Whatcha drinking (2018-2022)?

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It's always fun to try a beer you've never had before, especially when it's from a brewery you've not encountered, either. This was the case last night as we sampled Shuggy Boat Blonde from Cullercoats Brewery.

This is a 3.8% pale beer that is tangy and has a good bitterness. There is a depth to it that might lead one into thinking it was a little stronger if you were tasting it unseen. This kind of thing pleases me - it thumbs the nose at the tiresome "beer has to be 5% before I even consider it" brigade. Well, it's your loss.

A shuggy boat, incidentally, is a fairground ride otherwise known as a swing boat. "Shuggy" is the local dialect term. The brewery is actually in Wallsend, just on the eastern edge of Newcastle and named thus as it is the "terminus" of Hadrian's Wall. The brewery has an office in Cullercoats, just up the coast to the south of the slightly larger and better-known seaside town of Whitley Bay. The name of the beer is a nod to the many fairs and rides to be found in that area in the summer.
 
Wine with spaghetti and meatballs tonight.
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Duck59 said:
It's always fun to try a beer you've never had before, especially when it's from a brewery you've not encountered, either.
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As I sit here reading your beer posts, my brain is talking to me, and wondering if there is a legal and reasonable way to box up some local craft beers, and send them to you. You might like them, or might not, but I get the feeling you would just enjoy the experience of sampling some beers brewed in Dallas, Texas.

CD
 
Rounding off yesterday evening with a bottle of IPA and a small glass of rum, I absent-mindedly poured beer into the wrong glass. The resulting concoction was...interesting. It's not something I would choose in the future, but I've tasted worse.
 
caseydog said:
As I sit here reading your beer posts, my brain is talking to me, and wondering if there is a legal and reasonable way to box up some local craft beers, and send them to you. You might like them, or might not, but I get the feeling you would just enjoy the experience of sampling some beers brewed in Dallas, Texas.

CD
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What we need is a Cooking Bites craft beer club, whereby we can exchange beers around the world. I fear that realistically, we must rely upon our imagination to envisage the pleasures.
 
The last minikeg of north-east beer is, appropriately, from the First & Last Brewery (mentioned earlier in this thread). This beer, new to us, is Equinox Pale Ale (4.1%). Pale it certainly is, a very light yellow in colour. The first thing that hits you is the New World hops, which give it a very citrus zing. There is also a hint of tropical fruit. It's a very refreshing beer and there's a fair degree of bitterness. Any sweetness is of a fruity rather than sugary nature. Most enjoyable.
 
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Hurrah. Two cases of beer have arrived. We got some bottles this time, one lot from Hobson's Brewery in Shropshire (Epicuric country) and one from Lancaster Brewery in Lancashire. There is a nice mix of styles, with some golden ales, bitters, red ales, stouts and porters. I've had one of the Hobson's beers before, but otherwise, they're all new to me.
 
The Late Night Gourmet said:
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Don’t be fooled: this is a coffee stout. Tasty, but this is supposed to be habanero flavored, and there is virtually no spice.
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I've tried a few coffee stouts, with mixed results. There was one from a Scottish brewer that tasted exactly like cold coffee and was truly horrible. On the opposite side of the coin, Dark Star Brewing (from Sussex) did a beer called Espresso Stout which I thought was superb. I use the past tense because sadly they no longer brew it. A friend from Berkshire informs me that a local brewery, Binghams, does both a coffee stout and a macchiato stout. A quick visit to their website tells me neither is available online, but they do have Vanilla Stout and Chocolate Porter.
 
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