Gem: Perhaps the greatest beer ever brewed.

Name: Gem

Brewery: Bath Ales

ABV: 4.8% (bottle)

Style: best bitter

Season: All year long!

Availability: Available all year: Waitrose have a steady supply it seems.

Price I paid for it: £1.90 at Waitrose. Sainsburys also seem to have a healthy supply!

Try if you like: Doombar, Rebellion Red, Abbot Ale, bitter, sweet malts.

Don't let the title of this post lure you into thinking this is delusional hyperbole: this has to be one of the most perfectly executed pints I have ever sipped. Normally, when people talk of a 'good all-rounder' they usually mean a 'jack of all trades - master of none'. Gem is an outstanding all-rounder and is in no way, shape or form a 'master of none': it is a 'master of all'. 

The colour of this beauty from Bath is a deep-set chestnut amber with comparisons easily made with the sublime Sharps Doombar from Rock in Cornwall. The flavour also is reminiscent of that same drop: malty, morish, bitter-sweet but with absolutely no sourness or tannin tack at the back of the palette: the flavour eclipses Doombar in one respect and that is in that it refreshes at the first taste. It is rich, however, for a bitter and potent at 4.8% and a few of these at The Rec has had me very merry before the half-time whistle! This, however, does not put you off wanting another - the taste of almost caramel-hinted sweetness tempts you in again and again.

This beer is an award-winner (winning silver and gold at the International Beer Challenge) and when drinking it, you can understand why. It is everything you want from a beer: rich tasting, well-hopped and surprisingly light on its feet for its strength, this coming from the combination of Goldings Hops from Kent and the floor-malted Marris Otter Barley. The brewery's website calls this offering 'quintessentially English' and it certainly is, I think, our nations best expression of its brewing standard. Try this beer at any point in the year and you'll be rewarded with flavour and texture to die for. This brewery just goes from strength to strength and you can tell that their exceptional work stems from the solid foundations of this exquisite pint.

Imagine taken from: https://www.bathales.com/our-ales/aid/gem/

Review: Golden Champion

Name: Golden Champion
Brewery: Hall & Woodhouse, Dorset.
ABV: 5%
Style: Golden Ale
Season: Spring/Summer but really, any time you fancy something more than a cold lager can deliver.

Availability: Most major supermarkets.

Try if you like: Crisp, full-bodied lagers such as Pilsner Urquell, Fursty Ferret.

This is the beer that started it all. Back in 2005, I first saw a bottle of this adorned in sun blushed labelling with a dark, brown glass bottle and gold lettering. It was the first 'ale' I had ever held in my hands. It tasted wonderful. Grown up. Better than lager. Of the earth, the field, the country. I adored it. I still do. Today, it is slightly at odds with my favourite flavours of subtle caramel, morish malt and dark roasts but then that is probably why I love it: it isn't these things but still manages to finish sublimely whilst reminding me of a more naive time. Cut grass, pollen and summer freshness burst forth from the soft bubbling, shining copper brew. A wonderful golden straw not far off golden syrup in tone. Crisp, refreshing but with that depth of hop and malt that remind you this isn't a gassy, dilute lager or sharp pilsner: there is a slight coriander tone that keeps things from the garden and the echo of maltiness that give you something sweet and bodied to consider. Summer in a cup, in a quaff, in a mouthful. Perfect with a barbecue, on a picnic or whenever you want. Maybe it is nostalgia that really wins this for me? Or maybe it is that, whenever I go to a friends house, they tell me: "You left a bottle of ale here" and it is always a Golden Champion and I most certainly didn't leave it (but they buy me one every time I'm going to pop by and keep up the pretence!). I love this beer. I know it is winter and you are roasting chestnuts on the open fire but whilst you sit there in your thick knitwear, the rain drizzling down the windows and the sky churning an endless, miasmic grey just pop a bottle of this open and journey back to August. 

For more info go to: http://www.hall-woodhouse.co.uk/beer/golden-champion

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Review: Theakstone's Old Peculier

Name: Theakstone's Old Peculier
Brewery: Theakstone, North Yorkshire.
ABV: 5.6%
Style: Dark ale

Availability: Widely available in most supermarkets.

Try if you like: Coffee, dark chocolate, rich, deep & sumptuous treacle flavours, stouts, porters.

A quintisentially British brew and well worthy of its fame: a true legend and a beer that continues to be complex and surprising after each drink. Old Peculier pours out a deep, rich ebony brown and foams up with a head like whipped deep-vanilla ice. This is a dark brew but maintains itself a lighter body than a stout or a porter thanks to the slight carbonation that lifts the whole profile and the fresh bitterness from the equally legendary fuggles hops. The epitome of bittersweet, at the front it is fresh and roasted with the sweetness coming somewhere in the middle, not far off burnt caramel or dark maple or treacle. Towards the end, there lingers the more coffee-tinged notes and then the dip of bitterness to stop this brew from being sickly-sweet. It packs a real punch at 5.6% and you can taste that alcohol but it is managed extremely well through a balanced and smooth finish but, again, thanks to the slight fizz and fuggles, doesn't feel too syrupy. This really is a luxurious and surprisingly light brew for its colour and taste but somehow, I can never drink one quickly: be it the punch or to savour every drop, a pint lasts a bit longer than a quaffable amber ale. I adore this brew around late autumn and winter when fires crackly, fireworks pop and the days are so miserable that a pint in the cosy indoors is irrestable. When Theakstone crafted this, they crafted something that deserves to be preserved like Stonehenge or The Tower of London. If you've never had one, try one on Christmas Day, before the dinner; downwind of the pine needles: there's a resonance of rum-kissed raisin in this drink that will have you feeling merry in no time (and of course, the 5.6% will have nothing to do with it!).