After meeting with a
friend a week or so ago, discussing various topics including beer and
the up and coming closure of my pub. Which has actually shut now,
awaiting some sort of refurbishment or whatever.
Any way, he recommended
I try this beer in a place that had recently opened up in Walton,
Surrey. It is a pub that seems to change almost as often as Lady
GaGa's outfits at one of her shows.
It goes by 'Craft & Grill' in its current form. The décor and layout looks more or less
the same as it did before except this time it has an all American
BBQ/Bar theme with the smell of smoked meats and baby vomit. It even
comes complete with a Craft Beer fridge as indicated by an almost
misleading sign on the bar, in fact it wasn't until I sat down on an
excruciatingly uncomfortable customised church pew that I noticed
said fridge. When I say customised, I mean that soft thick cushions
have been attached, at least I think they have been customised, this
made them in no way more comfortable than what they were probably
like before. It gave you a very upright and forward seating position
forcing you into the table. Why customise a seat that was
deliberately designed to be uncomfortable to prevent unimpressed
children from falling asleep during something as boring as a Sunday
church service. This might seem to come across that I am in some way
passionate about church pews, but I'm not. I think they serve a
purpose to make it nigh on impossible to fall asleep on and that is
that.
It was a Belgian beer
that my friend had recommended but couldn't remember what beer, only
that it was only available in half pint glasses and that the logo has
some sort of cross on it. I tried to venture deep into my memory
banks to find it but failed. After looking it up online, it would
appear that there are numerous Belgian beers that have a kind of
cross as their logo. Using that as the only piece of information to
go on is like trying to describe how somebody looks by only saying
they have blonde hair.
The beer was a Belgian
Blond called Affligem, brewed by monks apparently. According to the
barman there is a very specific 2-step pouring process, similar to
that of Guinness. The first step pours the beer to a marked line, the
beer is left to settle, then secondly the pump is pushed forward
giving you a couple of inches of head. Whether this actually affects
the taste or not I have no idea, all I can say is that it gives you
this really thick, creamy beer flavoured froth similar to what you'd
expect to find on any cappuccino. I guess you could call this the
beer equivalent of a cappuccino.
A link to the Belgian brew.
The pub if you ever randomly happen to visit Walton.
No comments:
Post a Comment