So here we are celebrating the immanent departure of three young things off on their European Grand Tour. I took them to Josie Bones to experience the Beer Flight – a taste of three selected beers. Imagine my disappointment on being told it is only served Thursday to Saturday. And there we were on a Wednesday – I was full of woe! We consoled ourselves by choosing a beer each and settled down to enjoy the meal. Josie Bones prides itself on cooking from nose to tail – the young people – being conservative eaters – opted for nearer the nose – the the roast lamb. It was beautifully presented suitably for sharing, accompanied by little creamy potato casseroles. Delicious.
I, being more adventurous prefer the tail end and had the black pudding – a delicious square of soft crumbly cooked blood! My two favourite dishes here have been offal – calves liver and now black pudding. Great. It was presented with a lovely little grated apple coleslaw arrangement which included some sort of clear jelly. Perfect accompaniment. And we all enjoyed the beetroot and haloumi salad – a great side dish for rich food. So food all quite splendid.
Then to further improve our night we were told we could have a personalized Beer Flight! One of the intending travellers has been bartending to acquire money for the trip – so we set him to selecting three beers. Decisions made were conveyed to James, the beer expert who had impressed me on my last visit. He in turn was mightily impressed by our choices and proceeded to lay out three glasses – one like a champagne flute, a beer glass and a small shapely glass on a stem. Were these beers we would be drinking? Well yes – but what great beers.
James was once again very impressive in imparting his detailed knowledge of each brew. First, from Aberdeen, abstrakt, AB:03, bottle number 2946 of a total of 3200 bottles (is this a beer or an art print?), bottled on 8/9/10. A delicious strawberry flavored beer. Light and sparkly and well suited to our champagne glasses – and real strawberry evidenced by real fruit fruit floating in the mix. You can check out the fellows who made it here.
Then we had the Big Worst, made by the Mikkeller brothers. From Denmark. Pen pictures of both grace the bottle – looking very cool Danish! This was a barley wine beer, bourbon edition – aged 4 month in bourbon barrels. And boy, could you taste that whiskey! Great, and with 19.1% alcohol content a potent drop. You can check them out here, but you will need to speak Danish to get the good oil on this beer.
Our final taste sensation was in a little bottle inside a very stylish black tin. It came to us all the way from Norway. Dark Horizon. It’s a third edition (is this a beer or a book?) They describe it as Norwegian ale with coffee added – smooth and creamy and oh so black. It looked a picture in our high stemmed liquor glasses.
These were truly delicious beers and perfectly suited to the dessert we were enjoying as we sipped – apple tarte tartin and dark chocolate mousse. A memorable evening preserved for us by James
Get along to Josie Bones and discover extreme beer!
– Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Leave a Reply