Tonight's review was done on a sunny afternoon in the garden with the bees lazily buzzing through the budding flowers and the sound of buses plying the road outside my house far off and gentle on the breeze. It is also of an ale that I have been itching to get hold of for well over two years now after reading about it on another beer blog (now sadly no longer posting from what I can gather). I refer, in this instance, to Treason, a West Coast IPA brewed by a small brewery named Uprising Craft Brewery who seem to be operating out of the Windsor and Eton Brewery. I may be wrong.
I managed to pick this up from my local bottle shop after the proprietor had nipped down south for a bit and stopped off at the Windsor and Eton Brewery, indicating that there is significant overlap here. Anyway, the sun is currently high and the air is warm, would you like to know more?
The adventure continues! A lovely sunny and warm day, a quiet and pleasant evening in the lodge with the view of the woodland out of the back door and the feeling that nothing is impossible. Some cycling managed both in the morning and the afternoon with the eldest and some time now to settle with my other birthday present, Rivers of London, and get some reading done. Something I've not done in a very long time indeed. Whom should my companions be for such an auspicious evening but two ales?
Of course, tonight I have the pleasure of Portcullis IPA from my father as a random not-quite-birthday-gift that was imparted last week when I went to see the Pet Shop Boys. This is only the second ale I've had from Windsor and Eton Brewery, the first being way back when I was in London last year around Easter time. And I have also plumbed for the first of two ales from a much esteemed colleague and friend at work: Gnarly Fox Lager from Hatherwood Craft Beer Company. Both of these should serve me well as I attempt to unwind and relax, let the last few days at work and the journey here fade a little and bask in the evening glow with my wife.
I may not have mentioned this much before now, but last week we took our first family holiday since about 2010 and we took it to London. Staying in a, frankly, rather nice hotel at the Walthamstow Central tube station and taking our meals from local supermarkets meant that it was a budget buster and a very pleasant few days. Our young children showed me how utopian my thinking was on visiting such things as the Natural History Museum (no, we didn't see any dinosaurs) and the Science Museum (looking really quite tired in places) as well as sojourns to the National Gallery (no, didn't get to see the Impressionist stuff) and tourist-y sites.
On one such outing, this time around Parliament Square (I know how to live) I noticed a Shepherd Neame pub and joked about getting a half there. Anna agreed and suggested that I do exactly that one day. That night, after checking and finding no shows on, Anna suggested that I go and do a half there and some other pubs too. I, of course, did not need asking twice. And so it came to pass that I spent a very nice evening, the night of the fire in Holborn, gadding about in London sampling ales and public houses.
Does this sound like your cup of tea? It doesn't? Oh, what about your pint of ale? Ah, well then, time to read more...
