30th July 2012

The first major landmark, one hundred beers have now been drank. To celebrate the occasion I've done something unthinkable... I've let a woman drink my beer. Here you'll get a review from my lovely fiancé, Tiia, as well as from myself. Enjoy.

Sinebrychoff Porter (Finland)

Michael:

I wanted my first milestone beer to be one from the country that I love. The only Finnish beer left in the book was this one. And for a porter, this is actually rather boring. There's just not enough power in the taste. Although that might be a blessing in disguise, because the taste I did get was slightly metallic. If the taste had been any stronger it might have felt like I was drinking mercury.

Tiia:

When I saw him bringing this my first word was "NOOOOO!". I hate dark beer, do I really have to drink that? But it's Koff, it can't be that bad. And it's not that bad. This is the very first dark beer I'm able to drink (actually I didn't have a choice, "you'll have to drink all of this", he said, I'm wondering if he's trying to get me drunk). There was a weird bitter taste at the end, but it didn't bother me. I'm so proud of myself that I drank this. It's an easy to drink beer for females who are afraid of weird beers, which is everything except lager.

3 Monts (France)

Michael:

Trust the French to create a beer that you need a corkscrew to open. It didn't really taste like much, but the aftertaste was rather strange, a bit like you're drinking something much stronger. Like bleach. I'm still not sure if I liked it or not. Maybe it's a good thing that I gave half of it to the missus.

Tiia:

This had a mild taste at the start, but the aftertaste was like a cat had peed in my throat, which made me want to drink more of the stuff to get rid of the taste from my mouth. It didn't really smell like anything, which was good because then I wasn't afraid to drink it. Towards the end the cat pee taste didn't bother me... well, maybe a bit.

23rd July 2012

I'm writing this before 6am, so don't blame me if it's rubbish...

Left Hand Milk Stout (USA)

This definitely wasn't the strongest flavoured stout I've ever had, but still it was rather good. I understand where the 'milk' stout gets its name too, it was very smooth to drink. It doesn't taste like milk though, which is a bloody good thing, because i think that out of all the flavours in the world, milk flavoured beer would make me vomit the most.

Veltins (Germany)

Pilsener used to be one of favourite types of beer, but the more beers I drink from this book the more boring I find pilsener to be. I drank this after a rather powerful wheat beer, which was maybe a mistake, as I couldn't taste a thing. Although, towards the end of the glass I seemed to get a taste of plain rice in my mouth. So you could save yourself some time and effort by going out and getting some Uncle Ben's basmati.

16th July 2012

After a one-and-a-half week holiday in England I decided to make this week's blog an English beer special. And because you were denied a blog update last week, I'll make up for it by adding four beers. I'm just too thoughtful sometimes.

Barnsley Bitter (England)

Starting with the beer brewed in my hometown (visit the brewery's pub, Old No 7, if you're ever in the Barnsley area). This is light in alcohol, only 3.8%, but still tastes nice and strong. Apparently there are two beers called Barnsley Bitter, and I think I had the other one once before, and it tasted like some designer eau de toilette. This one doesn't, thankfully. Very drinkable. 

Old Thumper (England)

This "beast of a beer" is a red British effort that does actually taste very British. It's a stupid name for a rather nice beer. And I'm not sure what the wild pig on the bottle has to do with anything, but it is quite nice. 

Sneck Lifter (England)

The bottle gave the story of what a sneck lifter is but I can't remember and it was way too boring for me to put in the effort of googling it. If you want to know what it is, be my guest. It's a rather standard dark ale, no different from any other British dark ale on the market. It's good, but nothing specifically noteworthy.

Thornbridge Jaipur (England)

This came in a standard beer glass, so I was forced to look like a weirdo taking photos of beer taps in pubs. This was a rather nice IPA, plenty of hoppy bitterness made it really nice to drink on a summer lunchtime. 

25th June 2012

Friday was a double celebration for me. It was midsummer's day, which here in Finland is a huge thing, and it was also my birthday. Being one year older I should also be one year wiser, but with all this beer I've been drinking I might be stuck in reverse.

Malheur 10 (Belgium)

Thanks go to Jose for bringing this for me. When I poured it in to the glass I wasn't sure what this beer was. It looked and smelled like wheat beer, but thankfully didn't taste too much like it. Unless I've just become so accustomed to wheat beer that I've actually started to like it. What I do know about this beer is that it's very strong and actually very good. A quite typical Belgian effort, lots of flavour and plenty of alcohol.

Staropramen (Czech Republic)

This was my first beer to start the weekend of celebrations. I was looking forward to this because I really like Czech beer, and as you can see, my girlfriend Tiia was quite excited about it too. And with good reason. Although this beer doesn't taste so much different from some of the other Czech beers I've had so far, it's not a bad thing. So overall the weekend was a success... apart from the England-Italy game, but I won't go in to that. 

18th June 2012

A rather nice pair of British beers to drink while watching England scrape past the Swedes.

Brains Dark (Wales)

Although this sounds like a racist zombie's favourite beer, it's actually a rather nice drink. It tasted very bitter, rather like what I'd expect a lump of coal to taste like. If you like dark beer then I would definitely recommend this. If not then there's nothing so remarkable here that would make you change your mind. I do like dark beer though, so for me this was great.

Tribute (England)

The bottle says that this is "The South-West's Favourite", and actually it's quite easy to see why. This looked slightly cloudy in the glass and had a nice strong flavour. And at only 4.2% you could drink it all night and wake up the next morning without wondering what happened to your keys/phone/face/furniture. 

11th June 2012

The European football championship kicked off at the weekend, and I'm quietly confident that England has the ability to get knocked out in the quarter finals.

Victory Storm King Imperial Stout (USA)

This is a powerful beer, both in taste and alcohol content. Stout is one of my favourite types of beer, especially when it's done right. And this is definitely done right. It leaves an aftertaste like you'd just drank three cups of strong coffee without stopping for breath. It's good. And I mean really good.

O'Kell's Aile Smoked Celtic Porter (Isle of Man)

For those of you don't know, the Isle of Man is a tiny island located between Britain and Ireland. Apparently there's a brewery there, and if this beer is an example of what they brew, it's a pretty good brewery. I'll admit that the word "smoked" on the label frightened me a bit, I've had some bad experiences with smoke beers. But this one didn't have the overpowering smoky taste that the others had. This one tasted more like the tar flavoured things that you can get, at least here in Finland. A nice mild beer.

4th June 2012

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Tsingtao (China)

20% of the global population is Chinese, so you would think that at least one of the 1.6 billion people living there would be able to make a decent beer. However you'd be wrong. There are only two Chinese beers in the book, and both of them can be described as "below average". Maybe all the Chinese are too busy making cheap copies of expensive electronics, I don't know. But I do know one thing, at least the European and American beer industries will be safe if this is the best they can do.

Chimay Tripel (Belgium)

The drunken monks do it again. Trappist beer quickly became one of my favourites after I tried the first one. This beer has a really strong taste, a taste which makes you think it has a high alcohol content, but at a reasonable 8% it's not going to melt your tonsils. Those monks may have a boring life, but at least they make a nice beer to make up for it.