A weekend of craft beers - Camden, Clerkenwell and Euston

Beer for Punks

In London there appears to be a number of craft beer-houses popping up. They specialise in beers and ciders from microbreweries. In London Bridge we have the Draft House and Dean Swift both stocking a number of regional beers from microbreweries, with the Dean Swift support the Kernel Brewery literally a stone's throw from its doors tucked under the railway arches in Maltby Street.

Even better though, some of the microbreweries are setting up shop too. Last year Andy and I took Daddy Fox to the Greenwich Union, the Meantime Brewery's pub in the backstreets of Greenwich.

This weekend our friend @bermans descended on London Town on a Craft Beer mission. We hooked up with him in Camden to first head to The Black Heart, a favourite haunt of ours, who sell beers brewed locally from The Camden Town brewery. I highly recommend the wheat beer. Afterwards, with much excitement, we headed to the newly opened BrewDog Bar.

BrewDog make some of my favourite beers. They haven't been around long, founded in 2006 but they are already making a name for themselves. Their notoriety mainly lies in the super strength beers they make and sell which has earned them a lot of criticism from Drinking Groups and MP's.

So the facts - yes, BrewDog have some of the strongest beers in the world. Notably Tactical Nuclear Penguin at 32% and Sink the Bismarck at 41% (they made an even stronger one in The End of History at 55% loving served in a stuffed animal but as they only made 12 I don't think they are on general sale - they cost £500 a bottle anyway!). They also have some amazingly tasty beers too including Punk IPA and 5a.m. Saint. I tried Zeitgeist on Friday (a black lager) and IPA is Dead which was 6.7%. I only had a half.

Pints and Half Pints

What did impress me with BrewDog was the measures. The stronger the beers got, the less you could buy in one go. The 6.7% one I had was only served up to a half. Other came in 2/3 of a pint measure and the super strong ones were served in 25ml measures (they were not cheap either at £6 a glass). I almost bought a £15 bottle by mistake after asking for "the one with the octopus on it". I never did find out what the name of it was. All I heard from the barman was it was aged in casks dropped in the ocean. Maybe one day when I am a little more flush I will try it.

If you are in the Camden area I highly recommend both the Black Heart and BrewDog Bar Camden. You can find them here and here.

Because Girls Love Beer Too!

Saturday, the craft beer pub crawl continued to the Craft Beer Co. in Clerkenwell and the Euston Tap in the gatehouse outside Euston Station.

Craft Beer Co. doesn't look like it has been around long. Inside it is nice without being too pretentious and with I think about 20 beers on tap plus a wealth of bottles in the fridges too, you can't go wrong.

I tried a fruit beer called Boon to begin with which I loved. I continued on the fruit theme with an apple beer after. It was bizarre. Beer that tastes like cider. My brain was confused by that one.

The prices in The Craft Beer House were based on the abv. The stronger the more expensive. I noted one beer on the taps was £5.50 for a half! Ouch. Think I will stick with the lower abv beers thanks.

You can find The Craft Beer House here.

Afterwards it was a quick tube ride up to Euston to sample a quick drink in the Euston Tap before @bermans headed back to Lancaster. An amazing selection of craft beers once again with 27 on tap and more than I could count in the fridge.

Again I went with a fruity number, a peach infused beer (name of which escapes me - really should write these things down if I am going to blog about them). It was rather tasty and reminded me of Badger's Golden Glory. The pub is rather small but there is a fair bit of seating upstairs if you can carry your pint up the spiral staircase.

The Euston Tap can be found here.

All in all a rather good craft beer weekend and some newly discovered pubs!