Moaning done, it’s back to the new Beer Guide, and a bit of a curate’s egg* in Ware.
You know Ware, one of east Hertfordshire’s gems.
Like Baldock, Ware has been bypassed into a quiet life providing sustenance for retired gentlefolk visiting garden centres and parents who want their children to speak Latin.
Great parish church.
The Riverside is the last place in town I expected to ever grace the Guide. Even though it opens at 10am, always a winner.
The sort of place you meet your friend Jean for coffee, or celebrate your divorce over Quinoa, but I can’t quite fathom its rise to GBG superstardom.
Ah right. It’s all about choice. Eight beers, most of them boring and brown (hurrah). Fairly obvious what I’m going for, though.
I ordered an Eggs Benedict. As you do. Our Spanish barman reached for a coffee cup.
“And a coffee ?”
“No, half of Pedi please”
The look was bemusement rather than incomprehension.
“No alcohol until 11 Sir“
But it’s a Stonegate pub. Stafford Paul would be on his 3rd if this was Wolves.
I sensed that pushing the issue would get me in the Ware Watchman (Tues edition), so I smiled. Only 26 minutes to wait, and so much to explore.
As a diner, it was pleasant, and I only bumped into two gentlefolk on my travels. The excellent Eggs Benedict was made with bacon rather than gammon, clearly a political statement.
At 10.59.55 I approached the bar. Mr barman had already poured my half. He’d be useful in Margate Wetherspoons.
In fairness, a cool, rich, sulphorous Pedi, that wavered mysteriously between NBSS 3 and 3.5. Better than I expected, if I’m honest.
The soundtrack consisted entirely of First Aid Kit and the domestic arrangements of Ware mums, that are less interesting than those of mums (or dads) in Stevenage.
More decent beer, but perhaps the dullest tick so far this year. In Hertfordshire, who’d have thought it ?
*Curate’s egg only available on breakfast menu in selected Spoons.
retiredmartin 
Maple mustard and creamy cabbage, what are they when they’re at home? Would make good descriptions of, or possibly names for, unfiltered craft murk.
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Forget London Murk.
Tribute,Proper Job and Doom Bar are the Holy Trinity of West Country bland.
I’ve really tried to get on with them over the years but I’m nearly always disappointed.
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Funny thing is, I can think of a Tribute (in Buckland Monachorum), Proper Job (Woking) and now Doom Bar that I’d be happy to drink on rotation with Bass and Plum Porter forever. Just shows that the other 99% pubs that serve them aren’t good enough.
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Quite a number of beer writers and bloggers rave about Proper Job, but I have to say I’ve never really got it. For me, HSD is the best St Austell beer.
I’d have been straight on the 6X there. Strangely, its declared strength was reduced from 4.3% to 4.1% between the 2014 and 2015 GBGs, but the OG only from 1041 to 1040.5 – and it was 1040 in 1978. Still a great pint when well-kept, such as in a certain canalside pub in deepest Staffordshire. And that’s also why you need paper copies of the GBG – an app would just overwrite itself each year.
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Early last month in Cornwall I had three pints each of Proper Job, HSD and Tribute and enjoyed them all. I very much thought HSD to be a proper BBB, as one might expect of a beer introduced in 1976, and Proper Job more a beer for the hipsters.
Ah, yes, a certain canalside pub in deepest Staffordshire. I had three lovely pints of 6X there on 2nd September..
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I’m a fan of Proper Job, if well kept.
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– and probably Big Job but that’s much rarer.
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Looking at one of Martin’s photos, 6X is another West Country ale that got dumbed down many years ago for the sake of a national profile.
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Strictly speaking I always had Devizes in Wiltshire down as the South West rather than the West Country.
But I know what you mean.
Probably the least inspiring pump line-up I’ve seen young Martin post for a while.
It’s why I normally get rat-arsed on cider on my annual visit to Devon.
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Least inspiring ? Far too many, Pedi and 6X would do fine.
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Agreed, I’d most likely plump for Martin’s choice too.
Based on three days being the optimum time a barrel, in this case I’m assuming a firkin, is on sale for, the guvnor would need to shift approximately 1350 pints a week spread equally across those eight pumps, that’s a big ask especially Monday to Friday.
I used to run a pub in Hackney and I’d take 3-4 firkins of GK IPA weekly, I reckon I shifted around 250-260 pints a week, apart from the usual Friday/Saturday/Sunday spike I was blessed with punters who came in of the afternoon after an early turn, so it turned over fairly nice and evenly.
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Has it been dumbed down ? Only know it from mid-90s when it was already a staple of the early Whitbread ale houses. Like Bass, you get a great pint once in ten pints.
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In my opinion it was never quite the same after the deal with Whitbread to make it a national brand. In more recent times can any beer be improved by dropping the ABV from 4.3% to 4.1%?
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Didn’t know that. The answer to your question is NO, of course Wes !
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– and nearly twenty years ago it was in all Wetherspoons venues so Tim should take some share of the blame !
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Ware ?
The Quinoa would be less risky than the Ham as it’s not served with broccoli.
Stonegate pubs. Yes, the Stafford one does Pedigree at £1.05 a half from 9am.
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Not really a beer for halves, is it Paul. Like Bass, or other proper beers, best appreciated in a straight pint glass.
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I’ve been about for a few years and I’ve yet to find “a beer for halves” – not even in the Baker’s Vaults.
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Those murky grapefruit Double IPAs are best served in tulips.
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Or maybe best poured away into the tulip bed? The only beers for halves are those that you’d really rather not drink a pint of.
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A beer for halves is really a beer for someone else.
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Not a CAMRA approved review here. We need to know how well cooked the creamy cabbage and broccoli was; perhaps the quality of that ensured the GBG entry?
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I doubt creamy cabbage is any substitute for creamy head from an Autovac.
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But you could served boiled cabbage via autovac?
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“Riverside. Just like the pub”
A match made in Heaven. 🙂
“or celebrate your divorce over Quinoa, ”
If I’d been foolish enough to marry someone named Quinoa I’d look at getting a divorce right away. 🙂
“Fairly obvious what I’m going for, though.”
I’m still new at this but… the 6X?
““No, half of Pedi please””
Crap.
“No inch uncovered”
You’re talking about the television screen, right?
“The excellent Eggs Benedict was made with bacon rather than gammon, clearly a political statement.”
Gammon? It’s Canadian bacon (which is all mostly sent to the US) or it’s not eggs benny. 😉
“*Curate’s egg only available on breakfast menu in selected Spoons.”
I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing. 😉
Cheers
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Less is more…I’ll leave it there!
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