British Beer Destinations

[moreb33rplz]

I'm going to be in London, and various places in Scotland. Where should I go to experience beer? Most interested in older, traditional beers and breweries.

 

[MrFeltimo]

First choice would be Fullers, on the old Chiswick road, I think.
Try to head over to Marlow to the Rebellion Brewery, fantastic stuff.
its been a while since ive visited do im abit rusty.
good luck and have fun the English folk are a funny bunch.

 

[zmanzorro]

The original Harp pub and the Coal Hole in London are both pretty cool spots but most the pubs we went to all had the same style of beers.

 

[EDF713]

Try the Viaduct across from Old Bailey and close to St Paul's. The beer selection is the usual London pub stuff, but the staff can show you the old prison cells in the cellar.

 

[rodgers]

If you have time, try and make it over to Reading (30 minute train from Paddington) and check out either of these:

#1 Wild Weather. My local so I may be bias but it was definitely the best brewery tour I've been on. Focused entirely on the beer, and less on generic process. Free samples all day long and they're a real cool bunch of guys.

#2 Siren. Best new UK brewery 2013, and second best in the world that same year. Liquid Mistress is one of the best beers I've ever had and, for me, in a league of it's own.

I'm sure wherever you end up going you'll have a blast, but if you do find yourself in Paddington with a spare day consider these. You won't be disappointed.

 

[Derp]

First choice would be Fullers, on the old Chiswick road, I think.

I took the tour 2 years ago and enjoyed it. It's a typical brewery tour, but it was nice to meet some British beer lovers and discuss the American and British craft beer scene.

Reservations are required and there's a fee, but they pretty much let us drink our fill at the end of the tour.

 

[shtoive87]

I went to about 10 "traditional" pubs in London a couple months ago. My favorite was Ye Olde Cock Tavern. Laid back ambiance and 6-8 cask beers. Also highly recommend the Ship Tavern. They had Old Peculier on tap, awesome live music, and a great restaurant above it.

 

[MrFeltimo]

I took the tour 2 years ago and enjoyed it. It's a typical brewery tour, but it was nice to meet some British beer lovers and discuss the American and British craft beer scene.

Reservations are required and there's a fee, but they pretty much let us drink our fill at the end of the tour.

it is a great place for sure,
when i was a nipper i use to to go there with me dad, he was in a band.
if i remember correctly, the brewery/pub has two names, you would enter on one side of the street and the pub was called one name but on the other side the name was different.

i worked a lot in that area too.

 

[Derp]

if i remember correctly, the brewery/pub has two names, you would enter on one side of the street and the pub was called one name but on the other side the name was different.

Yep!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mawson_Arms

https://goo.gl/maps/gaMBUcuukhR2

 

[50quidsoundboy]

Hi - I work in London every week, and used to live here, these are my recommendations.

Pubs (craft beer):

Mother Kellys (http://motherkellys.co.uk/) - Short trip east on the Central line. Always excellent modern British and European craft beer, all keg, no cask. Also an amazing bottle selection.

The Euston Tap - Tiny pub outside Euston Station (very central, easy to reach). Loads of British craft beer (cask, keg + bottle), where beer nerds rub shoulders with commuters who just want lager and don't understand why there's no Heineken. Upstairs lounge is very sociable. I've had a lot of very messy nights up there. The tables get sticky and occasionally the whole pub smells like a toilet. This is part of the Euston Tap magic, don't question it.

The Dovetail, Clerkenwell (http://dovepubs.com/aboutdovetail/) - Close to Farringdon tube station (Circle line) or about a 15 minute walk from Kings Cross. Basically a Belgian beer cafe, but in London - loads and loads of Belgian beers on tap and in bottles, and great Belgian food, with a nice authentic cosy European vibe inside. Clerkenwell is a really nice historic part of London, formerly home to Charles Dickens and Karl Marx.

The Craft Beer Co (various pubs in London) - can be expensive compared to other pubs, but the draft selection tends to be huge and they often have amazing things like Cantillon straight lambic on tap.

Brewdog (various pubs in London, by far the best one being in Shepherds Bush) - a bit soulless, popular with yuppies, but always reliably great beer (keg + bottle only). They also have a bottle shop near Kings Cross, called BottleDog, which is great, and has its own little secret bar in the basement.

Pubs ("Traditional"):

AVOID any pub run by Greene King or which serves Greene King beer. Their beer is terrible and a national laughing stock. Do you enjoy cask "IPA" at 3.7% ABV that tastes of defrosted freezer moisture? No? Then stay away.

The Clachan (close to Oxford Circus tube station) Part of the Nicholson's chain, you find a good range of cask beer in these places and it's usually well kept. The Clachan is a very useful pub to hide in, because it's in the middle of central London's main shopping district.

The Viaduct (as mentioned above) - this is opposite my office! It's part of the Fuller's Brewery pub estate, they have dozens of pubs across London, and they vary quite a bit. The beer here is well looked after but the selection is uninspiring - London Pride, Sierra Nevada pale, Chimay Gold, macro lager. Worth a visit if you're in the area (it's an interesting building) but you would be crazy to make a journey just to visit this pub.

The Parcel Yard - this is Fullers "flagship" pub and it's actually located inside Kings Cross railway station. Loads of different beers, the entire Fullers range and it's probably the only pub in London where you can pick up bottles of Fullers Vintage Ale (their annually released barrel-aged barleywine) which are 10 years old or more. Very good food, really nice historic interior, very spacious. Gets busy with commuters between 5pm - 6:30pm.

The Queens Head (http://queensheadlondon.com/) - 5 minute walk from Kings Cross. Run by same people as Mother Kellys. Looks and feels like a classic (some would say "idealized") London pub, but serves really good craft beer (cask and keg).

Breweries

The Kernel - unfortunately they closed their tap room due to rowdiness but you can still visit at the weekend to purchase bottles. They make some of the best beer in London, they pretty much introduced the classic "US-05 IPA" style to this country, and they do that style extremely well alongside their historic recreations of London Export Stouts, and some really good sours. You see their beers in various pubs in London and they're always really really good.

Brew By Numbers - close to the Kernel, they have a great taproom although I haven't been there, my friends say it's great. Probably the best brewery in London right now. Their hoppy beers are total juice bombs, they make great saisons, and they do cool stuff like white wine barrel aged tripels.

Fullers - a bit of a hassle to get to via public transport, but if you want to visit a historic British industrial brewery without leaving London, this is the one.

I hope this helps!

 

[kristiismean]

what about "by the horns"? I have had some of their beers, pretty tasty..

I think Wandsworth area. Reasonable pricing (under 20 for tour and 3 pints)

 

[Hanglow]

Harvey's in Lewes although the tours are booked out for two years or so. They have a couple of pubs in London, The Royal Oak on Tabbard street being the pick of them. They also have a bunch of pubs on the south coast, check out their website for a map of them

Hook Norton have a nice old brewery no idea if you are going to be close to them, they are north of Oxford

St Peters, although fairly new, fit in with the traditional theme, their london tap is the Jerusalem Tavern

Sam Smiths have loads of pubs in London, have a google of them like Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese. I'm not much of a fan of their beers though people from the US always seem to like them

Avoid the Bree Loiuse, I've been twice and was disappointed with the beer and the service " This is warm and flat" - "It's supposed to be like that" etc etc. In fact london can be quite bad for warm and flat cask beer if you aren't careful with what pub you go into

This map might be slightly handy, bare in mind though that most british breweries don't have tap rooms, like in the states so your best bet to finding beers are in pubs

http://www.quaffale.org.uk/php/showmap.php


Scotland doesn't really have old breweries, the old ones are Tennents (mass produced crap lager) , Caledonian (Heineken owned and not very good) Belhaven (Greene King owned and even worse) Other than that the brands like McEwans and Youngers are owned by Charlie Wells in England and they are also rubbish as old breweries go. But there are plenty of good new breweries. Edinburgh is the best beer town by far, many good pubs and bars for beer, Glasgow has quite a few decent places too. If you are out in the sticks in Scotland it can be very hard to get good beer sadly, most places are still dominated by Tennents, Guinness, Best etc etc. Much better served with whisky though Where in Scotland are you going to?

 

[BrewSavage]

London has some great craft beer bars, as 50squidboy points out. These will have both international and British craft beers and are fun places to hang out.. However, I'm going to suggest the OP focuses on experiencing the cask ales of Britain as those are what makes English ales distinct from other nations.

There's always an great selection of cask ales at the Market Porter pub at the Borough Market. If you go on a market day it is even better as you'll have lots of serious food options.

 

[redarmy990]

Dont go any where near London for good beer
Go to Yorkshire. Ripon has the Theakstons brewery Old Peculier and Black Sheep are good
York has a couple of breweries and fantastic real ale drinking pubs.
Sheffield is the same and Barnsley has a couple of micro breweries.

Im not bias but i am a Yorkshire man.

 

[MyQuL]

I live in London. If you want a pub with a huge amount of hand pulls so you can try all kinds of British (and non Britsh Beers) the Craft beer co has a couple of pubs in central London. Heres the convent garden one
http://www.thecraftbeerco.com/covent-garden/

If you fancy a ye old Englande type pub, the Lamb and Flag is great (supposedly it was once called the bucket of blood as it used to hold bare knuckle boxing). It's now a fullers pub. Again in central london
http://www.lambandflagcoventgarden.co.uk/

The harp as someone else mentioned is also good but it's small so is usually packed when the offices workers finish
http://www.harpcoventgarden.com/

If your after older more traditional beers you'll probably want to try a shepard neame beer/pub which claims to be Britains oldest brewery. Again in convent garden so easy to get to if your in cental london, the freemasons arms http://www.shepherdneame.co.uk/pubs/covent-garden/freemasons-arms but I prefer the betysy trotwood in clarkenwell, bit more atmosphere http://www.shepherdneame.co.uk/pubs/london/betsey-trotwood.
I dont know what the laws are in the US regarding taking some bottled beer home but shepard neame 1698 (you can buy it in large ASDA supermarkets) is bottle condtioned and AFAIK no US yeast lab carries the strain so you could bring home a nice little HBing momento of your trip to the UK to culture up

 

[Derp]

I don't remember the limit, but you can pack some beer into your checked bags. I've done it several times.

 

[MrFeltimo]

Yep!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mawson_Arms

https://goo.gl/maps/gaMBUcuukhR2

Ha, i was right,
I better let my wife know. Nah! she still wouldn't believe i was right.