Winter, warmer (3)

This is the third of three posts about this year’s Winter Warmer Wander, CAMRA’s annual celebration of strong ‘winter’ beers. This one covers two trips – one to Cheadle and Cheadle Hulme, the other to Stalybridge – and ends with a round-up.

I always welcome the opportunity of a beer-ticking trip to Stalybridge, as much for the bars I visit along the way as for the inevitable last stop, the Buffet Bar. As I usually do these days, I started at Droylsden’s Silly Country, where – to my surprise – no qualifying beers were to be had. I had a half of something pale (Millstone Citra to be precise) and was given a sticker, but it was a bit of a disappointing start to the trip.

I got off the tram again a few stops down to visit the Sheldon Arms: a new pub to me, although not one I’ll be rushing back to. It’s a J.W. Lees house and a “modern restaurant pub” (WhatPub), and you can find it between a garden centre and a Travelodge in an otherwise deserted area about a mile outside Ashton-under-Lyne. Unlike the urban wasteland surrounding it, it was absolutely buzzing – although (at least on that lunchtime) it wasn’t at all clear to me that it was a “restaurant pub“, as opposed to a restaurant with beers on the bar. I stood at the said bar, thereby taking the count of non-seated punters up to 1, and got through a (rather nice) half of Plum Pudding as quickly as I reasonably could.

In Ashton itself I headed for  Tapster’s, where I had the usual, curious sensation of being transported to a high-end rock club, at about 2.30 a.m., on a weeknight, in 1982. No accounting for tastes – and their judgment where beer’s concerned is pretty good, as they serve Bridge beers from Staly ditto. The Dark Matter vanilla stout was pretty good, and would have been even better if I liked vanilla stout.

It was all getting a bit nearly-but-not-quite; fortunately, things looked up a bit when I hit the covered market for my usual lunch (one small pork pie, one cheese and onion pie), and looked up further when I got to Stalybridge. The Society Rooms (JDW) had nothing travelling as a stout, porter or old ale, but did have Bradfield Farmers Belgian Blue. I’m still not entirely sure what kind of beer this is – and what’s Belgian about it – but it’s marketed as a ‘Christmas’ beer; more to the point, it’s dark, malty and fruity, and really rather good. No problem here (or anywhere else so far) with stickers. In fact they may have been erring on the side of liberality on that front; I had a brief chat with a fellow collector, who was evidently completing his friend’s sheet as well as his own, as he’d collected two stickers for two pints. Both pints were pale, though, and I’m pretty sure one of them was lager. (To be fair, the less fizzy one could have been Coach House‘s ‘cranberry pale’, which they also had on; I guess that would qualify as seasonal.)

There were no stickers at Bridge Beers, just a natty rubber stamp; I don’t know if this is because they’d run out of stickers or if the rubber stamp is just their thing. They certainly do things differently at Bridge Beers; they were still operating the system of “listing all [the] draught beers on the blackboard whether they’re available or not, and having a bartender tell each customer in turn which ones are on” which I commented on in June. It’s a shame the cherry stout was in the “not on” half of the board, but Dark Matter on gravity was at least as good as it had been on hand pull, and a collection of SPBW newsletters passed the time nicely.

And so to the Buffet Bar, where I had a half of Titanic Plum Porter Reserve (see previous posts) and followed it with a third of something very silly indeed, particularly at this end of the trip: Vocation May Contain Sixpence, a ‘Christmas pudding imperial stout’ at a no-messing 12.5%. No stickers here either, although in this case I’m pretty sure they will have run out. Still one of my favourite venues, even when it’s busy with the pre-Christmas crowd – but then, a 12.5% stout has a knack of making the rest of the world go away.

Another trip out – heading South rather than East – took me to the Church Inn, a Robinson’s pub on the road out of Cheadle Hulme, heading towards Bramhall. This was a very different pub, in a very different area, from the Sheldon Arms, but they had one thing in common: a laserlike focus on the dining trade, resulting in a complete lack of seating for the non-dining drinker. (WhatPub: “The rear of the lounge is where excellent food is served”. And the rest (of the pub)!) On the plus side, they served a very nice half of (sparkled) Old Tom, even if I didn’t feel able to linger over it as long as I’d have liked.

I got the bus back into Cheadle Hulme proper, got a sandwich (from Waitrose, where else?) and promptly discovered not one but two of my new favourite bars. Archive was empty but had quite a nice vibe to it nevertheless; lots of greebling. They also had Titanic Plum Porter Reserve on the bar and… wait just a minute… RedWillow Festive Treat on the bar next to it. I had never heard of RedWillow Festive Treat, and was somewhat inclined to disapprove of it on the grounds of the terrible name – they surely haven’t run out of “-less”es? But I wasn’t going to turn my nose up at a 5.5% old ale from RW; and, sure enough, it was terrific.

The Chiverton Tap, a couple of doors down, was more austere in terms of decor but had regulars drifting in and out the whole time I was there, which made it rather a good place to linger over a beer; atmosphere’s what you make it, I guess. The beer in question took a bit of lingering, as it was RedWillow Blueberry, Maple and Pecan Stout (8.4%). I’m not saying RedWillow can do no wrong, but their pre-Christmas offer to bars in Cheadle Hulme was pretty much impeccable.

But I couldn’t stay in the Chiverton Tap all afternoon – not even after I’d had a chat with one of the regulars and worked out for myself where the loos are; not even with an 11% Trium imperial stout on the bar; I had stickers to collect, and miles to go etc. The bus took me back to Cheadle and the Red Lion, a Robinson’s house but not one of those serving Old Tom. Still, that was probably just as well after what I’d had already – and it gave me a chance to try Tom and Berry, which was rather fruit-cordial-ish but basically fine.

For my final half and – drum roll please – my 36th bar, it was down the road to the Wobbly Stamp. The qualifying beer here was our old friend Titanic Plum Porter, which I think I like a bit better than the ‘reserve’ version. I considered having a half of something else to celebrate finishing the Wander, but couldn’t see anything on the bar I fancied; a bottle of something Belgian, which to be fair was also an option, would have been a bit OTT on the alcohol front. So in the end I just went home. Note to self: future route end Chiv Tap.

11 pubs/bars, 10 qualifying beers, 9 stickers, one signature and one rubber stamp (two white, seven blue and two gold); two stouts, two porters, two old ales and three ‘Christmas’ beers. For the Wander as a whole, I’ve had eight stouts, ten porters, three old ales and three ‘Christmas’ beers. Like the first two, this third leg saw a really gratifying level of availability of stickers and (more importantly) of qualifying beers.

Actually doing the Wander was a reasonably pleasant experience this year (the bits between beers, I mean). I still think the pre-Christmas pub trade doesn’t really need CAMRA’s help (might there be any mileage in moving the WWW to January?), but this time round most places were pleasantly busy rather than rammed; certainly nowhere had anything like the scrum I experienced at the Friendship a few years back. The three-tier sticker system was a bit of a pain when it came to planning routes; still, it did the job of getting me to pubs I’d never visited before, particularly together with the (very welcome) involvement of Holt’s and Lees’. Other than that – and chalking up my non-visit to the Blossoms to experience – I’d only point to only one negative: dining pubs. In three separate places (viz Stockport, Cheadle Hulme and Ashton) I walked into a pub to find that provision for anyone looking for a drink was limited to non-existent. There’s no law against pubs focusing on food to the extent of not having any space dedicated to wet trade during food service, even at the front of the bar; doubtless for some it will make good business sense. But I don’t think those pubs should be enrolled in what’s basically a pub crawl – and if brewers do want to include them, they should make sure drinkers won’t stick out like a sore thumb when they do visit. On three separate occasions I was left feeling isolated and uncomfortably conspicuous, and consequently slugged down a beer that I would rather have savoured (Old Tom in two cases).

Speaking of beers to savour: overall, the ‘winter warmer’ landscape is looking remarkably healthy this year. My 36 ticks have taken in 24 different beers from 19 breweries: eight stouts, ten porters, three old ales and three ‘Christmas’ beers. (A fourth old ale should be mentioned – Dunham‘s single venue meant that it didn’t get a sticker of its own.) As well as Titanic‘s two porters, Vocation offered two different stouts, while Dunham had a porter and an old ale; Robinson’s (of course) offered both an old ale and a ‘Christmas’ beer, and RedWillow went one better by offering a stout, a porter, and an old ale (all of them worth seeking out).

More detail for the completist:

Stout: Black Edge, Bridge, First Chop, Marble, RedWillow*, Stranger Times, Vocation x2
Porter: Bank Top, Bridgehouse, Coach House, Dunham, Kirkstall, RedWillow, Salamander, Thornbridge*, Titanic x2
Old Ale: Holt’s, RedWillow, Robinson’s*
‘Christmas’: Bradfield*, Lees’, Robinson’s

Reviewing that list, I’m reminded that quality has been high as well as variety: I’d put 18 of those 24 beers in the “worth seeking out” bracket (and most of those that didn’t qualify had reasons involving either plums or vanilla). Those flagged with a *, meanwhile, were outstanding examples of their style.

Doubtless a lot of these beers would be on bars anyway at this time of year, but the range and variety of beers I’ve seen recently suggests that operators are really getting into the ‘winter warmer’ spirit. Bars and brewers don’t make this kind of effort unprompted; thanks are due to everyone who helped make it happen!

Winter, warmer (2)

This is the second of three posts about this year’s Winter Warmer Wander, CAMRA’s annual celebration of strong ‘winter’ beers. This one covers central Manchester (again), Sale and Altrincham, the Wilmslow Road corridor and another trip to Stockport.

An early-afternoon trip to Manchester started with a well-kept half of Holt’s Sixex in a pleasantly quiet Ape and Apple – which you probably won’t be able to experience now until some time in January. The beer is worth seeking out, though. The Piccadilly Tap had a couple of dark beers on, one of which was one of Vocation‘s current series of collabs: Vocation vs Adnams’ Coffee Stout. This was a biggish stout, over on the sweet side of coffee-flavoured dark beers and smooth with it. Then I made the trek to the Marble Arch for another biggish but easy-drinking stout – Marble Stout – following it with a third of their Amontillado Barrel-Aged Barleywine. The barrel had put in a lot of work: this was a smooth, easy-drinking 12.4%er, which in no way drank its strength (unless you thought of Benylin, perhaps).

Another lunchtime found me in the J P Joule (JDW) in Sale, where I was very pleasantly surprised to see Thornbridge Market Porter on the bar – a really excellent contemporary porter; I was sorry I was only stopping for a half. But I had places to be, viz. Altrincham. When I got there, sadly, the Unicorn (also JDW) had nothing qualifying on – at least, they had two or three Christmas- or winter-themed beers, but none at 4.4% or above. I thought it was in the spirit of the thing to order Moorhouse‘s recently-revived Xmas Cauldron, which was fine. No such problems at Costello’s, of course: both the excellent Dunham Porter and Dunham Winter Warmer were present and correct. The Winter Warmer was a new one on me, and I can recommend it.

A couple of weeks later the tram took me to Didsbury, where the Head of Steam (in common with a few other places) was serving Titanic Plum Porter Reserve. I can’t say I’m a fan. I’m not opposed to beer with adjuncts – I’ve got fond memories of the same brewery’s damson stout – but in this beer, and perhaps particularly in this higher-strength (6.5%) version, the plum tends to dominate rather than blending in. They also had Blackjack Petal – a ‘brut IPA’ with tea – on keg; I’ve got fond memories of Ticketybrew‘s Jasmine Green Tea Pale, and I can’t say I wasn’t tempted. It was a bit early to be stopping for a second, though.

On to the Railway, pausing only for an invigorating walk down Lapwing Lane (how I forgot that the Railway is at the “Metropolitan and Burton Road tram” end of Lapwing Lane, not the “Wine & Wallop and West Didsbury tram” end, I’m not sure). Holt’s Sixex was on the bar, but sadly that’s where it stayed; the line had just been cleaned and the beer wasn’t going to be on for a while. Instead I had another not-actually-qualifying seasonal, the 4.3% Holt’s bitter A Date With Santa. Which, again, was fine.

From there the bus took me to the Red Lion (JW Lees Plum Pudding) and then on to the Great Central (JDW), where they had the really excellent (and relatively seldom-seen) Bank Top Port O Call (a porter with port, no less). There’s some interesting ordering going on in some parts of the JDW’s empire. No stickers at the Great Central, incidentally, “because somebody foolishly binned ’em”.

Lastly, a repeat trip to Stockport. I’d been mulling this over ever since I heard that the Petersgate Tap had a Torrside old ale on; I thought I could combine that with paying a visit to the Blossoms, which in my experience keeps Old Tom particularly well. I arrived in Stockport on a rainy Sunday afternoon and got a bus down the road. I was glad to see the Blossoms by the time it hove into view: Chorlton to Stockport can be a longish bus journey in itself, and I was beginning to feel the need to use the facilities, let’s say. The building was dark, which initially didn’t put me off – I remembered the decor in the Blossoms being on the eccentric side, so keeping the lights low on a gloomy Sunday seemed like just the kind of thing they would do. Then I reached the front door and read the handwritten notice:

CLOSED DUE TO TECHNOLOGY BEING RUBBISH

Hmm. OK, I thought. Not to panic, I thought. Plenty of buses going back into Stockport. I could get Old Tom at the Arden Arms. And lots of places had… there were lots of places where I could… no, not thinking about that…

Thankfully, the buses back into Stockport were pretty frequent. All that remained was to, effectively, speed-walk from the bus station to the Arden Arms (which turned out to be a really surprisingly long walk). I now have thoroughly favourable memories of the Arden Arms, which had (a) Old Tom well-kept and sparkled (none of that ‘pin on the bar’ malarkey they’ve had in some years) and, crucially, (b) a Gents’ quite close to the entrance. In other respects it was rather unsatisfactory, admittedly – every space big enough to put a chair seemed to have been given over to diners, with drinkers apparently expected to prop up the bar (and squash up against it every time a server went by, which was often). I perched on a bench by an empty table and drank up.

After all that I was glad of a bit of a rest, which I took – albeit with half an eye on bus times – back at the Petersgate Tap. (The old ale I’d come for – Torrside/Durham Spark of Madness – was very nice indeed.) But I wasn’t going straight home. The Beer Shop in Heaton Moor was open; it really is a shop rather than a bar, and as such it’s not somewhere I’d choose to linger, but it was nice to see RedWillow Heritage Porter, and to drink it in good nick. Then a final stop at Ladybarn Social Club, which is a place I’d choose to linger; the qualifying beer here was First Chop POD, a vanilla stout.

13 pubs/bars, 11 qualifying beers (and two borderline), 12 stickers and one signature (five white, six blue and two gold): not quite as clean a sweep as the previous post, but not far off. Another good spread of beers, too: three stouts, five porters, two old ales and one ‘other’. And, unless I’ve miscounted, the 23 qualifying beers I’ve had so far include sixteen different beers from fifteen different breweries. Looking good!

Next: I venture into the lands of blue (Cheadle) and gold (Stalybridge)

Winter, warmer (1)

The Winter Warmer Wander, CAMRA’s annual celebration of strong ‘winter’ beers, is on us again. Here are a few notes from central Manchester and beyond.

On an overcast weekday afternoon I made my way to the Briton’s Protection, a landmark pub which is now, sadly, under threat. I had a half of Vocation Naughty and Nice chocolate stout – not my favourite style, but a very good example. I regret to say that the pub was practically empty; I was there early doors, admittedly, but… well, see below.

A few minutes up the road, Rain Bar wasn’t busy, but there was a definite early-evening background hum. One of the nice things about this year’s WWW is that both Holt’s and J. W. Lees have got involved, so there are some relatively unfamiliar pubs to tick off – and indeed beers. In this case I had JWL‘s Plum Pudding – a strong-ish dark bitter (well, 4.8%), which doesn’t taste of Christmas pudding but does, commendably, taste of plums. The fruit flavour is there and it isn’t; it supplies an element of the dark bitter flavour profile that you’d usually get from the malt, but if you stop and think about it it’s still fruit. It’s the kind of trick Ticketybrew used to do a lot, and here it works rather well.

On to the Paramount (JDW), which was buzzing, and where there was only one dark beer on – a stout which presumably hadn’t been shifting, as they were selling it as a ‘Manager’s Special’ at £1.99 a pint. I naturally baulked when charged the standard £1.56 for a half, which attracted a manager – who explained that they couldn’t possibly sell me a half for 99p, “the till wouldn’t let us”. He then turned to the bartender – who had already drawn the half – and said, dismissively, “he doesn’t want it”. I protested that I didn’t mind paying the £1.56, if that was the only way to get a half of the Manager’s Special Stout, but no, the till wouldn’t allow them to do that either: it was a pint or nothing. So nothing it was. (Something similar did happen to me once before in a Spoons’, although that time I was less fussed about sticking to the half.) I ticked off the Paramount on a later visit, when they were serving Coach House Blunderbus (it’s a porter).

On then to the Waterhouse (also JDW and also buzzing), where I was faced with a pump clip for Kirkstall Black Band porter on a pump being energetically jockeyed by a bartender, evidently “pulling through”. Was it not on yet, I asked (not seeing any other dark beers on the bar), and was assured that it was on, just not at this end of the bar; to underscore the point, the bartender swapped the pump clip on the new tap with one for a Bradfield beer, which presumably was the one actually being pulled through. Ah well. Kirkstall Black Band porter is a really good beer, anyway – and they evidently know how to keep it at the Waterhouse, even if they have an odd approach to pump clips.

Out the back and in at the next doorway to the City, which was standing room only (it’s not the biggest pub, but still). I had a half of Stranger Times Revenant – a brewery I’d never heard of, but a pretty good stout. But by now it was getting on for 5.00 and I had places to be.

Another evening I started out at around a quarter to five, at Gulliver’s – another J.W. Lees pub and another half of Plum Pudding. I haven’t been to this pub very often and won’t be hurrying back – but it’s not them, it’s me. Shortly before leaving home I’d noticed that I’d galled the skin under one fingernail, which was gently but persistently oozing blood; there was no pain to speak of, so I only realised what had happened – and applied a plaster – when I saw blood on my phone screen. What I didn’t do, then or at any time till I went to the Gents’ in Gulliver’s, was look in the mirror. It turned out that I’d gone into town on the tram, and ordered at the bar, with what looked like a large bloody scab on my right cheek, and smears of blood on my left temple. Still, at least they served me.

On to the Millstone where – what? Sorry? Can we go outside?

It wasn’t quite 5.00 when I got to the Millstone, but it was already rammed, and the karaoke was in full swing – and very, very loud. I ordered another half of Plum Pudding (partly by sign language) and drank it as quickly as I could.

The Lower Turk’s Head was a veritable haven of tranquillity by comparison, although in absolute terms it was pretty busy. It being a Holt’s pub, I had a half of Sixex. I was a bit sceptical about Sixex qualifying as a ‘winter warmer’ – I’d had it in bottle and not been wildly impressed – but fair play to Joeys’, on draught this time round it was big, dark and punchy, and generally pretty much what you’d expect from an old ale.

As for Stockport, I did originally have a comprehensive (and potentially health-hazardous) crawl planned, but consulting the Winter Warmer Wander card revealed that I was in danger of piling up the easy-to-get “white” stickers while neglecting the more challenging “blue” and “gold”. (That’s another innovation this year, and it makes things a lot more interesting.) This year’s WWW visit to Stockport was therefore more selective than usual, even allowing for the non-availability of the Hope, the Railway, the George and who could forget the Tiviot, if they tried.

Anyway – at the Calverts Court (JDW) I had lunch with the other half and collected a prized blue sticker along with a pint of Salamander Python Porter. I haven’t seen much from Salamander lately, but this was rather a good, full-bodied porter.

Then down the road to the Bakers Vaults, where I perched in a rather ungainly manner on a ridiculously high stool and had a half of (drum-roll please) Robinson’s Old Tom. Mmm, Old Tom.

When on a crawl in Stockport I often finish at the Petersgate Tap, for obvious reasons, but – Stockport’s topography being what it is – this would have involved going down and then up again, and who wants to do that? So the Tap was my next stop. By this time Torrside Grubby Bastard had left the building, sadly, but Black Edge Treacle Stout was a very acceptable substitute. They also had a keg stout – Siren Death by CCC – which was rather good, if you like the idea of a ‘Caribbean chocolate cake’ stout clocking in at 10%. Which – despite my reservations about session-strength chocolate stouts – I rather do.

How to follow that, but with another half of Robinson’s Old Tom, at the Swan with Two Necks on the lower level. It was on hand pump, as at the Bakers Vaults, and as at the Bakers Vaults it was well kept and generally terrific.

12 pubs, 12 qualifying beers, 12 stickers (11 white and 1 blue). A good spread of beers, too: three stouts, three porters, three (count ’em) old ales and three ‘other’ (viz. J W Lees Plum Pudding). Too good to be true? Stay tuned!

 

 

 

Bah, humbug!

CAMRA’s Winter Warmer Wander is going to have to manage without me this year. I got off to a reasonable, if rather belated, start – the Winter Warmer Wander seems to come round earlier every year…! In Manchester town centre I picked up stickers for Titanic Plum Porter at the Paramount, a chocolate and vanilla stout at the Castle and a chilli stout at the Crown and Kettle; a visit to the Petersgate Tap also let me tick off Ashover‘s uncompromisingly-named Liquorice, which I can honestly say is the most liquorice-tasting beer I’ve ever drunk. It’s only a pity I can’t stand liquorice. (Fortunately it didn’t have the (ahem) medicinal effects that I remember from Ticketybrew‘s liquorice-infused Invalid Stout – but then, I did have multiple pints of that.)

After that I was a bit busy for the first half of December, and then I caught my usual pre-Christmas cold, and then there was really no time to fit in enough beers for the 24 stickers I’d usually aim for. I thought I might be able to manage the 12, though, and headed Stockportwards.

The Wine & Wallop had a better dark beer selection than I’ve seen there sometimes, with two to choose from; Yeovil Yeo Ho Ho was a rather nice hoppy stout. From there it was a short – well, no, quite a long – walk to my current favourite bar, Burnage’s Reasons to be Cheerful. I never have a beer in Reasons without seeing one or two others I’d like to try, and this time it was more like five or six.

Stockport was calling, though. A bus journey and short walk later, I was in the Crown on Heaton Lane. I’ve seen pubs in decline before; generally the symptoms include a severely truncated beer range, dilapidated fixtures and fittings, and a pervasive smell of bleach. The Crown looked – and smelt – immaculate: heavy wood furniture, buttoned leather bench seating, etched mirrors and windows, even bellpushes in the panelling; a better example of the old-school multi-room pub you couldn’t hope to find. The beer range had been reduced since the last time I was in, but six handpumps – mostly serving well-respected local breweries – is still more than most pubs can boast. But the heart seemed to have gone out of the place, and the customers seemed to have followed; on a fine Saturday afternoon, the barman and I were the only people in the place. The only dark beer on was Titanic Plum Porter; it’s a good beer when it’s kept well, and it was here.

One of the nice things about coming to Stockport for the Wander is getting the chance to drink Old Tom on draught; there was a time when Robbie’s pubs in Manchester would have a pin of Old Tom on the go at this time of year, but I haven’t seen it outside Stockport in a long time. So I made a beeline for the Swan With Two Necks, where I had a half of Old Tom and eavesdropped on a late entry for Scariest Conversation of 2019: what initially sounded like somebody describing a film (“so he reckoned he had to get his revenge on the drug lord who killed his brother”), but then didn’t (“so I said, I’m not going out there for the funeral, I’m not going anywhere near it – my uncle went in the end, and even he was shit-scared”). Stockport, eh?

One of the really nice things about coming to Stockport for the Wander is getting the chance to drink two halves of Old Tom on draught in succession. The Baker’s Vaults isn’t a pub I’ve warmed to since its refurb – perhaps it’s just me, perhaps it’s just the circumstances in which I usually see it, but it has that indefinable “not entirely welcoming to solitary middle-aged men well on their way to getting thoroughly drunk” air about it. At least since the last time I was there they’ve put in some chairs at floor level, if you see what I mean. Anyway, I was mildly tempted by the 6.5% ‘special reserve’ version of Titanic Plum Porter, but they had Old Tom on – there was no real competition. (It cost about half as much again as it did in the Swan, incidentally.)

I said earlier on that Reasons to be Cheerful is currently my favourite bar; I think it’s because it gets the basics right and doesn’t really bother about anything else. R2BC doesn’t look “craft”, or look anything in particular; it’s a reasonably nice-looking space, with reasonably comfortable seating, and the range and quality of the beer is consistently excellent. Remedy, on the other hand, is quite a lot about the look of the thing; I’ve never actually been to an Edison lightbulb showroom, but I think it would look a great deal like that. I plonked myself down on a railway sleeper and had one of their own beers – Missing Slippers, a 5.5% “marshmallow stout” – which was fine.

And that – apart from an obligatory scoop at the Petersgate Tap (a third of Ashover Moscow, a 9.5% imperial stout) – was it for Stockport. Sadly, with only ten stickers I was obliged to… what’s that, Sooty? I could get the last two tomorrow? I could have gone out today? Yes, well. Even more sadly, the location of those ten stickers is currently not known to me; somewhere between Remedy and Chorlton, the sheet they’re attached to went missing. So I’m back down to zero, with far too little time to get to 12. So long, WWW 2019.

I am going to spin part of it out for a bit longer, though. When planning my 6- to 8-pub route, I did feel a pang for all the further-flung pubs I would normally have tried to fit in – Poynton! Romiley! Stalybridge! So I’m going to hang on to the list and make a personal challenge of it: I’ll tick off all 45 of them, at least once, before WWW 2020 comes round. Watch this space…

Val-de-ree!

Stockport and South Manchester CAMRA’s “Winter Warmer Wander” is often celebrated as a means of encouraging people to go to pubs they wouldn’t usually go to. That’s fine as far as it goes. But in my experience, it also encourages people (e.g. me) to go to pubs where they wouldn’t usually stay, which is a bit different.

Consider a few pubs I’ve visited recently (well, today).

PUB 1 is pleasantly busy, with a hum of background chat from what seems to be a group of regulars. However, the regulars are all in the back bar, and I’m in the front bar – which is empty apart from me and two men who came in shortly after me. One of them exhibits an admirable level of trust in his friend, opening up to him about past and future medical procedures in a way which does both of them credit. Unfortunately he has quite a loud voice – and the front bar is really very quiet.

PUB 2 is a Wetherspoon’s, and it’s rammed. (As, I suspect, it will be from here to Christmas.) I find a seat with some difficulty. Behind me and to the right is a large group – two families or possibly three – having lunch; at least, the adults are having lunch. One of the children has recently been introduced to the concept of the “high five” and is keen to gain practice in using this gesture in a social setting. Over the background noise of conversation I can hear:

“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”
“High five!”

It continues.

After a while one of the adults decides to introduce a bit of variety by making a game of it, presumably involving ‘low’ as well as ‘high’ gestures. The result is slower-paced and more varied, but just as relentless; now I can hear

“High five?”

“Scuba dive!”

“High five?”

“Scuba dive!”

and so on.

And on.

PUB 3, to be fair, was fine, and PUB 5 was a delight.

PUB 4, though… PUB 4 has a small front-of-bar area and two back rooms, one reserved for gigs and the other full of people – as indeed is the front-of-bar area. Waiting at the bar, I realise that the three people ranged along it in front of me are not in fact three strangers but a group; a moment later I realise that they are not standing waiting to be served but have installed themselves on bar stools. Although they are a group – making me feel as if I’m invading their space when I move between two of them to look at the beer pumps – they have positioned their stools so as to keep a respectful distance from one another, and are consequently taking up most of the length of the bar. I find a space at the other end of the bar and wait while they get served. They have ordered three pints, plus three pints of tap water; they are clearly settling in for the long haul. I order my half of Winter Warmer-fuel, get served, pay, ask for the obligatory sticker, etc, and glance round to see how the bar-hogging trio are getting on. All three of them are sitting in complete silence, pints untouched, staring at their phones.

I go in search of somewhere else to sit down. As well as the main rooms, I remember coming to PUB 4 once before and spending a pleasant quarter of an hour in an upstairs room (with a beer and something to read, let’s be clear) – a memory which was only slightly marred by the fact that I slipped on the stairs afterwards and sat down rather hard. I negotiate the stairs but find that the upstairs rooms are locked; in fact they appear to have been converted for staff use. I head back down, half-pint in hand. On the last step, just as I congratulate myself on making it down the stairs unjinxed by past bad luck, I step down and realise that I was actually standing on the last step but one; I keep my footing but land very hard, splashing the wall liberally with beer. I decide to find an unoccupied patch of bar and finish my drink before anything else can happen. Finishing my beer, I feel that a swift exit is in order; I tip the last mouthful of beer into my mouth, put the glass down, turn and head for the door, planning to swallow the last of my beer as I’m walking out of the door (it’s called multi-tasking). Unfortunately some beer has gone down the wrong way and I cough explosively just before I reach the door, spraying a table of drinkers. I mutter an apology and make an even swifter exit than I had planned.

Would I have stopped for a drink in PUB 1, 2 or 4, if I hadn’t been in search of Winter Warmer Wander stickers? I think not. (PUB 4 didn’t even have a stout or porter on, let alone an old ale.) Would any of them have missed my custom? PUB 1 maybe; the other two, definitely not. (I couldn’t find anywhere to sit in PUB 3 either; even the deceptively spacious PUB 5 was pleasantly busy.) As I’ve said before, considering that part of the point of ‘trails’ like the Winter Warmer is to spread the custom around by sending people to different pubs, it seems odd that we do this one in the run-up to Christmas, a time when a recurring complaint about the pubs we go in is that they’re too full.

That was certainly my main complaint today – and I know from experience that PUB 4 and even PUB 2 can be perfectly delightful places to spend some time, when the crowds aren’t out. Some people like busy pubs, admittedly – but does anyone really enjoy dropping in on a busy pub?

Stocport and elsewhere

This is another Winter Warmer Wander roundup, covering pubs I’ve visited (a) in Stockport (six of them) and (b) elsewhere (another five). (NB I know about the misspelling.)

There’s a lot of pub-crawl potential in this year’s WWW, but only in Manchester and Stockport; elsewhere the pickings are a bit slim. In Chorlton, which you would have thought fairly target-rich, only one pub is listed: the Sedge Lynn (JDW). Here I had a choice between Phoenix Wobbly Bob – a perennial presence at the Sedge Lynn – and Hawkshead Brodie’s Prime. I wasn’t entirely sure if the latter would qualify – or what style it actually is – but a quick google while I was waiting to be served satisfied me that Ratebeer, at least, call it a porter, so that’s what I ordered. I’d reckoned without the manager, who intervened – midway through the predictable hunt for the sticker sheet – to tell her staff (and me) that Brodie’s Prime didn’t count for the WWW. Not feeling entirely sure on the style point, I said something about strength, to which she replied “Yes, it’s got to be 5% or over”. We got it sorted out in the end – at least, I let her know that the cutoff was 4.5% and I duly got a sticker – but things were surprisingly combative for a while there. I guess the Sedge Lynn doesn’t feel any need to drum up custom.

There were three pubs on the Fallowfield/Didsbury route, but you wouldn’t want to walk between them. Down at Parrs Wood, the Gateway was serving Stockport Ebeernezer, which looked like the most interesting option of two or three beers that qualified on strength only; I was pleasantly surprised to find that it wasn’t a vaguely Christmassy dark ale but a porter. Up the (tram) line at Wine and Wallop, there were a couple of good options and one excellent one: RedWillow Thoughtless, a 9.4% imperial stout, which (predictably) was very nice indeed. More cask stout at the Friendship in Fallowfield, and a bit of local brewery news (news to me at least): as well as the Beer Studio range, a couple of the Hyde’s pumps were dispensing beers under the “Provenance” label. I may be doing Hyde’s a disservice, but if this means anything it seems to mean “in the style of beers from region X”, which is more or less the opposite of what the word ‘provenance’ generally means. Anyway, my Hyde’s Dublin stout was a nice enough beer – a light-bodied, dryish, easy-drinking stout.

Then there was Urmston. Earlier in the WWW, the Prairie Schooner had had a Winter Warmer from Ticketybrew on, but sadly this had gone by the time I got there. Tatton Yeti only really qualified on strength, but it was a very nice beer. I didn’t go anywhere else in Urmston – the Hop House already had the shutters down – and it was a bit of an excursion for the sake of a half. I liked the look of the Prairie Schooner a great deal, though; at first blush it looks like a small bar/bottle shop of the Heaton Hops ilk, but there’s a more comfortable seating area behind the bar, going back quite a long way. Like the Sip Club in Stretford, it’s one of those places I shall be sure to visit the next time I’m visiting that part of Manchester; unfortunately, like Stretford, Urmston is a part of Manchester I hardly ever do visit. Speaking of Stretford, I got accent-checked by the driver of the bus I got home – Sorry, where? “Chorlton”. Oh, right, Chorlton! (Twenty minutes from here, mate. Also, printed on your timetable.) Admittedly I am a Southerner by origin, but that hasn’t happened to me in thirty years. But then, I don’t go west of the A56 that often.

As for Stockport, I saved it this year till I only had six slots left to fill & could do it in a day. (If six sounds unambitious, read on – & note the a.b.v.s.) Coincidentally my local CAMRA branch had a Stockport crawl planned; I was hoping to join it, but on the day we had something else booked. So it was as a solo drinker that I hit town and went straight to the Swan with Two Necks for a half of – inevitably – Robinson’s Old Tom. It was on hand pump, it was in good nick, it was big, malty and 8.5%, and by the time the bartender had got round to signing my sheet it was almost all gone. Shame – that snug looked very comfortable. From there I headed to the (Portwood) Railway, where I’d ordered a half of Rossendale Pitch Porter – an old friend – before noticing that the Phoenix pump was dispensing a 7% beer called Humbug. (The Rossendale beers have had a redesign, incidentally, and look rather good. They’re also insanely cheap if my half was anything to go by (£1.25!) – although this may just be the Railway, and/or my Chorlton expectations colliding with Stockport.) Anyway, I can report that Phoenix Humbug is terrific – a pale barley wine, sweet all the way down but without ever becoming cloying. My second ‘old ale’ of the Wander, and one to put alongside Old Tom.

Back to town then, where the Baker’s Vaults presented me with a similar multiple-qualifer challenge: Old Tom or Titanic Plum Porter Special Reserve? Well, Old Tom obviously, but I was curious enough about the PPSR to ask for a taster. (It was fine.) Then a couple of new venues, at least to me. The Remedy Bar and Brewhouse is every bit as ‘craft’ as that sounds – bare brick, railway-sleeper benches, big steel vessels, that style of thing. On the bar I couldn’t see any of their own stuff, but they did have a (I’m sighing as I type this) Bad Seed/Trembling Madness collab called Descent into Madness. It was a 7% imperial stout and it was fine. On to the Petersgate Tap; also a very un-pub-like venue, but considerably less rock’n’roll and more cafe-bar, as compared to Remedy, and a lot more to my taste. There was a choice here: Elland 1872 or Liverpool Organic Kitty Wilkinson stout. I’m a confirmed fan of the Elland, but it is 6.5%, and by this stage I fancied easing off a bit. So Kitty it was (4.5% chocolate & vanilla stout, well kept, very drinkable).

On past WWW Stockport trips I’ve finished up at the Crown, but on my last couple of visits I’ve found it hard – despite the huge range of beer they offer – to find one that really called to me. This time I headed to the Magnet. Cryptic Round One stout was 4.9% and fine (I know, but you try remembering what the beer actually tasted like at the back end of a session like this). I finished off with a half of evil keg. RedWillow, like Marble, seem to have got a bit of a new lease of life recently; the Perceptionless “New England IPA” was terrific (and not particularly hazy, for what that’s worth).

Counting one beer per venue (in other words, not counting the Pitch Porter) and adding in the details from the previous post, that stacks up as follows:

Central Manchester and Salford
Stout: 5
Porter: 5
Old ale: 0
Other >4.5%: 2
No qualifying beers: 1

Stockport
Stout: 3
Porter: 0
Old ale: 3

Everywhere else
Stout: 2
Porter: 2
Old ale: 0
Other >4.5%: 1

Total
Stout: 10
Porter: 7
Old ale: 3
Other >4.5%: 3 (Prairie Schooner, Micro Bar, Cafe Beermoth)
No qualifying beers: 1 (Terrace)

Compared to previous years, cask porter has held very steady, and cask stout has grown and grown – if there’s one tangible success the WWW can point to, it’s that. Old ales, barley wines and winter warmers, though – where are they? Setting aside Robinson’s and Phoenix – both of whom, interestingly, brew a strong ale all year round – the breweries just didn’t seem to be trying this year. On the bright side, the number of pubs not actually putting the right kind of beers on – either not understanding the point of the Wander or just not bothering – has fallen dramatically; as recently as 2014 there were almost as many strength-only beers on my list as the rest put together. Overall, this year’s Wander has to be counted as a success; congratulations and thanks to the organisers.

Maximum darkness

Time for this year’s Stockport & South Manchester CAMRA Winter Warmer Wander.  The point of the Wander is to get round as many as possible of the nominated pubs and bars (40 this year), and – most importantly – to have a “cask conditioned stout, porter, old ale or barley wine (or if none available, any other premium beer 4.5% or over”) in each one.

In this, the first of two posts, I’ll focus on my experiences in the town centre pubs included – quite a lot of them this year.

I was in both the Micro Bar and Cafe Beermoth the day after the WWW began this year; this wasn’t me being quick off the mark, though, as I’d forgotten all about it and consequently didn’t tick them off. I went back to both the following week to do it properly. Nothing looked like qualifying at the Micro Bar – no Boggart Rum Porter in sight this year; they had Titanic Cherry Dark on, but this is variously described as a ‘fruit beer’ and a ‘black bitter'(!), and is in any case only 4.2%. I had Kelham Island Riders on the Storm, a perfectly pleasant hoppy brown bitter which (just) qualified on strength at 4.5%. Pickings were on the slim side at Cafe Beermoth, too; several of their keg lines had high-to-silly a.b.v.s, but only two of the cask beers qualified. I asked after the 6%er, but this turned out to be an IPA; so, Okell’s St Nick it was. This is a “full-bodied, dark-coloured beer with an aroma of fruit and malt” to quote the brewer; it’s 4.5%, and it was fine.

Incidentally, Cafe Beermoth have an infuriating system of listing all their beers in a standard format in a row of plain signs above the taps on the back wall – a standard format which includes a.b.v., brewery and town of origin, but not style. Given that they tend to stock beers that are off the beaten track this inevitably results (for me at least) in an extended conversation with the bar staff, something like this:

What can I get you?
– Er… what kind of a beer is Drummond’s Deplorability?
That’s an IPA.
– Oh, OK. What’s the, er, Flintlock Don’t Come The Raw Prune?
That’s a plum porter. Would you like a taster?
– damn, plum, I could have guessed that… No, I’m fine. What’s the JSD Chasmatic?
[sigh] …And that’s a stout. Is it a dark beer you’re after?

It’s a lose-lose situation – the person behind the bar obviously thinks I’m a timewaster, and I end up giving in and getting a pint of the second or third thing they mention, whatever it is, just so as not to prolong the embarrassment. Memo to Cafe B: styles, please! (They surely can’t make a living selling exclusively to people who already know every beer they sell… can they?)

Elsewhere in town it was dark beers all the way. Well, almost; the Terrace had Titanic Plum Porter on keg, but nothing at all that qualified on cask. Howard Town Super Fortress, a 4.4% ‘ruby ale’, was both the darkest and the strongest thing going. Another couple of places that didn’t make much impression on me either way were the Town Hall Tavern (the aforementioned Titanic Plum Porter – fine, albeit dearer than I’ve had it elsewhere) and Pie and Ale (Sonnet 43 Create Those Moments, a “spiced pear and brandy porter” which worked far better than I expected it to). The Castle has in the past been somewhere to linger, but Christmas party season seems to have started particularly early this year; it was standing room only when I called, so I drank my Saltaire Triple Chocoholic and got out. (No sign of Old Tom at the Castle, incidentally; I haven’t seen it there since this time in 2012. Shame.)

Two of the city centre’s four Wetherspoons’ – the Paramount and the Waterhouse – are on the WWW trail. Digressing slightly, I was pleasantly surprised to see that both of them had Ticketybrew bottles in the fridge; rather excitingly, the Waterhouse also had a keg font for the 6% Ticketybrew IPA. This was a fine beer when I had it in an unlabelled bottle a few months back, but I’ve never seen it since; sadly it was off at the Waterhouse, so the wait will have to continue. Great to see Duncan & Keri getting a bit more exposure. As far as the WWW goes, it was Brightside Season Four stout at the Waterhouse and Stockport Stockporter at the Paramount – both rather good and well-kept. (The Paramount actually had four different qualifying beers on, including the Elland 1872 porter which was their house beer for a while (as ‘Paramount Porter’). I’m guessing the regulars really like their dark beers.)

Down on Bridge Street, Brink had a small but well-chosen range of beers, including Squawk Porter – really excellent, one of my beers-of-the-Wander. The landlord commented that mine was only the third sticker he’d given out, and admitted to feeling a bit let down by CAMRA’s promises of extra custom; I said that the bar’s non-standard opening hours had probably knocked it off some people’s lists. Be that as it may, I’d recommend anyone to get down there – it’s a really nice little dive bar with excellent beer at decent prices. Anyone concerned about the War on Christmas will also be glad to learn that Brink appears to be resisting the politically-correct orthodoxy of the so-called ‘Scotch’ egg.

Carry on down Bridge Street and you leave Manchester altogether, but since there’s only one Salford pub in the WWW I’ll include it here. The New Oxford is an old-style ‘beer exhibition’ pub: one of those places with 10+ handpumps, mostly dispensing beers from local-ish breweries which don’t have much of a profile. It’s the kind of pub that seems designed to attract CAMRA members and tickers, in other words, and like others of the same type (the Magnet or the Portwood Railway) it’s built up a regular clientele who aren’t either of those things, but live nearby and fancy a drink from time to time. I guess you’ve got to make a living. Anyway, the beer of choice at the Oxford this time was Empire Porter. (Empire: a small brewery in Slaithwaite. You live and learn.) Perfectly decent porter, even if the name’s about as appealing to some of us as “Colony Gin” – and well-kept, not that I’d expect anything else at the Oxford.

That just leaves three local beer institutions. The youngest of the three, the Smithfield, is my favourite Manchester pub bar none. You can find as good a beer range in a few other places – including the Paramount, if my last visit is anything to go by – but none of those has the atmosphere of the Smithfield, which I’d characterise as classic pub ambience with a bit of ‘bar’ to lift it (pale walls, unmatched sofas instead of bench seating – that kind of thing). They had two stouts on, one at 5% and one at a rather fearsome 10% – and both at recognisably beer-like prices (none of that “£6 for 2/3” caper). I considered the silly-o-clock option but wimped out and got the 5%er, viz. Blackjack Stout – and very good it was too. My visit to the Piccadilly Tap was less successful; they had some good stuff on, but the Exit 33 stout I went for was a bit puny, tasting to me more like a rather tame dark mild with a bit of added roastiness (a ‘black mild’?).

And finally Esther, the Marble Arch. Time for a quick confession. The Marble Beerhouse was my local as soon as it opened (1999?), and I’ve been a loyal and mostly enthusiastic drinker of their beers ever since then – even though for most of that time I would have killed for a brown malty bitter. Round about 2011 I had a lightbulb moment – triggered, appropriately enough, by a Marble beer – and ‘got’ the pale hoppy beers the cool kids were all talking about (and which, of course, Marble had been brewing all along). And I haven’t really had a bad word to say about Marble since then. But I confess that, between 2011 and 2015, Marble’s beers weren’t always as interesting, or as solidly accomplished, as I might have liked.

Now, though – blimey, as they say, Charlie. Marble’s current range includes several beers, particularly in the 5.5%-7.5% range, which are really excellent. Earl Grey IPA, Damage Plan, Built to Fall and Extra Porter are all absolutely superb beers; Damage Plan in particular is a beer to dream about. I had a half of Built to Fall on cask at the Marble Arch when I visited; it’s great on keg, but the lighter carbonation and more rough-edged flavour profile of cask really brings out the character and complexity of this beer. (I suspect the same wouldn’t be true of Damage Plan, but I’d love to find out.) It’s not a ‘winter warmer’, mind you, so I preceded it with a half of Magic Rock Dark Arts – which was also very good. (Just not quite that good. Marble really are on a roll at the moment.)

Thirteen pubs, thirteen winter warmers? Not quite, I’m afraid:

Stout: 5
Porter: 5
Old ale: 0
Other >4.5%: 2 (Micro Bar, Cafe Beermoth)
No qualifying beers: 1 (Terrace)

I noticed last year that old ales were thin on the ground compared to porters and stouts; the trend’s clearly continued, sadly. Let’s see if the news is any better when I hit Stockport.

Warmer winter (4)

One final post on this year’s WWW, covering everywhere I went to that wasn’t in the centre or down Wilmslow Road.

I started in Chorlton, specifically at the Sedge Lynn. The Sedge Lynn has Phoenix Wobbly Bob as a more-or-less permanent guest, and I tend to ignore it very much as I ignore Abbot or Ruddles’. This isn’t very fair – it’s not as if you’ll find Wobbly Bob in every other Spoon’s – and I make a point of hitting the Wobbly when the WWW comes round. And very nice it was too.

On the night I went to Dulcimer, their habitually weird and wonderful range of beers included a Blackberry Porter, I think the one produced by Gloucester; it was good, and not as overpoweringly fruit-flavoured as fruit beers often are. I also had a porter at Parlour – Moorhouse’s by name, which I’m afraid wasn’t terribly good; too light, in flavour and texture if not in colour.

Another trip took me to Altrincham via Stretford, where the Sip Club was a welcome discovery; only a couple of pumps, but one of them was serving Dunham Milk Stout. More milk stout at Jack in the Box, the Blackjack tap in Altrincham Market Hall: Left Handed Giant Lactose Tolerant. But by far the best beer of the trip was the one I had at Costello’s, where the Dunham Winter Warmer had recently run off and been replaced by Lymm‘s Lymm Dam, a terrific 7.2% old ale.

Finally, although by this stage I’d hit my target of 24 ticks, I hadn’t had Robinson’s Old Tom – the archetypal winter warmer – or indeed seen it anywhere. I rectified this omission with a trip out to The Blossoms, an old-school multi-room local heading out of Stockport on the A6. The Old Tom was sparkled hard, giving it a definite head and knocking some of the gas out of the beer; I wasn’t sure about this approach to begin with, but by the time I got to the bottom of the glass I’d been won over. A magnificent beer; I might even have stayed for the other half if the TV in the room where I was sitting hadn’t chosen that moment to come to life, regaling us with an aggressive American voice loudly hectoring contestants in some kind of game show (“hey, what went wrong? you lost! why’d you lose? you don’t wanna lose!). Shame – it was quite restful until then. I left, anyway, and came home via Heaton Hops. This is a tiny “tap room and bottle shop” – and I mean tiny; both rooms were rammed, with about 15 seated customers in total. I contented myself with finding somewhere to stand, and had an excellent half of Bristol Beer Factory Milk Stout. Milk stout isn’t my favourite type of stout, but this was far and away the best of the three examples of the sub-style I’d had.

Final scores:

Winter warmer: 5
Porter: 6
Stout: 10
Other >4.5%: 5

Comparing to previous years, the true ‘winter warmer’ score is still low (although it’s worth pointing out that I didn’t go into Stockport centre, where two pubs could have been expected to be serving Old Tom). But porters and especially stouts are coming on in leaps and bounds: only five non-qualifying beers in 26 pubs, which for me is a new low score.

Good fun, anyway; many thanks to the people who organised it.

Warmer winter (3)

What was going on at the Fallowfield/Withington/Didsbury end of things? In Rusholme, first of all, the Ford Madox Brown (JDW) was serving Elland 1872 porter – 6.5% and a snip at ‘basically free if you’re having a sandwich with it’. My chicken and avocado wrap was stone cold – which is to say, fridge cold, let’s be honest – but the porter was a monster as ever, and you can’t argue with Spoons’ pricing.

A separate trip started at the Wine and Wallop in West Didsbury, which had an interesting range, as ever; Squawk Espresso Stout was very good indeed, if a bit hefty at 6.5% (again). More strong stout was on offer at Hyde’s pubs, specifically the Friendship in Fallowfield and the Fletcher Moss in Didsbury; in both places I had what Hyde’s are pleased to call Hefty Herkules, a seasonal 6%er. Oddly, although the beer was recognisably a stout, the pump clip refers to it as a ‘dark ale’. This is a trend I’ve seen in a few places; the word ‘mild’ has long gone from most pump clips and ‘bitter’ is thin on the ground, with many pump clips simply describing an ale by colour (pale, golden, dark, red…). The only exception to the no-styles-on-pump-clips trend is ‘IPA’, and strictly speaking that’s only a partial exception.

I’m glad to hear that the Milson Rhodes has been reprieved from an apparent threat of closure. I went in just after Christmas; I don’t know if it was because the pub’s future had been in doubt or just because of the seasonal rush, but the place was looking a bit sad, with about 2/3 of the pump clips turned round (and no dark beers in evidence). I went for Stone’s Amber Ale (brewed at Adnam’s), which was fine.

Further down the road, the Olde Cock Inn is (as far as I could make out) a Greene King house and one I hadn’t been in before. No dark beer here either, although they did have quite an interesting line in guest beers, with breweries including RedWillow on hand pump and BrewDog on keg. I had an Old Speckled Hen, which was perfectly drinkable, and followed it out of curiosity with a half of BrewDog Candy Kaiser, which was rather good if rather expensive (£4.45/pint is pushing it out in suburbia).

This trip finished at the Gateway – second Spoons’ of the trip and third of this post – where the fridge range included Chimay Gold at £2.49, plus Red and Blue for 50p & £1 more respectively. Spoons aren’t in the high-margin business where beer is concerned, and I salute them for that. I had a dark beer of sorts – Mobberley Origin – although as it’s a black IPA it doesn’t really qualify; nice stuff, though.

No winter warmers on this leg, but a fair few dark beers. Overall it’s

Winter warmer: 2
Porter: 4
Stout: 7
Other >4.5%: 5

Warmer winter (2)

More town centre Winter Warmer Wandering.

As I mentioned in the last post, I haven’t seen any Old Tom this year, and the Castle is one of the places I haven’t seen it. (Stockport readers – I know you’re out there! – where’s good for Old Tom this winter?) The Castle, in fact, didn’t have anything dark on, or anything over 5%. I had something at 4.8%; it didn’t etch itself on my memory. Nor did the 4.8%er I had at the Micro Bar. The next time I was there, fortunately, the Boggart Rum Porter was back on, so we’ll count that one.

I said elsewhere – so I may as well say here – that I can’t think of another bar that’s gone down in my estimation so far, and so quickly, as Pie and Ale: from the initial “ooh, shiny!” response to a new and exciting craft beer palace, to a disgruntled “why did I come in here?”, in three visits flat. Drinking a spiced dark bitter, from a brewer I hadn’t heard of, with a jolly-jingle-bells pump clip, while watching large-screen sport, perched on an awkward high chair at an awkward high table… you get the picture. Still, CAMRA discount.

The Marble Arch came up trumps, though, with Marble Stouter Stout and much else; never thought I’d see Blackjack Devilfish on cask. (Hate to say it, but I think it worked better on keg. So that’s two.) Shame about the ten-minute walk through the rain to get there.

Another bar that takes a special trip is the Piccadilly Tap, where Cloudwater Stout was rather brilliant. Many thanks to the bartender who offered me a taster of the same brewery’s 7.2% IPA without prompting – that’s pretty damn good too. (Another factor in my disenchantment with Pie & Ale, incidentally, is that they’d had that very IPA previously, at approximately 190% of the price being charged at the Tap. Nice work if you can get it.) Really must leave Manchester by train more often…

Pub atmosphere is an odd thing. There are plenty of pubs that just don’t have it; even when they’re busy they just look crowded. There are ‘atmospheric’ pubs that retain a ghost of their atmosphere however empty they are, and for that matter whatever time of day it is; I’d say that of the Marble Beerhouse, the Crown and the (alas) defunct Live Stockport, which always looked like it was just about to be absolutely buzzing. And there are pubs where the question doesn’t arise, because to all intents and purposes they always are buzzing; I’ve seen quieter pubs on a Friday night than the George in Stockport on a weekday afternoon. Then there are pubs that do have atmosphere, but need a certain level of custom to bring it back to life; get there too early and the place is just dead. The Crown and Kettle, I’m afraid, is one of those. But the beer’s always good, and Brewsmith Oatmeal Stout was no exception.

Pretty high level of WWW-qualification all round, even if your actual winter warmers are fairly thin on the ground. Where are we up to?

Winter warmer: 2
Porter: 3
Stout: 4
Other >4.5%: 2

Next: Didsbury ho!