Supplemental

As promised on Monday, an assortment of cask ales which I found in and around the recent JD Wetherspoon beer festival, but which weren't actually part of it.

Acorn's Old Moor is where we start. This is a porter, blackest of the black, with a head of agéd ivory. It is a creature of exquisite balance, being mostly quite dry and roasty but not thin, with added coffee oils rounding it out, including the slightly fruity cherry and raisin effect that some coffees give. There's some silky dark chocolate towards the end, a streak of buttery diacetyl, and then an assertively dry finish. I can't think what more any sane adult would demand from a 4.4% ABV porter. Yorkshire has a reputation for being no-nonsense, and they could sustain that on this beer alone. Proper.

I'm very surprised I haven't had the next one before. Wainwright used to be Thwaite's, now Marstons, next: who knows? It's all gone weird in the Carlsberg-Marstons empire these days. It's a golden ale of 4.1% ABV and, as usual in any Dublin Wetherspoon, looks perfect. I was expecting plain but there's quite a bit of character here. I'm guessing it got quite a warm fermentation because there is soft fruit aplenty, the flavour brimming with apricot, lychee and particularly banana. That follows a more subtle bubblegum aroma. Bitterness is not on offer, and only a faint trace of grain-husk dryness provides any balance. While this isn't bland, it isn't very impressive either, doing the cask blonde basics but no more than that. It's not on the list of beers that Carlsberg gave the chop to last year, but I wouldn't miss it if it were...

Staying in t'North, but moving to Yorkshire, Ilkley Brewery's Lotus is next, an American style IPA of 5.9% ABV. It was sharing a bar with Thornbridge Jaipur which seemed, in the words of Sir Humphrey, courageous. Quite a dark fellow, it smelled pleasingly citric, and the initial taste had the correct kick of grapefruit and lime. It takes a rapid left turn from there, delivering crazy fruit candy and banana esters -- an extreme sort of sweetness that's quite out of keeping with the style. The finish returns it to style somewhat, with a dryly acidic rasp, but that fruity weirdness remains the defining characteristic. I liked the brash boldness of it but also found it a bit too weird to fully approve of. If you've never had it, give it a go. I'd say it's a divisive one.

Finally, Gadd's No 3 had been assigned a festival badge at The Silver Penny, though it wasn't one of the 30-beer line-up. This is a pale ale, golden and clear, brewed with Fuggles, Goldings, and "some others I don't talk about". An admission that this Kent brewery doesn't use all-Kent hops? At 5% ABV it's a bit of a strong one. That strength is well used, giving the beer a full and chewy body. Whatever about the interlopers, its English hops give it a very beery flavour: a coppery mineral bitterness, infused with fresh and crunchy green vegetables, set on a slightly sticky base of golden syrup and oatmeal cookies. It might look like a lager but it's definitely a bitter: not quite as sharp as the similarly-golden northern archetypes (Landlord, Marble), but similarly clean, despite the extra malt. This is tasty, unfussy, and very well made. There's nothing novel or innovative about the flavours; only how precisely they've all been balanced against each other. This is the sort of beer I would love to have as a local regular; I couldn't imagine ever getting bored of it.

That's your lot for now, casketeers. We return to our normal force-carbonated content later in the week.