Christmas Beers from Japan +

First I have to say thanks to Joshua for the lovely Christmas present, thanks again Josh.

I have had a few beers from Japan, in fact Josh also brought me some back last year, so I will include them as well. I will start with the new ones though.

K’s Brewing, The Brewmaster Fukuoka Blonde Dry

5.0% gold colour wit ha nice head, sweet fruit and yeast aroma, bitter sweet Belgian blonde taste, best Japanese beer I have had to date.

From their web site,  The Brewmaster started as a handcraft microbrewery in Fukuoka, Kyushu Island in 2002.  Only a small brewery like us can create handcrafted, tasty and joyful beer-ale.

K’s Brewing, The Brewmaster Healing Time

5.0% black with a quickly dissipating head, bitter fruit aroma, fizzy bitter tart taste with a coffee after-taste.

K’s Brewing, The Brewmaster Amaou Noble Sweet

4.0% hazy pink colour with a nice head, bitter strawberry aroma, some strawberry in the sweet but tart taste. I let Dot drink this one.

Kirin, Classic Kirin Beer

4.5% gold colour with a very thin head, slightly sweet malt aroma, slightly sweet lager taste.

I may as well carry on with the rest of the Japanese beers I have tried.

Kirin, Ichiban

5.0% pale yellow colour with no head, sweet malt aroma, slightly sweet with a slight caramel taste. Although I have had the Japanese version, this one was brewed in England by Wells & Youngs.

Sapporo, Imported Premium Beer, aka, Draft Beer / Premium Beer

5.0% pale yellow colour with no head, sweet malt aroma, slightly sweet with a slight orange taste.  As with the last one, this was not brewed in Japan but in Canada although again I have had the original.

Asahi, Super Dry

5.0%, pale yellow no head, not much aroma (what smell it did have reminded me of pub toilets), tastes like slightly sweet over carbonated mineral water but dry. I have read reports that state it is refreshing, well so is water and that costs less.

Asahi, Black (Kuronama)

5.0% dark brown colour with a thin head, roast malt aroma, roasted smoky malt taste, it was a lot better than their Super Dry.

Last weekend's beers

Two new beers this Saturday but also many old favourite.

Worthington’s, Red Shield from England

4.2% deep gold colour with a thin head, caramel aroma and taste, slightly bitter. I though it was a lot better than the Worthington's, White Shield, I had back in 2010. It is good to see the famous Worthington name still being used.

Saint-Omer, Bière de Noël from France

6.8% amber colour with a thin head, the aroma is sweet sugary fruits, sweet fruity taste, a good Christmas beer.  Another beer from Saint-Omer, bit of a late festive beer but one of the better ones I have had this year.

Also we had these (click on the photo of review)

Another Ten English Beers

Another Ten English beers, this time I thought I would go for a selection showing the verity of good beers brewed here in England.  I am sorry that no Pilstners or Lagers are included in the list.

All are beers I really like.

Wells, Banana Bread Beer

5.2% amber with a thin head, very distinctive banana aroma and fruity taste with just a hint of banana, I personally love it. It is not a banana beer (I had one of those in the Czech Republic) but a banana bread beer, hence there is only a hint of banana.

Samuel Smith's, Organic Wheat Beer

5.0% hazy gold colour with a thin head, smells like and tastes like a good German Hefeweizen, strange thing is, it's English, it's organic and it's very good. Yes you can get a good draught Wheat Beer from England.

Wells, Waggle Dance

5.0% honey beer, gold colour with a thin head, you can actually taste and smell the honey. Although not a favourite of mine it is very drinkable and I think the best of the honey beers I have tried.

Theakston, Old Peculier

5.6% very deep amber with a thin head, malt aroma, malty caramel and liquorish flavour, a very good stronger beer.  An old favourite and after a bit of a journey, Theakston's it is now an independent brewery once again.

Hydes, Mackeson

3.0% black colour with a good brown head, taste is slightly sweet smoky roasted malt, smooth and bitter roasted malt, not at all a weak taste.  I am not a great lover of Stout or Mild beers but I have always liked this stuff.

From RateBeer, Originally brewed by Mackeson of Hythe in Kent in 1910. This is the first beer to use milk sugar to produce a Milk Stout. The Mackeson brewery was eventually acquired by Whitbread, which in turn was taken over by Interbrew who produced the beer at their Magor brewery in Wales. Subsequently has been contract brewed by Youngs and latterly by Hydes.

Greene King, Very Special India Pale Ale

7.5% amber colour with a thin head, citrus hop and malt aroma, strong hop and alcohol taste.  This is the strongest of the IPA's from Greene King and they are all very drinkable, as was this one but not too many in one session.

Bass, Premium Ale

4.4% deep amber with a thin head, bass has never had a good smell and I find it best not to sniff it but the taste is very good, fruity, malty and caramel with slight bitterness.

Bass was once one of the biggest brewers in England, not just England, the world, and I have drunk Bass in bars in the USA and in Belgium. It is now owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev and brewed by Marston's.

Marston's, Owd Rodger

7.6% very deep amber colour with a thin head, sweet fruity aroma, fruity taste with some caramel, very nice beer.  A very good strong but tasty English ale.

Badger, Long Days

4.5% golden with a thin head, aroma of fruit (as do most Badger beers) the label says raspberry and it could be, sweet fruity taste but slightly bitter, I liked it.  Badger make several very good beers, this one is harder to find that most though.

Ampleforth, Abbey Beer

7.0% very dark brown colour with a thin head, nice deep fruity aroma, satisfying fruity taste.  An Abbey Double from England (York) and it is very good, maybe I do not have to visit Belgium in future but maybe I do.  

Below are the links to my other Top Ten Beer blogs.

My Top Ten French Beers

My Top Ten German Beers

My Top Ten English Beers

My Top Ten Belgian Beers

My Top Ten Dutch Beers 

Another Ten French Beers

My Top Ten Beer Lists Updates.

For the Top Tens I have done that didn't include the actual Top Selling Beer in each of the countries,  I have updated the My Top Ten Beer blogs to include that beer, even if it is not actually one that I would count in my top ten.

Below are the links to my Top ten Beer blogs.

My Top Ten French Beers

My Top Ten German Beers

My Top Ten English Beers

My Top Ten Belgian Beers

My Top Ten Dutch Beers 

Another Ten French Beers

Another Ten English Beers

My Top Ten Dutch Beers

Well I think I have now had enough different beers from Holland, to do a, My Top Ten Dutch Beers.

As with all my other Top Tens, I have had quite a few beers in and from Holland but not enough to make a definitive top ten list of Dutch beers (I have said the same for each of my Top Tens). However as with the others, what I can do, is make a list of those Dutch beers I really like and would drink again given half a chance.

Like most of the other countries I have done in My Top Tens, the actual best selling beers for Holland are pale lagers / pilsners and this is the same for all the world as far as I can tell. However my Top Ten will not be full of pale lagers / pilsners but a verity of the beer styles that I like.

As Usual. Remember, this is my list, my top ten, my personal opinion, so please do not get upset if you favourite Dutch beer is not included.

My choice , in no particular order, is

Grolsch, Premium Weizen

5.3% cloudy gold colour with a thin head, smells like and tastes like a good German Hefeweizen, banana in the aroma and that wonderful yeasty wheatbeer taste, strange that it's Dutch then, well done Grolsch. I bet this wasn't the Grolsch beer you were expecting me to post here but it is their best beer by far.

Oranjeboom, Premium Lager

5.0%, gold colour with a thin head, slight malt aroma, quite watery feel to it, sweet malt taste, I do not know if it is just the name playing tricks on my mind but I can taste oranges.  It's one of those lagers that I mentioned in the introduction but this one is usually available in the UK and comes in large bottles.

De Koningshoeven, La Trappe Blond

6.5% gold colour with a thin head, fruity aroma, fruity yeasty taste, quite nice.  A beer in the mould of the Belgian Leffe blond, and if you have read my blogs, you will know how much I like Leffe.

Hertog Jan, Grand Prestige

10% deep amber colour with a thin head, sweet fruity alcohol aroma, the taste is sweet malt and strong alcohol.  I occasionally like a strong beer but not all are as drinkable as this one.

De Koningshoeven, La Trappe Dubbel

7.0% amber colour with a good head, sweet caramel aroma, fruity and malty taste, very good.  Another La Trappe beer that I like very much, a nice Abbey Dubbel.

Gulpener, Korenwolf

5.0% very cloudy gold colour with a thin head, citrus and banana aroma, nice flavoured wheat beer, it is the cloudiest beer I have ever had but I like it a lot. 

Brand, Sylvester winterbier 2011 - 2012

7.5% deep amber colour with a very thin head, fruity malt aroma, warming dry fruity caramel taste.  I have been saying how Christmas / Winter beers should be different from the normal and this one was.

Wieckse, Witte

5.0% hazy yellow with a poor head, yeasty citrus aroma and citrus taste not at all like most other Wittes.  I did enjoy it though sat outside a beach bar in Katwijk aan Zee.

Bavaria Brouwerij, 8.6 Red

7.9% deep amber colour with a thin head, caramel malt aroma and taste, I think this could be the best of the Bavaria 8.6 beers.   The 8.6 Special Blond Beer, was quite a good blond beer but the 8.6 Gold, was very sweet, far too sweet.

La Trappe, Witte Trappist

5.5% cloudy pale yellow colour with a nice head, banana and yeast aroma, banana and yeast taste, a lot less citrus than some.  I still have a few more of the La Trappe beers to try and I am looking forward to it.

Lastly here is Holland's Top selling beer Heineken, it is not in My Top Ten and one I would not buy but if I was given one I wouldn't turn it down, in fact there are not many beers I would turn down.  Also many of the beers above are now owned or brewed by the mighty Heineken empire.

Heineken, Heineken

5 liter keg, 5.0% yellow with a quickly disappearing head, faint sweet hop aroma, slight malt taste, the archetypical British pale lager from Holland, not for me.

Below are the links to my other Top ten Beer blogs.

My Top Ten French Beers

My Top Ten German Beers

My Top Ten English Beers

My Top Ten Belgian Beers

Another Ten French Beers

Seruptishous beer shopping

We had a drive out yesterday, we needed to start doing some walking again but the weather has been so wet for the last few months, everywhere is waterlogged.

So after dropping the twins at school, we drove to Northallerton and had our walk around the town centre there. It was market day and was busy but not as busy as usual (after Christmas lull maybe), I had a look in Lewis & Cooper, where I often find new beers but although they had a couple I had not seen before, I thought they were overpriced and gave then a miss. I did however get a bacon sandwich and cup of tea from Greggs for my breakfast, very nice.

Next we drove on to Ripon via Thirsk and had another walk around the town centre there. There are a couple of good beer shops in Ripon but again one of them is a bit overpriced. I bought a Belgian beer in the cheaper of them for about half the price the other one was asking but I did get only my second beer from New Zealand at a reasonable price in more expensive one.

In Sainsbury's in Northallerton Dot had seen a quilt cover she fancied but didn't get, so we looked in Sainsbury's in Ripon. Not only did Dot get what she wanted, I also got another new beer in there.

Reviews will follow as soon as I drink them, although I do have a backlog to get through first.