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VAT & Fiddle Review

VAT

Castle Rock – Harvest pale is 2010 CAMRA champion beer of Britain, so for somewhere to sell it for £2.30* is a good thing, but you can make a good thing better when the beer hasn’t had to travel.

The VAT & Fiddle you see is the Castle Rock brew tap, the brewery is literally right behind this no nonsense pub with a friendly cat†.
As you would expect a large cross section (6) of Castle Rocks finest adorn the bar along with 4 guests, it’s hardly surprising then that this is the place to try Britain’s champion, every pint of Castle Rock beer I have tried at the VAT has been consistently up with the best.

VATbar

No, you don't have to wear a tracksuit to get in.

It’s hard not to recommend the VAT & Fiddle if you want a decent pint, sure it’s a no frills boozer but when it’s only 3 minutes from the train station and a great way to kick off a journey into Nottingham (or indeed a good pub prior to walking to the football/cricket) it’s undoubtedly one to keep coming back to, no matter what you think of the decor.

*prices correct at time of publishing, you can get it even cheaper with Wetherspoons/CAMRA 50p off vouchers.

†the cat is worth a specific mention being as it will come and sit with whoever it fancies, whenever it fancies.

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Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem – Review

Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem, or just The Trip To Jerusalem, or more realistically ‘The Trip’ so where do I start? well it’s old, infact world record old though this is contested, thankfully I went there to drink last week not a few hundred years ago.

Jeru

I won’t mix my words here, at one point The Trip was embarrasingly bad, though this was several years ago when Greene King first took over, I’ll hold my tongue on my beef with Greene King somewhat but needless to say a popular tourist attraction was serving up the blandest Greene King beer they could ship in from their HQ in Bury St Edmunds.

pine

In real life pinecone people will not serve you, sorry.

As you can see from the bar picture, this is now thankfully not the case as they have a couple of Nottingham beers on (EPA and Legend, both tried, both very pleasant as expected) not only that they have a second bar round the corner as well.

bar2

On this bar was Nottinghams Rock Mild, and the best beer they had on; Seance by the Full Mash Brewery which was one of the best pints I have had so far this year.

mix board

Calm down, you don't do that many beers.

So would I recommend it? yes, it’s a great pub with a decent smoking area and cave walls (not all real) it often has ghost hunts and suchlike and is steeped in history, it used to make tourists think Nottingham can’t brew, now it doesn’t, that’ll do from the boys from Bury St Edmunds.

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West Bridgford Monarchs (hockey club) Beer Festival – Thu 3rd -> Sat 5th March

Thursday 3rd March 6pm – 11pm / Friday 4th March 4pm – 11pm / Saturday 5th March 12 midday – 11pm

The previous WB Hockey beer festival was in November, I reviewed it here and I had nothing but praise for it, I’ve been to many of these now and they offer a great atmosphere and most importantly the organisers always choose top beer, as well as charging a very fair £2.40 a pint they set it up a week prior to the festival.

WB Hockey

Good cheap food, and well priced beer, yes please.

If you fancy looking at the previous festivals list it’s here but without further ado, here’s the March list (not listed is an undisclosed scrumpy cider)

(A very pale to E very dark)

E BEARTOWN PANDAMONIUM 4.8% Strong Congleton stout
B BLINDMANS GOLDEN SPRING 4% Straw coloured brewed with lager malt
B BLUE MONKEY APE ALE 5.2% Pale strong and very drinkable
A CASTLE ROCK HARVEST PALE 3.8% The award winning pale
A COPPICE SIDE SCARY CROW 5% A strong blond from new Heanor brewery
C DANCING DUCK 22 4.5% Another new brewery with growing reputation
A DERBY BREWING PERFECT 10 4.5% Pale golden ale with hoppy finish
A KELHAM ISLAND PALE RIDER 5.2% Infamous Sheffield pale ale
C MAGPIE JPA 5.2% A special brewed in honour of the landlord of the Globe
B NEWBY WYKE HMS REVENGE 4.2% Golden beer with fruit / floral hop aromas
A NOTTINGHAM BULLION 4.7% Triple hopped premium golden beer
A OAKHAM BISHOPS FAREWELL 4.6% Golden ale with citrus and dry hoppy aftertaste
A OSSETT SNOWDROP 4.2% Very pale beer with malty hints
C PURITY UBU 4.5% Premium amber ale
A ROOSTERS ORANGE BLOSSOM CREAM 3.9% Very pale beer with citrus aromas
E SARAH HUGHES DARK RUBY 6% The best ruby mild from Sedgley W. Mids
C SHARPS DOOM BAR 4% Balanced blend of spicy hops and sweet roasted malt
B SUMMER WINE ZENITH 4% Dry hopped pale ale with notes of lime

How do you get there? well, jump on the number 10 bus; where Asda is you need to get off at the stop just after it (assuming you are coming into West Bridgford from town) then it’s a 7/8 minute walk up the main road, next to the fire station. Check out the WB Hockey website for more information.

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Nottingham Beer Festival 2011 : what to expect

Nottingham Beer festival, 13th October 2011 -> 15th October 2011.

We will be tweeting live from the festival Thursday and Friday, if you fancy following us to get live tweets on what’s worth drinking, follow us @NottsBrew

October 2011 update : beer list released! 928 currently, click here for the list! stuck? check out our what to drink guide!

September 2011 update: 900+ beers have been confirmed as have 120 ciders/perries, get your drinking hats on people.

June 2011 update :Well it would appear that this year is indeed going to break all previous records with the organisers aiming for a monsterous 1000! Ales, ciders and perry sellections are all due to increase even further on last years gigantic selection and to cater for this a new ‘mini token’ system is coming into play, as well as a third of a pint being offered for the first time to allow for even more variety than ever.

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With last years Nottingham beer festival still in recent memory lets take a look at what this years Nottingham beer festival 2011 could bring, and hopefully help attract more people from around the UK to visit. Despite last year having well over 800 beers available, yes that’s more beer on offer than even the GBBF (Great British Beer Festival) it seems a host of potential visitors are yet to sample this truely unique event, infact many still have never heard of it!

banners

Last years list met expectations of even more! as demanded from festival goers, infact so much so it’s almost daunting if you show up with no idea what to have, hopefully this year some kind of colour wheel system will be implemented to give you more of an idea of what you’re buying.

Can the organisers squeeze in more? we spoke to Steve Westby after the festival close last year and whilst the grounds are vast, the amount of usable flat land is almost up to its limit, though with that said I’d imagine they will be keen to break last years record! edit – we have recently read that they’re going to try and break their own 848 record!

If you’ve never been you can see the grounds here the main marquee area used is to the left of the castle in the main picture, with smaller marquees setup above near the bandstand.

glasses

It's easy to forget you're in a castle grounds at times, despite not being allowed to wander round inside in a full suit of armour singing 'take me home' the surrounding area constantly reminds you of how special this is.

We wrote a few articles regarding last years beer festival including our review but the best piece of advice we can take from previous festivals is get there early, if you want to try all the beers go Thursday, and if you must go on Friday late, or at all Saturday consider pre-purchasing tickets as the beer turnover rate is astonishing; the number of festival goers will be north of 20,000 so popular beers can start to sell out Friday afternoon, even if they put on multiple barrels!

2010 was hands down the best festival yet improving on every aspect of previous years, if they even match nevermind exceed last years it will yet again be unmissable.

We will keep updating this article as the year progresses (last update 6th October 2011) leave us a comment if you have any questions.
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Review: The Kean’s Head (Nottingham)

The Kean’s Head is a small but bustling real ale pub owned by Castle Rock (makers of the Award Winning Elsie Mo and delicious Screech Owl) situated in the Lace Market of Nottingham (and down the road from where I work….very handy)

Outside

Named after “Edmund Kean” a noted 19th century actor. Anyway enough of the history lesson.

Outside

The Kean’s Head is a remarkably small pub and fills up quickly and with good reason. The interior is rustic and comfortable with sofas, comfy chairs, stools and regular tables.

But onto the good stuff. The beer selection is pretty darn good.

Pumps

Usually stocking 2-3 Castle Rock beers and another 1 or 2 guests. The beer is kept (in my opinion) in top notch condition. Although the guests are little on the pricey side it runs the usual Castle Rock brewery 8 ball scheme where if you fill a card with stamps from different beers you get a free beer.

Aside from the real ale there is a great selection of other stuff for those who fancy a change such as Cherry and Raspberry Beers, Oyster Stout, Duvel and a few other continental beers.

One of the real eye poppers of the Kean’s is their fridge full of bottles. It’s literally one of the best selections of … well everything I’ve seen in a long time. You’ll have to excuse the below photo being blurry, often taking these photos is a covert affair as it can raise some eyebrows.

Bottles

But you get the jist, this fridge is full of stuff. Ranging from the most of the “Brewdog” range to “Coopers Sparkling Ale”. There are plenty of the stronger trappist beers, fruit beers all the way to American microbrews rarely seen in the UK.

inside

All in all this is great for a chuckle if the real ales currently on don’t meet your fancy.

If spirits are your game then they have a pretty mind boggling array of spirits from around the world. Not for the faint hearted due to the cost but it’s the perfect thing to top a night off. I myself am partial the Islay malts (the Japanese whiskey is worth a go too!)

The food at the Kean’s Head is more expensive than your average pub fair but with good reason. It’s delicious and well done English/Italian food. You’ll find a large selection ever changing on the board as below, its definitely worth a try.

Food

All in all the Kean’s Head is an excellent pub with a great selection worthy of a place on any pub route.

To find the Kean’s Head follow this google map

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SIBA National Champions Beer Festival : Nottingham 2011

This is a compararable festival to the champions league, each region of the UK has its best beers put forward to fight it out in various categories for the SIBA gold medal, the best beer of the entire festival then being given the prestigious top SIBA award.

Halves range from £1.30 – £1.50 with NO CAMRA discount.

As per 2010, 56 handpulls on an impressive custom length bar. This was taken at 5.02pm, by 5.20pm it was completely rammed.

Thornbridge Kipling has been steamrollering pretty much everything recently and to be quite honest rightly so, but not tonight, the Kipling on offer was a good to average beer that left its self open to the competition, fortunately for Thornbridge the rest of the strong bitters category where of a similar dissapointing ilk; all failing to impress having tried the lot other than the Cairngorm – Wildcat (5.1%), that seemed to have been off from the word go. Kipling then will no doubt get this category victory but perhaps a little cheaply, regardless on the night it was in our opinion the best strong bitter.

The top award however? well, this is where the current Nottingham Beer Festival champion (and others!) is left trailing in some fashion, Salopian – Prohibition (4.6%) with its wonderful fresh citrusy grapefruit feel and a sublimely dry finish was in a different class and surely in with a good shout to top the premium bitters as well as the festival champion, closely followed by Dorset Brewing Company – Ammonite (3.8%) a full bodied pint with a lot of depth that belies its alchol content, a shoe in we reckon for the bitters & pale ales up to 4.0% category, a nod also due to a speciality beer Coach house brewing Co – Blueberry classic bitter (5.0%) beers like this can usually go one of two ways, crap, or great, it went the latter.

We are far from done though as things could change tomorrow night, we have had most, but not quite all of the beers so far!

http://www.siba.co.uk/events/?page_id=883

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Review: The Salutation Inn (Nottingham)

The Ye Old Salutation Inn is one of the Oldest Pubs in the UK, I say “one of” because 2 other nearby pubs lay claim to the same title and rather than get involved in this argument ill be straight and say CBA.

Sally

If I’m honest however I would say the Salutation is the “least modernised” of the pubs which lay claim to the title and represents an authenticate English pub to the tee. To give you an idea of how old this place is it was built in 1240, lets not beat about the bush, that’s bloody old.

pete

The interior is made up of a lot of stone and a lot of old timber which makes a beautiful change to the usual modern pub interiors, its obvious the owners have been careful not to change the old feel of this pub.

inside

Beneath “The Sal” are caves (Nottingham is known as the “City of Caves”) which date back to the 9th century which people are free to take a look at (assuming Pete the landlord is in a good mood likely) and are usually given to “LARP” and role-playing geeks (and to be clear I myself in the past have role-played occasionally)

Inside 2

Keep your eyes peeled for the resident ghost which is apparently a small girl (no really..)

The pub is broke up into 4 main rooms. 2 smaller rooms near the entrance are nice and cozy, the main bar is a quite large room with a great jukebox (usual MP3 one with a zillion choices, however is usually dominated by rock/metal)

The upstairs is a large room usually for functions or karaoke and live bands. I had my wedding reception up there (for a small fee Pete kindly put on a barman and a barrel of Nottingham: EPA which was sublime) which was fantastic.

The Salutation has a great selection of beers on, usually with a great backup of real ciders and a myriad of bottled beer/cider and spirits (They even have the Dan Akroyd vodka in a skull bottle)

To be clear the selection in the Sal rivals wetherspoons for sheer volume

Selection

There is usually at least 3-5 real ales on as well as the usual fare. The beer is always kept excellently with a great selection usually rotating daily. The Sal doesn’t appear to favour any brewery over another with guests from The Nottingham Brewery, Blue Monkey (Pete seems to have a monkey fetish), Milestone and many more regularly appearing.

Occasionally there is a beer festival and about 10-15 barrels materialise in the main bar.

CAMRA discounts apply here if you’re a member.

Another great point of the Sal is the food. You would be forgiven for looking at the beer stained folded sheet of paper with the menu printed on and thinking “cripes”. The reality is The Sal has a great chef and do some great food at decent prices.

The Chilli the salutation do is literally the best I’ve had anywhere. Its nice and spicy and well worth a try. The burgers are handmade and excellent.

While the Salutation is primarily a rock pub (Its motto is “Rock and Ale”) don’t let that put you off. The Sal is a friendly pub, with friendly staff, great food and ale.

Just what you should expect from a real ale pub.

Click here for google maps location

Cheers!

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Ruddington Beer Festival 2011 dates confirmed.

The white Horse inn has now confirmed the ever popular Ruddington beer festival will be taking place from Thursday 2nd of June till the Sunday 5th June.

Rudd 11

Don’t forget this coming week sees the SIBA beer festival come to Nottingham (opens Thursday 5pm), and going head to head with this is the first Hucknall beer festival.

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Riverside Farm and the Nutbrook Brewery

Food isn’t really our focus here, but it’s mixed with ale, so get over it.

Riverside Farm is located at the old Harry Ramsden site next to the Riverside Retail park. It’s a little out of the way but offers something different for those willing to make the short journey, or perhaps have been out shopping and need something to shut the kids up, or can’t be bothered to cook a meal.

Riverside Farm

The food is pretty much standard fare, portions are average and having been three times now nothing much on the menu sticks out as being exceptional. The puddings are certainly worth avoiding however, they’re expensive and small, to somehow ‘fool’ the customer a mountain of whipped cream is put on top of pretty much everything, lame.

Thankfully the Nutbrook Brewerys beer single handedly rescues little issues such as above, they have 2 dedicated Nutbrook pumps rotating and they’re always quality ales. The last visit offered Bitlyke (4.2%) and Responsibly (4.4%) the former being the difference between a good and an average meal, a real top pint.

Is the Riverside Farm worth a visit? why not really, Nutbrook beer isn’t exactly everywhere in Nottingham, so just for that reason it’s a decent enough shout, just watch out for that whipped cream…

http://www.riversidefarmpub.co.uk/

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King William IV

Ice Hockey fans, lots of them.

That was my initial impression on walking into the King William IV, otherwise known as the ‘King Billy’ My first thoughts from the outside revolved around why I wasn’t wearing a stab vest, it’s based towards the outskirts of the city centre near the Ice Arena (hence the hockey fans) it looks a bit rough round the area in general, and the windows have bars on them, but looks can often be decieving.

Poncy glasses and the unnecessary in general are not present.

Any doubts you may have had are quashed upon entry, 8 hand pumps are practiclaly on the other side of the door, the bar staff are very pleasant and the beer priced fairly. Of the beers I’ve had there in 2 visits, Newby Wyke – Kingston Topaz stood out as exceptional. At night lit by bulbs with a soft pink/red glow you would be forgiven for thinking you where in Amsterdam, but they don’t serve Amstel thankfully.

Being badgered to go made me finally give in and make the journey to this pub, and I’m glad I did as it’s a fantastic place to have a drink prior to Panthers/Forest or watch the mighty Notts County VS Manchester City; you could also use it as a good starting point for a pub crawl snaking your way back into town.

Unexpectedly they have a TV in the drinking area at the rear that has sky sports, a nice bonus! A pub then that’s  a little off the beaten track, but well worth the journey.