Choosing A Beer
Can I get a taster before committing to a beer?
There are certainly pubs that will offer you a chance to try the beers, and that's always a good idea, from both points of view. For the customer, it gives them chance to see whether a beer is to the pallet or not, and for the Publican it's a good idea because it shows that they're interested in beer and they carry a good range of different flavours and styles of beer. Not all pubs allow you to do that however, so it's worth seeking out the ones that do.
What should I look for on a bottled beers label?
When looking at a beer label I would always look for information. There are a lot of bland statements being made on beer labels about finest ingredients and master brewers. If you can find information on a label that tells you how the beer is brewed, how it should be served, what ingredients are in it, maybe even what sort of food to serve the beer with that would tell you that the brewer has thought about the beer and is very proud of the product and it is a beer worth trying.
What should I look for on a beer's hand pump?
The problem about finding information about beer in a pump is that the pump clip and the hand-pump have very little space to provide that information. There may be words or there may be a description. There may be the strength of the beer, but there's not an awful lot of room there for the brewer to tell you much more. In a pub where the publican knows his beer and is keen to promote his beers, there are very often supplementary blackboards with information about the beers, descriptions of flavor, and a bit more background about the beer. Sometimes, the pub staff themselves are well trained and if you ask them, “Is this a golden beer? Is this a dark beer? What sort of beer would you recommend to me?”, they can quite often come up with a good answer for you.
Which alcohol percentages make the best beer?
Strength really has nothing to do with the quality of the beer. You can get some fantastic beers that are only 3% in alcohol, bags of flavour - but not too much strength. On the other hand, some of the world's finest beers are some of the strongest. Some of the beers from the Trappist monasteries in Belgium for example, they start at about 7, 8, 9% and go up beyond 10%. They're magnificent beers, big, bold beers, but so brilliantly brewed that the alcohol doesn't factor. It's the flavour of the beer that takes over and makes it so enjoyable.
Should a beer have a head?
Whether it's right for a beer to have a head or not really depends on the customer, and where you grew up or how your beer preferences have developed over the years. In Germany, for example, or anywhere where you serve traditional pilsner, that's meant to have a big, thick, foamy head. In the north of England, where they serve ales with a thick head, that's what the customer preference is there. In the south of England, beer drinkers prefer beer not to have such a big head, just a light lacing of foam on the top. That means there's more carbonation maintained inside the body of the beer. It's not all knocked out into the head. If you drink a northern-style ale, you'll find that the head is very bitter and very creamy and very foamy, and underneath that there's only a very soft prickle of carbonation. With southern-style beers, that carbonation is maintained in the beer, making it a slightly more gutty drink.
What will a dark beer taste like?
Dark beers are the result of using dark malt in the recipe. So if you look at the malting process and find out how dark malts are produced, you can anticipate the flavors you're going to get from a dark beer. Malts that are roasted heavily to get chocolate and coffee sort of characters are going to carry those flavors and characteristics over into the beers as well.
What will a light beer taste like?
Light beers do not have much in the way of dark malt presence. They are brewed using very pale colored malts - the malts that provide most of the sugars for fermentation. They will be light in color, they may have a honeyed note and be generally quite sweet. Also, because they are so neutral in many respects, they allow hops and other flavors from fermentation at the brewery to come through and take over the beer. A pale beer may have a general light, sweet, biscuity character, but would be a good showcase also for hops and the characteristics that hops bring to a beer, such as the degree of pepper flavor, citrus flavors and bitterness.
What can I tell from the smell of beer?
Aroma is a very important part of the beer tasting process. Most of the flavors that you pick up in a beer are actually detected by the nose. It's the flavor receptors in the nose that do most of the work. That's why, if you've got a cold, you can't taste food very well. When you're tasting a beer, it's always useful to have a good swill of the beer in the glass if you can to start with and allow those aromas to escape, and to take those aromas in, and to pick up the malt flavours. The hop flavours give you a good indication of what's to follow when you actually take a sip from the glass.
