The Bar Towel

I think Kilkenny was 'brewed down' starting about 4 or 5 years ago, maybe more recently than that. I read the book, 'A man walks into a pub..' and it was mentioned in there. I remember drinking that stuff and Caffreys and it was one of the few times I had a seriously bad hangover. I never touched the stuff again, same with John Smiths, Tetley, Worthingtons etc etc.

I would go for the mild if it wasn't:

a) A light mild
b) Wasn't Nitro fed.

I wish someone would do a good old fashioned dark mild, ala Cains and Theakstons. A great 3.5% ale with loads of taste and full bodied, with a lovely roasted, coffee, licqourice flavour.

Torontoblue wrote:Kilkenny, and most other Nitro-Keg smooth-flow crap

I originally heard this term from some British Brewmasters during a tradeshow in the US. They also went on to describe these ales as Euro trash that they pawn off on North America. I concur that the metallic aftertaste is very unpleasant and you only really get away with nitro beer on something with the body of Guinness to mask the nasty nitro twang.

When I first tasted many of the nitro draughts they hardly tasted like beer to me. I don't know where that metallic-like taste comes from. It does not I think come from nitrogen (which surely has no taste itself - beer gas is used commonly here to dispense and it is partly nitrogen). Some nitro beers have less of the "nitro" taste than others. Guinness to me shows none of its effects which leads me to think the taste of some of these other beers derives from their recipe. I call it a "cream soda"-like taste. Maybe it was devised by people who thought it would appeal to people who wouldn't in general drink beer, who didn't like that is the traditional taste of beer. I don't know. The nitro beer from St. Ambroise is I find quite drinkable, so is Boddington. The Granite has its Keefe Stout on nitro I believe and I find it excellent.

Gary

[ The nitro beer from St. Ambroise is I find quite drinkable, so is Boddington. The Granite has its Keefe Stout on nitro I believe and I find it excellent.

Gary[/quote]

if its high in nitro, i want it in a bottle
no Guiness at all unless its foreign export stout

lister wrote:If you ever go on to make a fortune from it, remember where you got the idea from... I got the idea when we made a vanilla cream ale and thought it would be awesome as a nitro.

If I ever have the inclination to try and make a fortune making beer, I'll even name it after you.

I was thinking vanilla cream ale wouldn't work all that well. What did you use as a base beer for that?

I wish someone would do a good old fashioned dark mild, ala Cains and Theakstons. A great 3.5% ale with loads of taste and full bodied, with a lovely roasted, coffee, licqourice flavour.

Indeed. The lost, lamented F&M Mild, served cask conditioned at the Bow and Arrow circa 1996, fit the bill perfectly. Nothing since compares that I have come across in these parts, though C'est What did recently offer their MBA for a brief time on cask, and it was far superior to the regular nitro product.

But the C'est What Mild Brown Ale was really just that, a mild-tasting brown ale, not a hint of the usual mild flavours to be sniffed at, it wasn't a true dark mild that I long for. Even Pepperwoods drew me in when I saw they had a mild last year, alas it was akin to the C'est What mild. I guess the term Mild doesn't travel across the Atlantic too well

It's not a draft beer but Hockley Dark to my mind resembles a good English mild beer.

Gary

Bobbyok wrote:If I ever have the inclination to try and make a fortune making beer, I'll even name it after you.

"Lister's Only Agreeable Brew"?

I was thinking vanilla cream ale wouldn't work all that well. What did you use as a base beer for that?

I can't remember as it's been well over a year now. I'll ask my friend who has the recipe book.