much I enjoyed it, but the chances of me buying it in a clear bottle are still basically nil.

Right, next set of thirds. Evan Evans Autumn Frenzy. Copper-coloured, with a maple syrup sort of sweetness. The watery finish has this weird savoury mushroom quality making me wonder if they're going for a full-on forest floor leafmold thing. So, OK, it's autumnal, but nobody wants to drink a third of a pint of fungal maple syrup. I think I get what it's trying to be, but there's still a really dull brown bitter at its core, dragging down all the seasonal bells and whistles.

In the middle is Titanic Brewery's SEA ("seriously enigmatic ale" -- if ever a name suggested a batch of something else that went wrong), another brown one, at 5% ABV, and another odd one. The flavour is more muted than Autumn Frenzy, but it's thicker, almost like a gloopy nitrokeg bitter. That mushroom thing is there again but this time there are no brighter notes to lift it off the forest litter. There's a bit of cleansing tannin but it doesn't do enough to keep this beer from being heavy, cloying and difficult.

The day's second and final international collaboration was Braddon Bitter, produced at Wadworth in association with BentSpoke of Canberra. Brown again, and with some nice burnt caramel and a sharp dark fruit thing, all blackberries and sloes. I had to check if Bramling Cross was in the house but turns out it's all Admiral and Cascade. It's pretty dry, sucking moisture off the palate and finishing tight, sharp and astringent. This is another one of those beers I'm really enjoying a third of but more than that would probably get difficult.

OK, enough cask. I'd be lying if I said I hadn't been eyeing up the new Wetherspoon can all afternoon. Treason is an IPA from Windsor & Eton, 5.8% ABV and a hazy orange colour. There's a balanced orange fruit bitterness and a hint of dank in the aroma. It tastes fresh and fruity with distinct overtones of Punk IPA and Bibble. Citrus! Resins! Cool! Acceptance! It is very nice, and top marks to the brewery for putting it together, but it does taste like quite a few other beers to me. It's just as well that quality and flavour trumps individuality every time.

Overall, quite a good festival this year. No stand-outs, but the beers I didn't enjoy were at least interesting. And that, in general, is the best any blogger can hope for. The festival continues until Sunday and I'd imagine that several in the line-up will be around for a while after that.

Gold and brown

And just like that the year was over and it was time to hand out the Golden Pint Awards for 2015. This is the seventh year that bloggers have been invited by Andy Mogg (and formerly Mark Dredge) to nominate the best of the year's beers, and beer-related artefacts and activities: if you're interested in what I've had to say in previous years, you can find them here for 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014. Andy has expanded out several of the categories this year, and mercifully dropped a couple I never had much of an opinion on, though sitting up here on the first paragraph it remains to be seen whether the re-jig will make things easier or harder.

But before getting stuck in, the customary beer. There's a tenuous connection to the awards as I bought it from the winner of the Best Supermarket category, though longer ago than I realised because it was several weeks out of date when I pulled it from the fridge. Karmaliten Kloster Dunkel is a dark lager from eastern Bavaria, about half way between Munich and České Budějovice, so right in the heart of lager country. It's a pure mahogany brown colour and exudes noble hops on the aroma. Their acidic greenness doesn't go very well with the accompanying dark caramel smell so I was worried it may be a bit gastric on tasting. Thankfully it's not. Crunchy, chocolatey bourbon biscuit is at the centre: sweet, but cleaned up beautifully by lagering so it doesn't linger on the palate. It's also balanced by them hops, adding a healthy burst of celery, still fresh and moist even if the beer is older than it ought to be. The carbonation is little more than a light sparkle and the body is chewy enough to be satisfying drinking without getting difficult. It's a lot easier going than many a Bavarian dunkel I've had, though no less complex for that. Good, accessible quality, which is just what a supermarket beer should offer. And so to business.

The Golden Pint Awards 2015

Best Irish Cask Beer: Giant's Organ
It's always a roll of the dice when an Irish beer shows up on cask, but I'd no such qualms when it came to Lacada's IPA. It was beautifully kept at the Belfast Beer Festival: clean and clear and bursting with sherbet citrus. Honourable mentions go to a similar offering from the very opposite end of the island -- West Cork Brewery's Sherkin Lass -- as well as to Trouble's Centennial SMASH. All three were encountered at festivals. Wouldn't it be nice if pubs got the hang of keeping and serving cask beer reliably too?

Best Irish Keg Beer: Little Fawn
I've taken the decision to award this one to a beer I enjoyed pouring down my neck in quantity this year: it's as good a criterion for greatness as any other. As such, this comes down to a three-way battle between Galway Bay's Heathen sour ale, Rascal's Rain Czech pils and White Hag Little Fawn session IPA. And the fresh hops carry the day. Though I wasn't bowled over when I first had it bottled, the keg version is an absolutely perfect juicy explosion. And at 4.2% ABV you can just keep setting them up and knocking them back.

Best Irish Bottled Beer: Black Lightning
I can't help but feel I'm being a little unfair in this category. There are loads of fantastic Irish beers available in bottle but because I mostly drank them on draught I don't get to include them in the running here. One that I did come back to was 9 White Deer's black IPA, and while it wasn't as amazing as the ultra-fresh keg version at the Franciscan Well Easter Festival, it's still very good indeed.

Best Irish Canned Beer: Kinsale Pale Ale
A handful of Irish micros have cans available now. I have been very remiss so far in not getting hold of the recently-released Rascal's ones. But instead I've enjoyed the casual hoppy goodness of Black's Kinsale Pale Ale, with a bonus thumbs-up for the sub-€2.50 price tag.

Best Overseas Draught: Magma Triple Spiked Brett
Fresh hops and brett: together at last, said nobody ever. But this one pulls it off beautifully. Belgian maestros Troubadour fit the different elements together so well that you don't even notice how wrong it all is. If there were an award for best brand extension, this would also get it.

Best Overseas Bottled Beer: Spontanbasil
It was on my must-drink list for quite a while and it didn't disappoint when I finally got hold of it. I've had a couple of basil beers this year and they were all extremely tasty, but this Lindemans-Mikkeller collaboration takes the prize.

Best Overseas Canned Beer: Bibble
A string of lacklustre beers on a stifling hot summer's day in London was completely offset by a cold tinny of this beaut, swigged on the way along Gray's Inn Road. Shouts-out also to Beavertown Holy Cowbell and Rooster's Fort Smith. The Brits have got this one in the can! *cheesy wink*.

Best Collaboration Brew: Radical Brew
Perhaps I'm taking a bit of a liberty here by not awarding this to a collaboration between breweries. Radical Brew was released by Cork-based gypsy brewer RadikAle with input from Waterford distillery Blackwater. The use of gin botanicals in a big rye ale was inspired and clearly both sides knew exactly what they were doing when they brought their respective halves of the combination to the brew kettle. A close second was Crann, the magnificent bière de garde that Inishmacsaint and Poker Tree put together together.

Best Overall Beer: Spontanbasil
Quite a variety of types of beer to choose from among those eight finalists, but it the Belgian basil extravaganza is the one I'd trade a case of the others for. Maybe.

Best Branding: Wild Bat
Breweries that eschew the mystical Celtic claptrap that plagues so much Irish beer branding always get a thumbs up from me. I love the cartoonish energy of Oughterard start-up Wild Bat.

Best Pump Clip: Vincent Van Coff
The name was chosen in a public competition and I think the artist excelled himself in graphically interpreting Mountain Man's final choice of moniker for their coffee and vanilla festival special. Subtle? Tasteful? That's not the Mountain Man way. Definitely fun, though.

Best Bottle Label: Torc Smoked German Ale
The polar opposite of the other two graphic design winners, Torc's branding is all clean and understated elegance. The charcoal grey of the Smoked German Ale is my favourite of their range.

Best Irish Brewery: Rascal's
What do we want? Good beer, produced locally, sanely priced with a spritely turnover of new ones and the occasional stand-out stunner. When do we want it? Continuously. With a solid core range, a fascinating World Hops Series and magnificent festival specials including that superb Chardonnay Saison, west Dublin's Rascal's really delivered in 2015. And through no fault of their own, Trouble has to settle for second place again, despite bringing back Graffiti and turning out a highly enjoyable SMASH series, both of which deserve very honourable mentions.

Best Overseas Brewery: Brewski
These Swedes are my standout from Borefts this year and are ones to watch. Berliner weisse with lime, elderflower and basil is just what the world needs right now. Shut up, it does.

Best New Brewery Opening 2015: YellowBelly
I wish I could keep closer track of what the brewery under Simon Lambert & Sons in Wexford Town is pumping up to the bar counter on a regular basis, but I've enjoyed what I've had. Declan and the crew seem to have hit that sweet spot between playful experimentation and knowing exactly the things you have to do to design and brew really good beer.

Pub/Bar of the Year: 57 The Headline
Yes, again. Several great meet-the-brewer nights secured The Headline's place on my list for the third year running, not least the time we had Carlow Brewing and Starr Hill in for a chat. But even when there's no event on, the turnover and range of beers is fantastic. And there's food and seats and windows and all the other secondary things too.

Best New Pub/Bar Opening 2015: The Beer Market
As with last year we have Galway Bay duking it out with Bodytonic for the best new Dublin pub. This year I'm giving the prize to the Galwegians, though I've certainly enjoyed my visits to Bodytonic's Square Ball. Though The Beer Market's initial plan to be an international-grade rare-beer heaven hasn't quiite worked out, I've enjoyed several of my favourites from 2015 there and the Dublin beer scene is definitely richer for its presence.

Beer Festival of the Year: Borefts
In 2015 I returned to a few festivals I've been away from for a while: Cask & Winter Ales, GBBF, Belfast Beer Festival, and I also attended my first Polish beer festival, but still nothing tops the kid-in-a-sweetshop thrill of De Molen's annual gig in September. Its days as a well-kept secret are pretty much over and the crowds were definitely bigger this year, but it seems perfectly able to handle it and still give the drinkers plenty of comfort. Good beer you don't have to queue for, and somewhere to sit while you drink it, were always available.

Supermarket of the Year: SuperValu
This was the year that quality beer became one of the fronts on which the Irish supermarkets fight their never-ending war with each other. The drinking public has done rather well out of it, and a special commendation goes to Dunnes and Rye River for the extremely good value of the Grafters beers. But SuperValu has also been commissioning exclusives, and getting in a superb selection of Irish and international beers. It's rare that I spot a beer in the supermarket that I haven't already been able to get from an independent off licence, but that's happened about twice in SuperValu this year. Someone in the company's offices somewhere has the word BEER written large on a whiteboard, with a circle around it, and arrows pointing to it.

Independent Retailer of the Year: Redmond's
As usual I've been mostly shopping in DrinkStore, and it meets almost all of my beery take-home needs. But there have been odd occasions when I've been looking for something rare or particularly special and that's where Redmond's bails me out. Not the cheapest off licence in Dublin, but among the most browseable. I passed twenty years as a customer a few months ago. How terrifying is that?

Best Beer Book or Magazine: Around Brussels in 80 Beers by Joe Stange
A complimentary copy of the second edition arrived just before I went to Brussels in October, so I declare this publication fully field-tested and operational.

Best Beer Blog or Website: Our Tasty Travels
I love a grand project, me, and Our Tasty Travels's "New Beer Every Day Beer Diary Challenge" has kept me enthralled since it began in January. I'd say Brett will be very glad to sign off instalment number 365 tomorrow -- a hearty well done to him for keeping it running. The other grand project I enjoyed was Oliver Gray's attempt to publish a serial novel, December, 1919, over the course of the year. Unfortunately it ran aground in May but I'm looking forward to its return. I need to know what happens with Jack and his brewery just as prohibition bites in Philadelphia.

Simon Johnson Award for Best Beer Twitterer: @BroadfordBrewer
Without a doubt the runaway champion of this category, David has more Johnsons than he knows what to do with. But it's fully deserving so this year I add my voice to the chorus.

Best Brewery Website/Social media: Eight Degrees
The Eight Degrees website always has the information I need when I go looking: what are the new beers out, what are they made from and what are the vital statistics? It's an essential service when a brewery produces as much new beer as this one does.

And that's your lot. Time to start forming some impressions of beer in 2016 now.

Festival leftovers

A postscript to the 2015 Belfast Beer Festival to mention, to begin with, a couple of English beers I tried in what was otherwise an all-Norn Iron session for me.

Hawkshead Windermere Pale Ale impressed, even on an overwrought palate late in the day. Quite a feat, considering it's a light 3.5% ABV. It doesn't try to pack too much into this, but what's there is good: a gentle lemon spritz on smooth biscuity malt with a light and thoroughly quaffable texture. A simple pleasure, but no less a pleasure for that.

And on the way out the door, Hopback Citra. I found this surprisingly malt-driven: if you stick the name of a hop on the badge -- and especially a high-octane one like Citra -- you really are obliged to make your beer taste of it. What hop character there is is severely bitter and ends abruptly leaving nothing in its wake. It's the sort of beer I might quite enjoy a pint of in an English pub, but I wasn't in the mood to deal with it at this point of my day out.

And so back to Central Station and the early evening train home. Richard had been busy before the festival, dropping up to The Vineyard for takeaways, and he was kind enough to share a few tinnies with Andrew and me on the trundle back to Dublin.

The first open was Madness by Wild Beer Co. I was gung-ho for this IPA, following a delightful experience with its stablemate Bibble during the summer. This one didn't do so much to impress. I mean, it's very nice and all that -- lots of bitter pith, a sizeable chewy dank element, and balanced on a filling toffee base -- but I couldn't help feeling I'd tasted it before. Maybe if I'm this bored with quality IPAs, the problem is with me not them, though I did also think that 6.8% ABV is a little excessive for what it delivers.

That was followed by a lighter beer: Eternal session IPA from Northern Monk. There's an intense dryness here, a chalky mineral quality and a slightly harsh acridity from the hops which are at the centre. Did I detect a bit of cardboard-pulp oxidation too? My notes say I might have, but judging from the state of this guy's handwriting I don't think I'd trust him. A nice clean finish ends it and the sum is a beer that's a bit more serious and severe than is warranted in a 4.1% ABV session ale.

And one token American to bring us home: Mountain Livin' by Crazy Mountain in (where else?) Colorado. It's fine: rich warming malt at the front, a pinch of bitter hops at the end. 6% ABV, but could probably pass for more, and perhaps a little too strong and heavy for the outdoor refreshment purpose the brewer has in mind.

We rolled into Connolly then rolled across to the street to The Brew Dock, the traditional finishing point for any international beer adventure worth its salt. It was a fun day out, but it also served to remind me that I really should set aside some time in 2016 to visit the new craft beer pubs in Belfast. Fingers crossed for a crash in the value of sterling.

London crawling

The thing about London is I'm almost always in a hurry, going to a particular event and trying to squeeze a few beers in around it. The day after the 2015 Great British Beer Festival was different, however. The flight home didn't leave until quite late in the evening and there was nothing special I wanted to do or see. So I picked a neighbourhood which has a few famous London pubs in it, and spent the day exploring.

Holborn is the centre of the area I chose and that's where we alighted from the tube. A short walk along from the station is The Princess Louise, one of several Samuel Smith pubs in central London. It's not a particularly large premises but is made seem even smaller by its meticulous sub-division into a sequence of little snugs, each one communicating with a short length of the round central bar. The décor is classically Victorian, all coloured tiles and elaborate mirrors. None of this seemed to interest the early afternoon clientèle, all happy to concentrate on their cheap beers. The missus suffered through a ropey half of Old Brewery; a perfectly fine glass of Extra Stout for me. No new beer ticks, but a feeling that we were on our way.

Just a block away, The Holborn Whippet is a horse of a very different colour. From the people who brought us The Euston Tap, this has a fairly similar business model. It's bigger than the 'Tap, though still feels rather cramped, and has a smaller draught selection: half a dozen cask and a round ten keg beers. I decided to take my second punt on something from Manchester's Cloudwater, the Grisette being on offer. This low-ABV saison is 3.7% and a pale hazy yellow. The flavour is a riot of floral and citrus notes and I found lemons, lavender and bergamot in varying intensities as I sipped. The massive zingy refreshment here makes it seem more like an electrified witbier than a toned-down saison and it's all the better for that. Super stuff.

A Siren beer for the lady, Love of Work on cask. This is a golden ale with a very modest 3.6% ABV but nothing at all modest about its flavour: all funky hoppy dank from US hop varieties Amarillo, Citra and Centennial, and a rich tannic quality from the addition of tea to the brew. It's almost too heavy for a low-strength afternoon beer but absolutely fine for a half on the hoof.

Back to the middle of Holborn next, and we struck east towards the City. A little further along we came to the other Samuel Smith pub of the day: The Cittie of Yorke. The interior here is very impressive, with a clubbish carpeted front room and then a quite ecclesiastical hall at the back, housing Cyclopean breweriana (big butts), a long counter and a row of snugs. There's a bit about its history in this recent piece from Des de Moor: don't let the Tudor styling fool you, the building dates from the 1920s. Picking more or less arbitrarily from the bottle fridges, I drank a Samuel Smith Organic Chocolate Stout. It's 5% ABV and a dark reddish-brown colour. The chocolate in the flavour is by no means subtle, and barely tastes like proper chocolate at all. Instead it's the sweet, flaky sort of chocolate taste you get in powdered drinks: very artificial. There's a certain graininess to the base stout but not enough bitterness or dryness to take the edge off all that sugar. A pint was tough going and it's not a beer I'm likely to return to. Onwards!

The previous afternoon, at the festival, I discussed my sketchy plans for today with Mr Cornell who made a few recommendations for detours and one imperative order to have a beer in The Blackfriar. So, crossing into the City of London and skirting around the edge of Clerkenwell, we arrived at the pub which is just next to Blackfriars Bridge and station. The trees were in full leaf so it was hard to see the art nouveau exterior, but inside it's very impressive too: the walls of the L-shaped saloon covered in bas-relief friezes of monks at work.

The Blackfriar is a Nicholson's house so the beer selection was pretty good. Except I'm a total masochist and there was that Robinson's Trooper Iron Maiden novelty bitter which I've never had before. I'll give that a go just so I can say I did. And it's awful. It's not even boring brown bitter; it's harshly acidic sugary brown bitter, all builders' tea and puke. Bleurgh! And I see they've launched a brand extension now too. I'll let you know how that is if I find any.

For herself I suggested Lambton's by Maxim Brewery, solely because it mentions Citra on the badge. The urinal cake aroma also says Citra, and not in a good way. But the flavour is more gently herbal, simple and quaffable though finishing a little bit soapier than is pleasant. For a 3.8% ABV golden ale it's perhaps more flavourful than most, but it could do with some extra complexity added.

On the way back north again we cross Fleet Street where the Punch Tavern is. Martyn had mentioned that this is the motherhouse of big bad pubco Punch Taverns so, given its symbolic place in English pub industry debate, we stopped in. The exterior is very grand indeed, a tiled entryway leading to a far plainer interior.

There was a meagre selection of beers on the small bar, from which we got a half each of Marston's EPA. Marston subsidiary Brakspear used to have a beer called EPA. Is this related? Anyway, you know that whole thing about cask beer in London being terrible? This was a poster child for that. It looked awful in the glass, a murky orange, and the yeast off-flavour almost completely drowned everything else in the light 3.6% ABV bitter. Enough pithy hop zing survives to make it palateable but it's very obviously not how the brewer intended this beer to be served. Boak and Bailey had better luck when they beat me to The Punch several weeks earlier. Our halves may have been from the bottom of the same cask they got. So there wasn't much to keep us here.

The next landmark pub is down an alley off Hatton Garden. Þe Olde Mitre looks like it's been left standing while modern London washed around it, perhaps more akin to something you'd find in Brussels. There's a small poky public bar at the front, a larger saloon to the rear, and an endless stream of tourists. Including me, obviously. These days Fuller's is running the show and they have a new beer out, a 3.8% ABV golden ale called Oliver's Island. I wasn't impressed; it's a dull mix of marmalade and biscuits, very plain fare indeed. The mediocrity was thrown into sharp relief by sublime Oakham Citra on the next tap over.

Our exit point, King's Cross station, was in sight and after the last two wonky beers I felt sorely in need of a hoppy lift. As it happened we were passing BottleDog. A can of something for the road? Standing in front of the fridge I vacilitated between a few of the canned options and eventually settled on Wild Beer's Bibble, a 4.2% ABV pale ale with American hops. And even swigging from the can this has a fantastic impact. It's quite dry and the hops are super fresh and leafy. It's not juicy as such, but properly seriously bitter: green papaya and sterner pine. I've no notes on the appearance for obvious reasons but it tasted pale: the malt wasn't saying much here. If it's this good walking up Gray's Inn Road I bet it's fabulous sitting down with a pint.

Palate newly awakened it was on to the last stop of the day before Heathrow: The Queen's Head. I had tried to get in here on a solo pub crawl a couple of years ago but it had closed early for Christmas. Today, the doors were wide open to let a cooling summer breeze flood the open and airy single barroom. The draw here is that it has its own brewery, somewhere: it's not on display that I could see. Two beers from onsite were available so we got a half of each.

Her Majesty is a pale ale and the sort that gives London Murky a bad name. Opaque orange is par for the course but this also features an acrid bitterness that coats the mouth and possesses the senses. There's a kind of mouldy fruit bowl flavour which builds until it feels like you're drinking from the back of a bin lorry. Set it aside, as I did (and I never do), and it still won't leave you alone: there's a residual taste of concentrated chemical furniture wax. This is a pale ale straight from a horror movie, mocking and torturing the palate, and never quite staying dead.

"So how's yours?" I asked. My wife was drinking Lady In Red, which was brown and disgustingly soupy looking. The nose has a playful Laphroaigish quality but one sip opens that out into a honkingly awful phenolic infection made worse by a slick greasy texture. The bitter yeast bite which would destroy any other beer provides relief in this one. "The trick is not to breathe and suppress your gag reflex," she answered.

I'm guessing everyone knows that you just don't drink the house beers at The Queen's Head. And you don't have to either because the guest line-up is excellent. We couldn't leave London on the worst beers of the trip, so two safeish bets to go out on. Another Cloudwater beer for her, their Summer IPA on keg: a big-hitter at 6.8% ABV. It doesn't taste its strength, however, being light and spritzy: all bitter jaffa in the aroma turning to fresh coconut in the flavour. I took the soft option of Redemption Trinity. This is a golden cask ale at just 3% ABV so I'd say a tough style to brew and keep. Mine had some pleasant gunpowder spicing, but also a wet cardboard oxidation tang that took a bit of the shine off. The haze probably also had something to do with it not being as good as I've been told it normally is. The Curse of the London Cask strikes again.

Between this lot, and Monday's spotty offerings in the north-east of the city, I came away with the impression that we're not actually doing too bad in Dublin. I think your chances of getting something enjoyable when picking randomly is rather better in Dublin's beer specialists than in London's. Perhaps I should have just gone to The Royal Oak and The Harp and left it at that. Certainly, departing England for the third time in five weeks, it seems very clear that northern England leaves London, and Dublin, standing when it comes to beer quality, variety and price.