Beery Goodness

Summer is officially over.

The Houston Brewing company's second festival of the year usually marks this and indeed it was its usual random self, with rides for children, a random band and, as usual lovely weather until around 5. Selection of beers wasn't great but they had a real cider on.

Which made me think about Beer, obviously. Now by Beer I mean Ale, or a lager, but none of your Tetleys, none of your Carling, or Tennents, in short if its chemically stabilised and accelerated, leave it out.

Now in Scotland Ale isn't always an easy find, although with the propagation of bottled ales it is becoming easier for pubs to make a shout on it, and the popularity of Good quality European biers is putting some pressure on the lager market (As can be seen by the way the usual big players are bringing out "Luxury" brands and trying to play up their own less chemical origins) however I won't believe them until they are forced by law to print an ingredients list on the side.

So, how do you tell a real ale from commercial swill. Well, its not 100% but a good way to tell if anything is good, is if its being sold, or marketed ice cold, be it Magners over ice or Ice cold Carling there is only one reason to serve anything below zero and that is to numb the taste buds to mask the taste. Not that ale should be served warm, despite what Americans will tell you, it should be cellar temperature, or a few degrees off normal room temperature, like it was in a room where you'd consider a jumper.

Still, it was good to be on the real ale again and with the rise of beer geekism and snobbery hopefully they should become more prevalent as places try to look more cosmopolitan.