"Camra says this is Real Ale"

Tried another bottle over the weekend - this was much better, with a reasonable, although not excessive, head, good carbonation and poured clear.

However, as the health warning on the bottle recommended that I shouldn't consume more than 3-4 units in a day (and a bottle contains 2.5), I couldn't have another one ;-(

PeterE wrote: wrote re Freeminer Goldminer

oh good to hear - did you happen to notice a best before date - it's just I don't want another frothfest if I can help it.

shouldn't

I read somewhere that 2.5 pints of Guinness in a 24hr period now constitutes a binge :~)

That means we now don't have a superlative super enough to describe the drinking habits of many of those on high streets on a friday/saturday night. cheers MikeMcG

Mind you, 1845 is one of those beers that, while I recognise it's a very fine beer, I wouldn't want to drink more than one of.

The Freeminer was stored in a cool cupboard for 4 days after buying, but not in the fridge.

Ta for that Peter, I will try again as I thought it was a cracking beer before.

I tried over 30 RAIBs over Christmas and all were in date and stored correctly. However, a significant (5-6) number fobbed over with loss of beer and disturbance of yeast. These beers were often slightly (or very) sour which suggested some problem with contamination in the bottling process (though in the case of one brewery - this meant it tasted exactly like the cask beer !).

While I persist with exploring the RAIB market, I do worry that experiences like this can put the average punter off them for good.

Mark Enderby

Very interesting stuff Mark - did you find much in common with the ones that were sour &/or over-carbonated?

E.g. You seem to suggest a link between these two? (sourness & overCO2d)

This would make sense as wild yeasts, bacteria, etc can ferment beer further than ordinary brewing yeasts, making it fizzier, but also creating acid in the process (e.g. lactic or acetic).

Was there anything in common between the 'problem beers' - were they all/mainly from smaller micros?

Do you know the bottling/preparation methods for the problem beers / good ones? (filtration, sterile/rough, fining, krausening, centrifuging, etc)

I haven't yet got a copy of GBBG, so I prob won't know this info myself.

As someone who is trying to work out how to set up a commercial brewing co. including bottled beer, using small breweries' spare capacity, I am very interested in all this.

Comments/experiences very welcome from anyone else too, here or email is fine, if so please use the following address, not the newsgroup one mic_mac (at) postmaster (dot) co (dot) uk cheers MikeMcG.

I find the well-established ones are generally fairly reliable - the problems seem to come from the very small breweries where bottling is probably done by someone else and the quality control isn't there.

We recently did a tasting of BCAs for "Opening Times".

Brains Dark, St Austell Clouded Yellow, Worthington White Shield, Fullers

Hi Peter, I had a quick look thru the e-versions of OT, but couldn't find a recent piece about BCAs - has it been published yet? cheers MikeMcG

It's in the February issue which is not online yet.

The relevant website is:

I can probably scan it later on if people are interested.

Ah fair enough.

I'd certainly be interested, but if the Feb edition of (the excellent) OT is going to be up soon then don't worry,

cheers,

MikeMcG.

I've done it anyway:

The first one to my mind was "off", it wasn't just a case of excessive fobbing.

Ta muchly for that, I will have a look. MikeMcG