Tribute to a Swedish Real Ale Brewery

It is great pleasure to introduce a new brewery that has touched my beer heart the last couple of months. Sometimes you just feel that this is it, this is great from start, and for the little "brewery" up north in the city of Sundsvall it has simply been a joyride for us beer geeks in Stockholm.

It is amazing that a place that is actually a local small pub in Sundsvall can do such master pieces. Simple traditional beers with genuin English cask conditioned traditions. You can simply in short say that this is "Real" real ale because they do the beer so traditional that it can ever be, well structured in the style and very british.

The Irish Pub in Sundsvall has been in business for quite a while now but it is just the last couple of months that it has appeared as a genuin brewery, at least now when the beer is available not only locally in Sundsvall. Its like a big secret has been revealed that has been hidden up north. Just a pitty that we have had to be waiting such a long time.

I guess I have sampled all the available beers and styles served at Akkurat the last 2-3 months, and they have all been great and very distinct in flavor and tradition.

Some of the sampled beers has been;

Irish Pub East India Pale Ale

Irish Pub Guld Kusten

Irish Pub Svarta Katten


So what could be better when we talk about Swedish Real Ales, well the market is not really big but at least the quality is high, so it would be my favorite brewery in Gothenburg and the amazing Ocean Brewery. Favorte beer from that brewery is the great english IPA in form of the Ocean India Pale Ale;


Cheers.

QUICKTAKE: The beers from Skinners

We have recently been enjoying real ales from both Rudgate and Skinners lately in Stockholm. Escpecially Skinners is a very good example for a great new brewery from Cornwall. Well "new", at least the brewery is quite new when it started up the business in 1997.

The brewery was started by Steve and Sarah Skinner in 1997 in Truro, Cornwall and they have quite quickly established themselves as one of the major craft breweries in the South-West. The brewery is family-run and operates all brewing in Truro and where they have a great selection of cask conditioned ales that has earned them prizes including twice Supreme champion of the South West and SIBA UK National Reserve Champion of Great Britain.

One of the fun part of the brewery is the quite hilarious labels that they use for the bottle design and also the beer name. What about; "Pennycomequick", "Jingle Knockers" or "Bishop Bills Truro Brew"? and these labels;



Served beers at OT that I have sampled so far is Skinners Keel Over and Skinners Figgys Brew.

The first one is a classic styled bitter, with a clear deep golden to amber colour and big white head, a decent real ale bitter. Second one is a darker bitter, copper in color and white head, a bit of hops with notes of malt, also very decent and drinkable.

The beers are not master pieces but they do decent drinkable beers that you can drink much of. Beers do not always need to be strong and hoppy and master pieces, some times you just feel for a drinkable beers and that is where breweries like Skinners have a place for me.

A Real Ale report

Coming back from the city last night I did some more real ale experiences with beers and breweries not sampled before. From the real ale offering over at OT sampled to of them (very tired of Christmas beer so the Otter Claus was left out).

1. Robinsons Double Hop (Cask): A ESB brewed by Robinsons from Unicorn Brewery, Stockport, Cheshire, England. Reddish colored with a light head. Malty and hoppy aroma with some citric notes. Quite bitter finish, but ending quite fast. Not excellent but a decent ale and much better than the Christmas beer that I am so tired of right now. Simply refreshing and lite that you can drink more pints of.

2. Elgoods Old Black Shuck (Cask): A dark stout brewed by Elgoods brewery from Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, England. A balanced stout with pleasant roasted flavours. Coffee and caremel notes. Quite short on the finish but at the end a very decent and drinkable beer.

Great Real Ales in December + Harviestoun!

Oliver Twist in Stockholm is always a great place for really quality served Real Ales (not just micros from the US), and December looks like a good month.

Just noticed that a old favorite is returning next month in the form of the Scottish brewery Harviestoun. This was a favorite brewery for some years and a couple of summer months when it was the traditional Real Ale brewery of the summer at Oliver Twist.

Unfortunately it was purchased by the Caledion brewery in the fall of 2006 and the brewmaster quit (retired) at the time of the purchase. So it is not the same thing when the beer now returns as a real ale to OT, but still this brewery produces quality brews.

It is difficult to say if the beers are different now. I guess it is more connected with a feeling and not facts, but something is different just because it was bought by a macro-brewery. Still beers like Schiehallion (She-ha-li-on) is a very good lager beer (very hoppy and dry to be a beer from GB), that has been a favorite at OT during the summer months.

The other breweries and beers that will be available in December are the following;

1. RCH Brewery

1.1 Double Header
1.2 Firebox
1.3 Old Slug Porter

2. Elgoods Brewery

2.1 Greyhound
2.2 Old Black Schuck
2.3 North Brink Porter
2.4 Cambridge

3. Harviestoun Brewery

3.1 Schiehallion
3.2 Bitter & Twisted
3.3 Ptarmigan

RCH Brewery is new for me, seems to be a very small brewery in North Somerset, England, will be fun to test. The number one beer based on ratings seems to be the Old Slug Porter.