La Biere Du Demon

I gave my other half the choice of my final beer of this particular trip to the pub and she chose the beer of the demon. It proclaims itself to be "Biere blonde la plus forte du monde". Now my French is pretty ropey but I think that means blonde beer which is the strongest in the world. It certainly is strong weighing in at a whopping 12%. 

I actually very much enjoyed it. I have had the ultra strong beers made by freeze distillation such as tactical nuclear penguin from brew dog. I find these tend to taste less like beer and more like port. The demon beer had a flavour that gave a hint of that kind of taste, I found it nice and very drinkable for something so strong. I was surprised to see it only getting a 2.5 on untpped, I thought it was much better than that. 3.5 out of 5. 

Ename Dubbel

Another beer from the Ename brewery was my follow up to the achingly sour beer I had just had. There isn't a lot to says out its beer, the Ename brewery seems to produce perfectly fine examples of typical Belgian beer. This is a good example of a Belgian Dubbel, without ever being special in any way.  3 out of 5. 

Cantillion 100% Gueze

After having brunch at Urban coffee in the jewellery quarter I headed into the city centre to make the most of the last few days of the summer holiday. This meant a stop at the post office vaults. Unfortunately my phone had run out of battery so no photos of the ones I had that day. First up was a sour beer from Belgium. I have no truck with sour beer I think it just tastes a bit gone off. This beer was especially sour, the first mouthful, was like sucking on a beery lemon. It did get better as I drank more and I became more used to the flavour, but overall I'm not a fan, 1.5 out of 5

Kasteel Rouge

No photo of this one. I had it while I had some friends up to watch the birmingham bears play some t20. We met up in the post office vaults before heading to the game. One of the beers j had that day was the Kasteel Rouge. I ordered it without a thought and ended up drinking a berry flavoured beer in front of my mates, very manly. It was ok not too bad, I'm looking at you floris beers, but also nothing write home about. 2 out of 5. 

St Bernabus Abt 12

When I spoke to Kieth, the man who has finished the 200 beers, he waxed lyrical about this as a beer. He told me it is basically the same beer as  Westvleteren XII. Westvleteren XII is supposed to be the best beer in the world but is also rather rare, they do have it in the Post Office Vaults but it is £30 a bottle. This makes the St Bernabus a real bargain at £5 even if it is only a pale imitator of the best beer in the world.

What strikes me first is how happy the monk, presumably the eponymous St Bernadus, on the bottle looks. The beer is very dark and thick and has a good deep complex taste. It's a party in my mouth of the different flavours that go into a beer, it's quite intense. It's also very strong, 10%, as benefits a quadruple ale. It left me feeling a little bit pissed, I hadn't had any lunch. So I went off home for an afternoon nap after having this. 4 out of 5. 

Poperings Hommel Beer

This beer goes into the category of the also rans. It's not a bad beer but it doesn't really have anything to set it apart from the large crowd of beers that there are. I would rate it as average in almost every way and I wouldn't recommend anyone going any distance for one. 2.5 out of 5. 

Ename Blonde

Following in from the other Ename beers I had had earlier after the direction of a past champion I went for the blonde version. Ian the current barman said he thought this was the best of the beers from this brewery. It is quite a standard Belgian blonde beer. It's nice but doesn't really have anything to put it above anything else. 3 out of 5. 

Chimay Red

More Trappist beer!

The good monks of Chimay make beer that comes in different coloured bottles. The red, or rouge, is the least strong of these. 

I had this beer as when I asked for a beer du demon the bar maid couldn't find it and started to look a bit flustered at the people waiting behind me. The post office vaults doesn't seem to have a system for putting beers into the fridges and this can result in a long wait for a beer.

The beer itself was nice, a fairly standard dubbel style beer with a kind of rich fruity sweetness going on. Drinkable but not special, although I was glad it was only 7% as some if these Belgian beers can really bowl me over when they push into double figures. 3.5 out of 5. 

I also learned that there may be plans afoot to move the post office vaults 3 doors down the road. Exciting if this is true. 

Monks Stout

It's no secret that I don't like stout but if it's in the book then I have to drink it. The best I can say about this beer is that it is very stouty. It's like they turned up the stout to 11. I didn't like it at all. Burnt, that's what it tastes of. 1 out of 5. 

Gregorius Trappist

Another day another Trappist beer, those monks just love brewing. This one comes from a small relatively new Trappist brewery in Austria. Following on from the St Sebastien this one come in at over £8 and I don't even get a cool ceramic bottle to keep, oh well. 

The beer itself is very dark and packs a lot of punch. It's full of flavour, malty and very sweet, much sweeter than most beer I have had. A quick glance at the ingredients reveals the reason for this sweetness, those crafty monks have added honey to the mix. Overall I enjoyed this beer and actually found the sweetness nice, it did however start to cloy a little towards the end. 3.5 out of 5. 

Ename tripel and cuvée

I was in the post office vaults last Monday, and when I ordered my drink  the barman informed me that I was in the presence of greatness and introduced me to Kieth, one of the 3 people to have finished the 200 beers. I had a chat to him and he informed me that he thought the Ename beers were a good drink. So I had two of them.

First up, the tripel. 

I can say that this lived up to Kieth's promise and was a very likeable beer. Slightly sweet and very warm in the mouth it went down very nicely. 3.5 out of 5. 

Next up the Cuvée 

It has a slightly pink colour and I was fearing another berry flavoured nightmare. It proved to be ok but lacked a real in depth flavour. It was very light and fizzy. No where near as good as the tripel. 2.5 out of 5

St Sebastian Grand Cru

Sometimes I think the whole beer passport is just a way to sell me rubbish, such as the entire Floris range of beers, and very expensive beers. This beer comes in a a hefty £11.50, but hell I'm probably only ever going to have it once.

It comes in a very distinctive ceramic bottle and for my £11.50 it is Big bottle coming in at 500 ml rather than the normal 330 ml so it's practically a bargin.

The beer itself is very nice. It's a golden beer with a rich deep flavour. It's quite warm in the mouth but is pleasant and refreshing as well as having a nice complex flavour. Having finished the beer my other half decides to retain the bottle and put it to use in the kitchen holding olive oil. Maybe the £11.50 was a bargin. 4 out of 5. 

Brekles brown

I'm a really big fan of American beer. I love a hoppy American style IPA, plenty of flavour, easy drinking on a sunny afternoon. many people consider one of the quintessential American beers to be the Anchor Steam Beer. I've tried it a number of times and find it incredibly bland. This comes from the same brewers and I hope it will be a step up.

All I can say is that it is a very middle of the road brown beer. Not bad, certainly inoffensive, but with nothing really to recommend it. 2 out of 5

Augistiner Dunkel

Germany is famous for beer. When I think of Germany it's heavy set set men in leather leggings quaffing larger. I've never been to Munich but I really hope that's what it's like. This beer comes all the way from Munich. It's very dark, so doesn't fit into my Munich dream, and has a bit too much of that kind of stouty flavour that I don't like. It's alright but tastes a little bit burnt for my liking. 2.5 out of 5

Schelentera Marzen

After watching some nutter come into the pub, shout widely about the devil and threaten to disembowel one of the other patrons I was in need of a stiff drink. Thankfully of all the people in the pub the small barmaid managed to get the nutter to leave and I was given the Schelentera Marzen.

Its a smoked beer from Germany and it tastes and smell vaguely of smoky bacon flavoured crisps. On the face of it this is a good thing. However 2 thirds of a way into a bottle I was struggling. I'm just not a fan of smoked beer. 2 out of 5