As some of you might recall I wasn't at the chat on Saturday because I was at a beer festival. Over the weekend I had about thirty different beers (in half pints over three days!)
I don't normally get involved in the beer discussions but I thought I'd share some of the names with you.

The Abeydale brewery go for a religious theme with beers called Absolution, Black Mass and Last Rites. As the last one of these is 11.5% alcohol it's appropriately named.

B&T meanwhile provided us with Dragonslayer while theBeartown brewery offered Bearskinful and Black Bear.

Daleside had supplied Greengrass Old Rogue a name that will only be meaningful to Brits who watch Sunday night television.

I wanted a glass of the Ptarmigan from Harviestoun just because I've been to the town of Chicken (which legend has it would have been called Ptarmigan if anyone had been able to spell it). Unfortunately it wasn't on at any of the sessions I was at.

The Ring O' Bells brewery gave us Tipsy Trotters and Sozzled Swine while Wentworth supplied a Rampant Gryphon.

Without doubt though the winner of the strangest name prize went to the Inveralmond Brewery with it's Thrappledouser bitter.

Altogether there were over a hundred beers. Next year I must allow more time.

Vescere bracis meis.

Read all about my travels around the world here.
Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog.

I think that was wise of you, Bob. It wouldn't have done to have drunk to excess at such an important event.

Still, you could always pop out to Ma Pardoe's tonight to top up if you're feeling a bit thirsty.

Richard English

Yesterday, Easter Sunday, I told my son about our beer discussions here. His thoughts are, once you have had one or two, it doesn't matter what they taste like! You can't taste them anyway.

Which proves, I fear, that he has never drunk good beer.

After all, would that be a valid comment about good wines?

Richard English

quote:

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After all, would that be a valid comment about good wines?

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Richard, of course it would. After all, there is a point of no return after too much of any type of alcohol--and, most of us, at some time or another, have been there!

I think one of the funniest names for a beer is Germany's St. Pauli Girl. I am not sure why beers have such strange names. I mean, let's face it, "Hog's Back" isn't a very sophisticated name. When I first asked for it at my favorite liquor store, not only was I a bit embarrassed, but my son, who was with me, cringed. I'm sure he was thinking, "I don't know her!"

If you were to choose between the 2 German beverages, "Donnhoff Reisling" or "St. Pauli Girl"--which would you choose???

My observation was in reponse to the comment "...once you have had one or two, it doesn't matter ..."

After one, or even two, glasses of good beer (or good wine) the taste buds should still be in fine discriminatory order. The point of inability to taste would come, for most people, well beyond that point. For me it would certainly be beyond the equivalent of a bottle of wine (six glasses) or three Imperial pints of beer.

Of course, one glass of American Budweiser would do the trick, since my tastebuds would be anaesthetised through the action of the freezing liquid and the various vile and harmful chemical additives. Hence my comment about GOOD beer.

The names of beers can be strange but, inevitably, with thousands of different beers this will happen in an attempt to avoid duplication. Many beers, like many wines, use the name of their location and, although "Hogs Back" might seem strange to the uninitiated, there is a good reason for it. The Hog's Back is a low range of hills in Surrey, which when viewed from a distance, look like the profile of a Hog's Back and the feature is therefore thus named. It's no stranger than, say "The Blue Rudge Mountains".

The brewery is in the village of Tongham, just off the Hog's Back and this is why the name was chosen. Now stranger than the names of many wines that have taken the names of local villages or other features.

Richard English