Mild by Northwest

More observations on Mild Magic 2019.

Manchester
Pubs in and near the city centre did pretty well by Mild Magic this year. I had Brightside Ch-Ch-Cherry Mild at the City and an excellent Moorhouse’s Black Cat at the New Oxford (have Moorhouse’s changed the recipe? I’m sure it never used to be that good). The Briton’s Protection even had a house mild on (brewed by Beartown). I would have liked to stay longer at all of those, the Briton’s most of all – partly because they had an excellent beer range, partly because I’m not a huge Beartown fan and wouldn’t have minded moving on to something else, but mainly because I was the only person in, that Wednesday evening. Most of the pubs I went into on a weeknight were pretty quiet, but that was a low point. Of the town-centre Spoons’ – which weren’t quiet – the Moon Under Water and Paramount both had a mild or something similar (Pheasantry Mikado and Orkney Dark Isle respectively); the Waterhouse didn’t, although the porter I had instead was very good. The Oxnoble was (I think) new to Mild Magic this year, and (definitely) wasn’t really trying – only one hand pump on when I visited, and that one had Robinson’s Trooper on.

Stockport
I mentioned the Hope and the Remedy Bar in the previous post. The Petersgate Tap also had a ‘coffee mild’ on – North Riding Coffee Bean Mild – while the Railway had Howard Town Milltown. Less encouragingly, on my visit there was no mild at the Angel or at the Cocked Hat. I’d been encouraged to revisit the Cocked Hat by reading that it had reopened under new management, but I won’t be hurrying back. The main beers on the bar were a pale bitter called 28 Days Later and a darker bitter called One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, both from a brewery called RT about which I can find out precisely nothing (except that I don’t think they’re anything to do with RT Ales of Cardiff). I had the second of these, and it was really poor – somehow bland and unbalanced at the same time. As I was forming this opinion the song playing on the PA finished and another started – a cover version of the Steely Dan classic Do It Again, which had apparently been augmented by the bass and drums from Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean. Recoiling from this travesty, I necked my beer as quickly as I could manage and moved on. Up the road, Heaton Hops wasn’t serving a mild (although the Siren Undercurrent was excellent). Normal mild service was restored – not before time – at Fred’s in Levenshulme, where I had my second half of Brightside Ch-Ch-Cherry Mild, to the accompaniment of the bar staff talking among themselves about how horrible it was.

– Have you tried that one? It’s… ugh…
“I’d be all right, I like anything with cherries in.”
– Well, I’m the same, that’s what I thought, until I actually tried it…

(Memo to Brightside: I don’t care what they say, I like it.)

Spoons’
Mild in Spoons’ pubs was patchy this year, possibly because the chain’s latest ‘beer festival’ had only just finished when Mild Magic started; the Sedge Lynn in Chorlton was still starting ‘festival’ beers two weeks later. Yes, there were milds at the Moon Under Water and Paramount – not to mention Tim Bobbin in Urmston (Lymestone Stonefish), the Great Central in Fallowfield and the Society Rooms in Stalybridge (both Leeds Midnight Bell) – but there were no milds at the Waterhouse, the Bishop Blaize, the Ash Tree, Ford Madox Brown or the Gateway. Part of this will just be down to when beers start and finish; I was told at the Gateway that they’d have a mild on the next day. On the other hand, the Smithy Fold in Glossop did have Beartown Brown Bear on, but it was off (and was exchanged without a fuss). The Sedge Lynn didn’t have a mild in the first week of Mild Magic, or the second, or the third; that said, when I went in the week after that they’d put two milds on to make up for lost time. (But no, I didn’t note either of them down.)

Next: Urmston, Didsbury and beyond…