Lets just get something out of the way straight off the bat. Summer Wine make puckeringly bitter beers, it's their trade mark and personally I love 'em. If you don't like bitter beers then you probably won't like a lot of Summer Wines beers.

This beer is no different, but it's also one of the most elegant beers I've drank from Summer Wine. Yes it's bitter, but it's also got a real depth of hop flavour and a great interplay between sweet malt, citrussy hops and funky yeast character. Magic Rock's Clown Juice is an obvious comparison, but for me, Half Wit is by far the better beer.

The aroma is yeasty orange, boiled sweets, and a touch of sweet pine. The flavour has that signature bitterness with just enough sweetness to calm your tongue down, before a final onslaught of orangey, citrusy hops and a little bit of barnyard funk which sticks on the tongue in the finish.

There's a truckload of hop character in this beer. A good minute after I've swallowed I can push my tongue against the roof of my mouth and the bitterness returns.

It's got a funky yeast character but it doesn't taste anything close to a wit, more like a Belgian yeast IPA, but do you know what? I don't care. Its a fruity, resinous pine and citrus hop hit with an edge of Belgian yeast. The bitterness will kick your arse but if you like big hop flavour and lots of bitterness, you'll love this.

I want more.

 

Deciding to spend our last two days in Brooklyn was one of the best moves we made, the only problem was that we liked it so much we wished we had longer. That said, we got there before lunch the first day and didn't need to leave until late the next, so managed to squeeze in some excellent food and beer in a short space of time.

Our first day in Brooklyn was the one bad weather day whilst we were in New York (the photo here was taken on the second), with some seriously torrential rain threatening to ruin the party. Luckily it was still pretty warm and there's lots of great places to duck into for refuge, just like the place we ate a late lunch, Peter's Since 1969.

Peter's is a Southern home style restaurant that's all about comfort food made well and served in a relaxing environment. Their menu consists of specialities such as rotisserie chicken alongside more American staples like meat loaf and collared greens. We went on the recommendation of the house and opted for the meat loaf lunch special, which came with two sides (we went with mash and collared greens), creamy sauce, gravy, corn bread, and a soup or salad for around $7. Stunningly good value, delicious and filling food to boot. Perfect wet weather fare.

They also have a few decent beers on tap, I think I drank a Brooklyn seasonal of some sort, again for a good price of under $5, but to be honest I was concentrating on the food.

After an afternoon spent perusing vintage shops trying to find a decent leather wallet which fits British notes (me) and some denim jean shorts (the missus, I swear) a beer was very much on my mind. Breukelen Bier Merchants was the next port of call, firstly because I wanted to see if there were any interesting bottles I'd missed that I wanted to buy to take home, but secondly because their happy hour runs 4-7 and offers every draft beer at $3 a pint. That's very, very cheap.

Plus they don't fuss over abvs: Any beer, any strength, one pint, $3. Would this ever happen in the UK? I doubt it.

I jumped straight in at the deep end with Firestone Black Rye IPA at 8% abv. Did I mention it was $3 a pint?

This was a great black IPA with sweet ripe mango and light cocoa in the aroma, fruity and lush in the initial taste before a flood of dark malt and then a long bitterly resinous finish. Lovely stuff and very drinkable for 8% too.

I did have a few more beers but we had got chatting to some locals and I stopped paying attention to the beer too much, though I remember all but one beer being excellent (the American Wit wasn't great if I remember rightly).

Breukelen Bier Merchants is a great place to hang out and we ended up staying for the majority of happy hour, which still left us enough of the evening to get around some more places which I'll be writing about in my next post.

Oh and my post on Brooklyn Brewery is still to come too.

 

http://breukelenbiermerchants.com/

http://www.peterssince.com/

 

As you might imagine, I brought back quite a haul of beer from #NewYork. The combination of more availability, cheaper prices and very generous customs allowances was a triple threat that made my suitcase very, very heavy for the way home.

I brought back a range of styles from Barley Wines to Ameican Porters, but it's the pale, hoppy beers that were quickly crammed into my fridge in order to preserve that fresh hop character, with this, Captain Lawrence Captain's Reserve Imperial IPA (8% abv not stated in the bottle), being the first to make it into a glass - and what a beer to start with.

This pours a perfect liquid gold with a pure white head. The aroma is unbelievably fresh - Clean, floral and fruity with a citrus fruit bowl of pith sitting alongside pure fresh pine.

The flavour is just so clean and fresh the bitterness goes almost unnoticed on the first taste as a wash of citrus, sweet grapefruit and resinous pine fly past atop a magic carpet of perfectly crisp pale malt. It's a masterclass.

In fact aroma bursts out so readily that as you swallow the hop aromatics rush up through your nasal passage and the effect is so dramatic that it actually made me sneeze. A happy first!

There's a great depth of hop flavour too thanks to the range of 5 hops used, and the bitterness which is subtle at first builds up after a few sips to become full and drying in the finish. That said, it certainly doesn't have a punishing bitterness like some American IPA's, and is clean (there's that word again), balanced and moreished.

I could drink this stuff all day. What a beer.

 

I bought the majority of my beers from Good Beer in the East Village, a fantastic bottle shop come beer cafe.

 

Spaghetti alla carbonara is the epitome of Italian cooking's beauty through simplicity. When made correctly it is completely satifsying and delicious yet surprisingly quick and simple, containing only a few ingredients and taking about ten minutes to cook.

Unfortunately the amount of variations out there (us Brits are particularly guilty of this) which overload the recipe with piles of butter and cream to make a thick cauliflower cheese style sauce is criminal.

Real carbonara doesn't contain cream. There I said it, out of the way nice and early. The creaminess of the sauce (and it will be creamy if you get it right) comes from the combination of very lightly cooked egg, melting cheese and a little starchy pasta water. Trust me, once you've tried it the authentic way you'll never go back.

Before I start, I realise that the strict Roman version doesn't use garlic but I've tried it both ways and I prefer it with. Also, make sure you use fresh free range eggs, proper pancetta, and either Parmigiano-Reggiano or Pecorino Romana cheese (I prefer the former). There's only a few ingredients in this so they have to be the right ones I'm afraid.

Ingredients (the below is for 1 person, just scale up to suit)

• Ring sized bundle of spaghetti
• Small handful of Pancetta lardons (approx 50g)
• 1 free range egg
• Handful of freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggianno (or Pecorino Romano)
• 1 clove of garlic, peeled then smashed with the back of a knife.
• Olive oil
• Black pepper

Directions

1. Put the pasta on to boil in a large pan of salty water.
2. Meanwhile gently fry the Pancetta on a medium heat with a glug of olive oil in a large, high sided frying pan until crisp. The fat should have rendered out of the bacon a little but aim for crispy, not crunchy.
3. Turn the frying pan down to low and add the garlic, cook gently for a few minutes until lightly brown then remove and discard (it's just there to flavour the oil).
4. In a bowl lightly beat the egg (or eggs) and add the cheese along with a very generous mill of black pepper.
5. When the pasta is al dente drain it briefly over a bowl (so you can reserve some of the starchy cooking water) then add it to the frying pan and stir well to coat it in the bacony oil.
6. Remove the frying pan from the heat and then pour your egg and cheese in with the hot pasta and toss and stir with a wooden spoon or tongs until the cheese has melted and the egg has lightly cooked to create a creamy sauce (I usually do this for approximately 1 minute). If its looking too dry add a splash of the pasta cooking water to loosen the sauce.
7. Serve immediately in warm pasta bowls with extra grated cheese and black pepper as preferred.

Beer match

Believe it or not I don't drink beer with every meal and after a Bank Holiday weekend which was anything but beer free I ate this meal on it's own.

However if I was drinking a beer with this then I would probably go for a nice crisp Saison. Something not overly herby but with a nice bit of bitterness, even a touch of sourness, to counteract the richness of the dish and cut through that creamy sauce.

A good crisp Pilsner would work well too.

 

Chow!

 

 

It must get annoying for these two bars, constantly being referred to in the same breath, but the fact is they are two of the most well known Manhattan beer bars and just happen to be a stones throw from each other.

We actually visited The Ginger Man first out of the two but the reason it is second is because we didn't really like the place, received awful service and left pretty swiftly.

Rattle n' Hum on the other hand, we loved. We even returned after going for Thai in Hell's Kitchen so we could have another hour or so propping up the bar, hence why it's getting top billing. I'll get on to why Gingerman left a bitter taste in my mouth (and not in a good way) later on.

Rattle n' Hum is an Irish bar at it's heart and despite the awesome lineup of draft beers there's absolutely nothing pretentious about the place, with most people there for the atmosphere or chicken wings rather than the beers. It's a proper, old school, spit n sawdust, baseball on the TV type bar, and I loved that about it.

But here's the thing, the beer lineup is incredible too. I drank pretty much exclusively tasters whilst there because there was just so much good stuff to try. Here's what I had:

Avery IPA - so classic us ipa, with a floral finish that's bitter but not intense. It's a cleverly subtle beer this one. A lightness of touch. Deserves a second visit but no time! Avery white - very drinkable, like it but not making a big impression. Could drink a lot of it though. Green Port Hoppy Stout - definitely not a black ipa. More like a dry stout but with a more bitter finish. Lovely. Weyerbacher Double Simcoe - ok yes a bit of catpiss in the aromas but the taste is great. Sweet, fruity full on. Like it

Founders Cerise Ale - Aroma is light cherry and old pot purri. Flavour isn't overly sweet and it has a fresh cherry juice finish which reminds me of the Turkish cherry juice I used to love having on holiday as a kid. Smuttynose Wheat Wine - Crazy. Tastes like booze soaked vanilla fudge. It's great but a 4oz is enough. Flying Dog Snake Dog IPA - This stuff does well as an export for a reason, wow thats a lot of hop flavour! So fresh and clean with a lovely depth of flavour. Great. Troegs Pale Ale - Yes it's a quaffer, but it's not great. Tastes like a summer ale (American style, bitter, but drinkable). It's just 'ok'.

My memory / notes start to take a turn for the worst on the third set of tasters after dinner, as you might imagine. Laughing Dog Dog Father Bourbon Barrel aged - this is a great big thick imperial stout. Really full and luscious, with a great bourbon flavour. It's really pronounced but not overpowering. One of my favourites of the night. Founders Red Rye - Red fruit. Grain. Biscuit. Spicy bread. Bitter orange spice finish, really lovely. Bear Republic Hop Rod Rye (cask) - ahh warm n flat! Bugger camra! Urthel Hop It - hoppy Belgian Golden Ale. Good, but exactly as I expected. Reminded me of La Chouffe IPA.

In the interests of fairness. Here's what I drank at The Gingerman and what I thought:

Dogfish 90min - powerful but much sweeter than I expected. Very full bodied. Great divide 18th Anniversary wood aged - mental, nice well hopped underlying beer but with a great whiskey flavour in the finish. Green Flash/Founders Linchpin - delicious and very drinkable Pale Ale. Smuttynose Robust Porter - unctuous, smokey, very thick and full for a porter. Great.

Ok, so the problem with the The Gingerman. We entered and walked towards the bar before being told "no please take a seat and we'll come over to you". 15 minutes later we had finally ordered our drinks, about 35 minutes later we actually got a drink. Rather than mess around again we decided to move on and as such asked for the bill. We left enough to cover the round we had and a dollar to spare because we didn't have any more change. Like I said, the service had been awful and we only had one round.

The waitress pretty much ran over when she saw the money (the quickest she moved the whole time we were there) and then said "Were you not happy with the service? You left me a dollar."

I get that there is a tipping culture (we tipped well throughout the trip) but this is as good as begging.

So here's your tip. Get yourself over to Rattle n' Hum! http://www.rattlenhumbarnyc.com

 

 

After feeling like we night never eat again thanks to 5 Napkin Burger, we were surprisingly peckish by the time we dragged ourselves out of bed on our only Sunday morning in NYC.

Tipsy Parson was a tip off from fellow Leeds blogger Nick, aka The Beer Prole, and it turned out to be a cracking little place.

Greeted by friendly staff we grabbed a table in the window and looked over the impressive brunch menu whilst sipping very good coffee and proper, freshly squeezed orange juice.

Colette went for the Lemon Cornmeal Pancakes and I opted for the BBQ pulled pork with fried eggs and Corn Spoonbread. The pancakes were great, but just so damned stodgy. That's not a criticism of Tipsy Parson, we just both find American Pancakes so bulky. I suppose if you are starving they're a good bet, but I'm yet to be totally convinced.

The star dish, despite it being at the back of the photo, was the pulled pork. It was the best pulled pork I've ever eaten, coated in a light, natural tasting BBQ dressing and topped with perfectly fried eggs, plus... the best thing on the plate, spoonbread.

I'd never heard of it too, but it's basically a sweet cornbread-come-souffle that is super light, hugely flavoursome and worked amazingly well with the savoury accompaniments of eggs and pulled pork. We both agreed the combination was a pretty damned near perfect brunch dish.

Tipsy Parson also do a great looking lunch and dinner menu and serve a handful of interesting craft beers. I wish we'd had time to go back.

 

Tipsy Parson, Chelsea / Meat Packing District, New York

http://www.tipsyparson.com

 

When talking about the best burgers in New York there really isn't one place that can be crowned the definitive winner - it's all down to personal preference. One which is repeatedly mentioned though is 5 Napkin Burger - and quite rightly so, the burgers are epic.

When we arrived there was a bit of a queue for a table but thanks to those flashy paddle thingies we didn't have to stand around (take note Meat Liquor etc...), we sat at the bar with a drink, which is a much more civilised way to handle things if you ask me.

Within 15-20 minutes we were sat at our table outside, watching the world go buy with a beer and onion rings. I think the fact we were happy to sit out in the heat rather than inside under air-con jumped us up the queue somewhat.

They have a few craft beers on tap and I ordered from their 'Joker Line', which is basically a mystery guest line, but they will tell you what it is if pressed - and it turned out I was drinking Victory Summer Ale. Wahoo another Summer Ale! But it was a good one, and went perfectly with the super crispy onion rings and sunshine we were enjoying outside.

I went for the 5 Napkin Original burger, which looking back, does sound a bit whacky on paper: 10oz fresh ground chuck steak pattie, gruyere cheese, caramelised onions and rosemary aioli. Colette opted for the much more classically flavoured cheddar and bacon, and do you know what? I wish I had too.

For the first 4 nights of our New York trip we stayed in Manhattan, or more specifically the Meatpacking District near to Chelsea Market. It's a nice area with a neighbourhood feel to it, studded equally by designer labels and half industrially decayed buildings (some on purpose I'm sure), which reminded us a lot of the Shoreditch area of London.

Probably the most famous beer bar within walking distance of where we stayed is The Blind Tiger Alehouse in the West Village, but on our first day in New York the sun was beating down and we wanted to sit outside with a drink and make the most of the weather. Luckily Brass Monkey is right around the corner and thanks to a little* prior research I knew it was a decent craft beer bar which had a rooftop terrace - perfect.

As my reference to Shoreditch before may have alluded, the Meatpacking District can feel a little try hard, but Brass Monkey is a down to earth boozer if ever there was one. From the outside it looks like a small corner pub, but inside it has two expansive air conditioned floors (each with a bar) and a good sized rooftop terrace where table service is efficient and friendly.

You aren't going to get that über rare Imperial Smoked Black IPA you read about in Brass Monkey, but you will get a choice of some quality American Craft beer from some of the big hitters, and plenty of seasonals. I didn't drink a bad beer in here and there was always at least a few pump handles that tickled my fancy.

The seasonal 'Summer Ales' were everywhere during our stay in New York and I tried a few decent ones while sat in the sunshine at Brass Monkey, my favourite of which was actually from Sam Adams - A zesty, pithy, refreshing ale with a great bitterly hoppy finish, it was a perfect Summer beer which I later found out to be a wheat ale (but perfectly clear) brewed with lemon zest.

We came back more than once and I drank the likes of Lagunitas IPA and Goose Island, all of which tasted much, much hoppier served freshly on draft as apposed to the bottles that make their way over here.

If it's sunny and you fancy a beer in the Meatpacking District, this is the place to go.

 

*Colette would argue my "research" was exhaustive to the point of obsessive, but I hate wasting my time in shit bars and restaurants.

 

So it's the last day of my New York trip and I'm soaking up the last few hours of free hotel wifi and cloud spotted sunshine before heading back to Blighty.

It's been a fantastic trip, I'd come back in a heartbeat, particularly to Brooklyn, where we've spent the last two days of our holiday but which I felt instantly at home in. There's just something about the slightly downtrodden look of the place that I can relate to, it's feels lived in, uncontrived and all the more appealing for it. As nice as our hotel in the Meatpacking district was, I always felt a bit of an imposter sipping my sixpoint next to the trust funding yuppies ordering round after round of Mojitos by the pool.

My final port of call was to Brooklyn Brewery this afternoon, and wow what a place it is. Vast in its expanse compared to UK craft breweries, yet located smack bang in the heart off Brooklyn. I'll be writing about it soon, along with a handful of the other places I visited.

Warning, extreme beer porn to follow....

 

Nicola Kay-newmarch!

Big congratulations to Nicola and I hope you enjoy your meal at Chateau Marmot!

Nicola's favourite food and wine match was Rare Roast Beef and Chianti, and a fine match it is too!

Thanks to everybody who entered, if you want more info on the event or would like to book a table, please contact chateaumarmot@gmail.com