boddingtons

[mountain beer]

I tried a Boddingtons for the first time this past weekend. I t was one of the milder beers I have ever had. I have been looking for a recipe to try to make brew this myself. Does anyone know of a recipe to brew this beer.

[beer editor]

"Brew Your Own British Real Ale" by Roger Protz and Graham Wheeler has a recipe. The basics for a 5 gallon batch: 5.86 pounds pale malt, 5 oz crystal, 3.3 oz white sugar (!), 2.1 oz goldings at start of the boil, .3 oz goldings and .15 fuggles with 15 minutes left in the boil. Mash for 90 minutes at 151. OG 1035, racking gravity 1007, 37 IBUs, 7 SRM. No mention of yeast, but Whitbread would make sense, or another English ale yeast.

Prosit,
Stan

[BigIndieBeerMan]

I'm a newly acquire Boddington's fan myself. I'm glad to hear someone else shares my love for the Cream of Manchester.

[brewbob]

AHHH, YES! THE CREAM! THE CREAM!

The nouveau beer jihad begins, as the number of hordes equal to the number of nitrogen bubbles in Boddington's remove the taste buds of the Bud-guzzling infidels!

[Richard English]

It's interesting to see so much enthusiasm for Boddington which is but a mediocre beer by UK standards these days.

Once, of course, it was a great beer but the brewery was taken over by Whitbread (the A-B of England) and the Strangeways brewery was closed. The only thing that can be said about Boddingtons nowadays is that it's better than Whitbread's own bitter.

It is the policy of the Whitbread company to buy shares of smaller breweries until they gain control. Once they've done so, they simply close the brewery. That has been the fate of hundreds over the years.

[mountain beer]

Richard

Its a shame to hear about the Strangeways brewery---Imnot about to throw the rest of my case away---

You said that Boddingtons is only mediocre by UK standards. Could you throw some other beer names my way so I could try some other brews from the UK.

[Richard English]

My comments about Boddingtons were in the main to do with its draught beers. In the USA most UK beers will be supplied in bottle - unless a brewery has decided to set up local production.

My favourite bottled beer is Fuller's 1845 (see the separate thread) and I understand this is available in the USA. Another good beer, also available in the USA is T.E.A. from the Hog's Back Brewery. I have not checked the availability of others. One thing is certain, though. Any beer that is widely advertised will almost certainly not be much good; good beers must be sought out.

There are two sites that you should check: http://www.quaffale.org.uk is a listing of all the brewers in the UK with links to many of their sites and www.carmra.org.uk which will give you a large amount of information about Real Ale and the reasons why it has been preserved in the UK (and why it has now become available again in the US)

[matt]

I think the reason Boddington's is selling well in the U.S. is that in some areas in the U.S. there is still no cask-conditioned beer available. The Boddingtons (Guinness technology) nitro-can provides a less gassy beer drinking experience that most brittish beers are brewed for. For those who like it, I also suggest you seek out (in my order of preference) Old Speckled Hen, Abbott Ale, Tetley, Wexford and Caffrey's. But if you do seek those out, I also suggest you make an effort to find real cask-conditioned ale (or lager!) at a local brewpub, brewery, or beer bar. If you can't find it, go to the UK, that place is littered with it.

The nitro-keg, and later the nitro-can and bottle were introduced by Guinness as a compromise between normal CO2 kegs and cask-conditioning. Guinness felt it was too expensive and would limit their market if they continued to distribute all of their beer as caks-conditioned, but normal force pressured CO2 was too gassy and hid the taste of the beer. They invented a faucet that has in it a sparkler similar to what you might find screwed into the end of a beer engine, which knocks some of the gas out of the beer as it's poured, hence the famous guiness settling. But they also use a gas mix that is approximately 75% N2 and 25% CO2. Some idiot beer outlets around the world refer to this as Nitrous Oxide, which it is not. That's a rather different beast. Anyway, back to the gas mix. It was formulated to mimic the chemistry of air, but without Oxygen that can damage beer, the idea being to mimic as closely as possible the air that cask-beers are exposed to. The result is that there is less CO2 that bleeds in to the beer itself than in normal CO2 kegs. This technology has made its way into cans and bottles.

A member of CAMRA will tell you that the whole idea of such devices is abhorrent, but I for one would rather have the choice to have canned beer that is portable and tastes similar to (but not as good as) the cask-conditioned beer I can get from my local beer establishments. This option can be very handy on picnics. Bottles are good too, but I find that english-style pale ales and bitters in particular taste much better when served at 1.5 atmospheres of CO2 dissolved in the beer than their bottled counterparts, even, in some cases when the bottles are bottle-conditioned. I've noticed however that most english breweries don't offer a bottle conditioned version of the products they distribute to pubs as casks. My thinking is that its simply because beer brewed for cask-conditioning doesn't hold the same flavor profile when bottle-conditioned, the higher CO2 pressure impairs the flavor of the beer. My own home brewing experience bears this out.

My tastebuds tell me that the beers that do better bottled (naturaly carbonated or otherwise...) tend to be hoppier. I think the effervesence of the CO2 bubbles helps bring the hop aroma to the drinkers nose. Some fine examples of this that I suggest our Brittish friends try out are Victory HopDevil IPA, Stone IPA, and Arrogant Bastard. If you've enjoyed Wild Goose IPA, you're in for a very pleasant surpsise with these beers. For a comparison that you may be familiar with, Fuller's ESB dry-hopped in the cask and Deuchar's IPA (brewed by McEwans I think) have about half the hop flavor and aroma.

I seem to have rambled on quite a bit, haven't I? Apologies to the bored :-)

-Matt

Washington DC

[Richard English]

Is that the same as Goose Island IPA (Chicago)?

That I've tried and it's very good. The others I've not seen locally although they will certainly be available through specialist outlets.

Your comment about Fuller's ESB is interesting and accurate. It is not a very hoppy beer, although it has other virtues.

I agree also that most breweries' bottled beers do differ from their draught beers and I'm sure that this is, as you suggest, due to the different conditions that prevail in the bottle as opposed to the cask.

And, of course, you are so right about draught beers in the UK. The pub I was in last night had four different draught beers - Fuller's London Pride; Harvey's Armada; Wadworth 6X and Courage Directors - all excellent.

What we all too often do lack in our pubs is a good choice of bottled beers. However, since I prefer draught beers and only buy bottled beers for home consumption, that's not a big problem for me.

Hotels, though - that's a quite different story. Don't go to a your hotel bar when you get to the UK and expect to get anything drinkable. You will almost certainly find wall-to-wall chemical fizz (often from A-B) being sold at grossly inflated prices. Walk to the nearest boozer - there's usually one close by.

[matt]

chemical fizz.... I like that appellation. Can I borrow/steal it?

[matt]

Sorry, I also forgot to mention that I meant to refer to Goose Island (Chicago) rather than Wild Goose. Wild Goose also makes an excellent IPA, but is a very different brewery. I expect I'll be drinking some thoroughly dry-hopped Goose Island IPA at the end of this month during the Chicago Real Ale festival, of which Goose Island is a major sponsor. I'll keep a look out for some good ones that export to the UK.

[Richard English]

Feel free to use the term. I don't know where I found it - maybe CAMRA - but it is a very good description for the products of most of the US major brewers.

Incidentally, the latest edition of CAMRA's Good Beer Guide, in its section on the global giants of the brewing world, contains the following quote:

"ANHEUSER-BUSCH UK

A wholly owned subsidiary of Anhheuser-Busch of St Louis. Missouri, has complained that it has not been listed previously in this section. We apologise for this egregious error.

The company brews Budweiser at the Stag Brewery, Lower Richmond Road, Mortlake, London,SW14 7ET, the former Watneys plant. Budweiser is brewed from rice (first on the label), malt and hops with chips of wood used to clarify the beer.
"Mortlake" can be roughly rendered in Modern English as "dead water", which some may consider is the ideal location for a brewery producing Budweiser.

A-B's Budweiser should not be confused with the classic Czech beer Budweiser Budvar"

[thejam]

Greetings,

I fell upon this forum thread and realbeer.com while doing an engine search on google.com looking for info on Boddington's.

I read the threads and came across Richard English's post stating that his favourite bottled beer is Fuller's 1845.

Richard, you seem like an you know what you are talking about :D And I enjoyed reading your posts. So, I went out and searched for a bottle of Fuller's 1845.

I found one and I drank it. IT IS NOW, HANDS DOWN, THE BEST ALE THAT I HAVE EVER ENJOYED OUT OF A BOTTLE!

Richard, what other bottled beer do you enjoy? Anyone else out there please list your favorites also.

I live in the states, but I will hunt them down and drink them.

Cheers!

David

[thejam]

Greetings,

I fell upon this forum thread and realbeer.com while doing an engine search on google.com looking for info on Boddington's.

I read the threads and came across Richard English's post stating that his favourite bottled beer is Fuller's 1845.

Richard, you seem like an you know what you are talking about :D And I enjoyed reading your posts. So, I went out and searched for a bottle of Fuller's 1845.

I found one and I drank it. IT IS NOW, HANDS DOWN, THE BEST ALE THAT I HAVE EVER ENJOYED OUT OF A BOTTLE!

Richard, what other bottled beer do you enjoy? Anyone else out there please list your favorites also.

I live in the states, but I will hunt them down and drink them.

Cheers!

David

[spankymac]

Originally posted by Richard English
Once, of course, it was a great beer but the brewery was taken over by Whitbread (the A-B of England) and the Strangeways brewery was closed. The only thing that can be said about Boddingtons nowadays is that it's better than Whitbread's own bitter.

Richard,

I'd be interested to know how Boddington's as we in the States know it (in the nitro-pint can) differs from the 'once great' variety you describe. Different ingredients? Different process? If it's mediocre now, I'd love to know what it was like in its heyday.

[paul84043]

thejam,
Welcome to the forum, it's a fantastic brewers resource due largely to people like Richard and many others here that are experienced brewers.
Ocasionally an inexperienced idiot like myself will throw his or her opinion out, but that's the riks you take!!

I stumbled across it as well just a short time ago and I have learned tons since then.

Hope you stick around and join the fray!

Paul.:D

[Richard English]

Boddingtons is not even brewed in Manchester now. It uses different and cheaper ingredients and, of course, the original "Boddies" was never available as a nitrokeg, only as a handpulled pint.

It's still available as a handpulled pint in the UK now, but it's very bland compared with such Manchester stalwarts as Hydes, Holts and Lees...

If you want to taste a proper UK beer but can't find one on draught, try a bottle-conditioned ale such as Fuller's 1845, Hog's Back T.E.A., Young's SLA, Hop Back Summer Lightning.