Monday 19 March 2012

Dealing with Bad Beer


Not all beer is good. Some is faulty, some badly brewed, some isn’t to my taste and some just tastes really horrible. Last week I drank some horrible beers.

One of the beers was a stout. I expected richness, a smooth body, a roasty depth. I got c-hops and thin, weak coffee (plus some diacetyl...). It was the beer equivalent of a fat 50-year-old dressed up in mini skirt, high heels and plastered in try-hard make-up in that the beer wanted to be something else and failed: it wanted to be an imposing cask stout, highly hopped, stronger than you’d usually see, but it just didn’t even get close to being nice.

There was also a sub-4% best bitter. Golden in colour, it looked good, but it tasted disgusting – probably the worst beer I’ve had this year. I can usually tolerate or suffer through beers I don’t enjoy (I did with the stout, just about), but not this one. The first sniff made me wince. It was like I’d pressed my face into a herd of cows. A mouthful was fine to begin – the condition was excellent – but the taste was just unreal. Have you ever tasted hopped wort? It was like that minus all the sweetness. I love hops but this was bitter beyond pleasure and there was no sweetness, no malt character at all, to balance it.

As these were drunk in a decent venue, the staff presumably tasted the beers so they knew what they were serving. The beers were both well kept – no complaints there. They had that little snap of natural carbonation, they had life, they kept their foam throughout, and even though taste is subjective, I struggle to think that anyone could’ve enjoyed these beers and gone back for more.

And it leaves me thinking... If I ran that place and I put those beers on the bar, would I continue to serve them after tasting them or would I pull them off the tap? How much responsibility should the bar/pub have on serving beer like this? It damages what I think of the place as well as the breweries. But what can they do? Make the call that says they don’t like the beer or serve 70 pints of it and hope for the best? As the only fault is the flavour, then can the customer return the beer and ask for something else?

When a bad beer gets to the pub then who should deal with it and how?  

40 comments:

  1. 'If I ran that place and I put those beers on the bar, would I continue to serve them after tasting them or would I pull them off the tap?'

    I assume this wasn't a brewery-tied pub? Were the stout and the golden bitter from different breweries?

    'Golden in colour, it looked good, but it tasted disgusting [...] I love hops but this was bitter beyond pleasure and there was no sweetness, no malt character at all, to balance it.'

    There are a lot of bad, bad, baaaad beers like this (usu. from regional micros who make half-decent malty best bitters and milds but feel they should get down with the kids and have something pale and hoppy). Unpleasant hop teas that can look just fine but have a wincingly vegetal bitterness with no balancing characteristic at all.

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    1. Different breweries and an untied-pub. Hop tea is a good way of describing it. It was all English hop as well so it was vegetal and muddy. Just grim!

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  2. I suppose it comes down to how bad the beer is - whether it makes you whince and gurn - as to whether a pub would pull it. Can they return it if it's not faulty and just tastes bad? I'd say probsbly not.

    For a drinker it's kind of down to them to try before they buy. I don't think I've been to a pub host won't readily let you have a nip.

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    1. It was a real gurner! I did actually try the bitter before I bought it! I tried it alongside another beer from the same brewery and that was even worse. By the time I'd had two proper mouthfuls I realised how terrible it really was (it was one of those - it-can't-be-that-bad kind of reactions to begin!)

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    2. Actually I quite like Camden town beers, you should give them another try!

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    3. I do hate anonymous comments. So faceless. And cheap, you know. And you're obviously not drinking the same beers as I am.

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    4. Oh come on Mark, get a sense of humour!

      Camden Town's beers aren't awful, but they're hardly exciting or award-winning. Website looks pretty though.

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    5. What do awards mean? Looking at most of the competitions in the UK, they mean virtually nothing, in my opinion. And why does every beer have to go 100 miles an hour? If you want that then someone else does it well. Camden Town do something different and do that very well.

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    6. I couldn't agree more, UK comps are a joke.

      Please enlighten me on what Camden town do well? BUT please be impartial as you can, some would say you have a vested interest.

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    7. Come to the brewery and drink the beers and you'll see. You've obviously had them before so must be in London or travel in to drink them. I think all the beers are excellent at what they do and I did before I started there or I wouldn't have gone to the brewery. Hells is a lager that anyone can drink and enjoy; Ink is a hoppy nitro stout which works for geeks or Guinness drinkers; I don't think there's a better hefeweizen made in the UK; and Pale is modelled on SNPA/Little Creatures in a drinkable, dry, aromatic beer. As a core range goes, I think that's pretty strong.

      Now must you keep up this anonymous act?!

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  3. I've been there too - in fact, we must have! I guess the main point is in your opening statement. If it's not to your taste, then I guess that's just bad luck - you buy the ticket, you take the ride. If the beer is in poor condition, infected, or obviously not fit to be served then...well, it's not fit to be served! Buy halves?

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    1. There's beer I don't enjoy and then there's beer which is just plain awful without being technically flawed or infected... Even a half was too much to suffer through!

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  4. Talking of hop tea, English hops and light & hoppy...
    You get lots of Vegetative grassy rawness from dry hopping with English hops (German too), which after 4 to 6 weeks settles down into something more in keeping with drinkable beer, I've seen this in my own Homebrew. But straight out of the brewery a week in the cask, I'd think it wouldn't be that pleasant.

    If I ran a pub and the beer tasted shit, I'd send it back, it wouldn't do me or the brewery any favors for people to keep drinking it... maybe its a hard line to tell a brewery that 'In your opinion, their beer is shit'
    The 'PC' line might be....
    I'm really sorry but after 4 or 5 pints and not a good word said I had to take it off the bar, maybe you (the brewery) could explain to me what went wrong, I'd like to serve beer that shows you in a good light.

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    1. The rawness did taste very fresh. A little time might've helped the beer out but who knows. The PC line is probably the best way to go. And I'm with you - if it doesn't taste good then I'd take it off the bar - it's does no one any favours.

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  5. It's occasionally hard to know someones if the beer is badly brewed, a poor recipe or a duff cask. If you think it tastes poor, then I'd always query it with a barman (though in my experience it is not always the case that they know better- I've been told by landlords and bar staff at places that are generally OK that clearly infected beer is fine...). And also why not drop the brewery a (constructively worded) line and ask them about the beer - if I were a commercial brewer, I'd like to know whether people did or didn't like beers I produced - if not to alter recipes, it could be done kind of quality control issue in distribution or point of sale, the matter the brewers have relatively little handle on in an untied pub.

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    1. You're right - it can be hard to tell where the fault lies. As the condition was good in these it pointed towards the actual beers. Feedback is always good - no one deliberately sets out to make bad beer!

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  6. It's occasionally hard to know someones if the beer is badly brewed, a poor recipe or a duff cask. If you think it tastes poor, then I'd always query it with a barman (though in my experience it is not always the case that they know better- I've been told by landlords and bar staff at places that are generally OK that clearly infected beer is fine...). And also why not drop the brewery a (constructively worded) line and ask them about the beer - if I were a commercial brewer, I'd like to know whether people did or didn't like beers I produced - if not to alter recipes, it could be done kind of quality control issue in distribution or point of sale, the matter the brewers have relatively little handle on in an untied pub.

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  7. As a commercial brewer, constructive criticism of one of our brews is always taken on board. But the odd email you get saying your beer was 'terrible' is no help whatsoever, we need a reason, then we can look at solving the issue. Luckily we get more emails saying they like the beer which is nice! Cheers Tara. Mallinsons Brewing Co

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    1. I'm sure there are many, many more saying they like the beer than saying they don't, Tara!

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  8. If it's a new beer from a brewery you're familiar with you'll probably have a reasonable idea what to expect. If both beer and brewery are unfamiliar then you pays your money and takes your chance, so maybe best to start with a half. Or a schooner...

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    1. I favour the safety of the half pint when stepping in brave new directions!

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  9. Are schooners now available in the UK?
    Some people might actually like the beer you clearly did not. It's hard to say. I like beers that taste like hop tea, full of tannins, though I am sure there is a point where it becomes too much.

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    1. Schooners are now available! And I love big over-the-top hops but this was just undrinkable, like clench the jaw, swear out loud bad.

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  10. I had a similar experience over the holidays when I was in France, having spent a hour to drive to a village market purely because a small artisan brewer was selling his wares that day. I bought a bottle of each of his beers and when I drank then they were simply disgusting, something seriously amiss as they all stank of sticking plasters and TCP. I emailed the brewer to let him know, and have heard precisely zero back from him, not even an apology or possible explanation, I guess he has my money and doesn't give a shit any more.

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    1. There is always that problem! It's hard to find the balance between politely handing over feedback and sounding like a douchebag, plus you never know how the brewer will take it.

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    2. I think it's a bit late to start worrying about sounding like a douchebag.

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  11. When a bad beer gets to the pub then who should deal with it and how?

    I think you should say to the management "I'm Mark Dredge, renowned beer expert. This tastes like a tramps underpants"

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    1. If I were the management, I would ask how you know what tramps underpants taste like?

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    2. I had my I'm a Beer Expert t-shirt on so they should've known in the first place.

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    3. Mark what are your actual credentials for being a beer expert?

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    4. I never said I was a beer expert, Anon... Ask Cooking Lager. And what credentials does one need to be called an expert?!

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    5. I might be interested in medicine, does that mean I would post blogs (or cut and paste articles from books) on how to perform a triple heart bypass?

      I would have thought a brewer would have the credentials to be a called a beer expert? However you wouldn't have to be a brewer to be an expert taster, but you would need to have a proven palate amongst your peers. Your peers being the man on the street.

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    6. I'm no medical expert, but my understanding is that the instructions for performing a triple heart bypass (or even a heart bypass of lower multiplicity) are not ordinarily sought for in blog posts - at least, not by the people who are actually carrying out the surgery. I'd say that ScalpelAndClamp.com, if you ever get around to writing it, will be at worst a harmless diversion, but perhaps an entertaining read.

      Of course, there always is the doomsday scenario in which some amateur enthusiast undertakes to perform his own operation according to your prescription, with a tragic outcome. Then you'll be kicking yourself for not having chosen a non-lethal subject to blog about!

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    7. Anon - Cut and paste?! It's called research. You try and write 2,000 words on a piece of history and not use books.

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  12. I had a very similar experience with two beers this weekend. One from a very well respected local brewery which had a horribly acidic/vinegary aftertaste, the other from a pretty major national brewery which tasted like watered down wort.

    Like you say, the difficulty is knowing whether the taste is intentional or whether it's down to poor storage or transportation?

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  13. There's no simple answer to this. Brewers and pubs need to work together to get the beer to punters at its best.

    Some breweries make great beer and don't seem to care how it's served.

    Some pubs don't seem to taste the beer at the beginning of the day, or they'd realise how bad it is.

    Sad to say, I have mostly given up pointing out to bar staff when the beer isn't right, except if I'm in one of my regular haunts where they know me.

    Tara makes a good point. Sure it would be more useful to brewers if punters said something like "your beer was full of diacetyl/sulphur/acetaldehyde/twigs", but is it reasonable to demand that level of expertise from drinkers?

    I have only ever emailed a brewery once to point out that a bottle of their beer was infected. Never got a response of any kind, even to say that I was wrong.

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  14. An interesting post Mark, and one I have mixed feelings about having been on both sides of the bar, so to speak.
    I feel a post of my own coming on regarding this subject!

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  15. I actually had a similar experience in a well respected bar that I really like. I didn't even try the beer first because I've loved everything else I've had by this Brewery. It literally tasted like cleaning fluid and made me feel a bit dodgy so I went to the bar and spoke to them but they claimed it was fine and just very well hopped. I know what really hoppy beers taste like but that was not a really hoppy beer, I'm certain that there was something wrong with it.

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    1. I'd like to add to this, however, I waited for ages to try Northcote Brewery Jiggle Juice and finally got a bottle... this bottle was oxidised which was very disappointing because I had waited so long. All I did was spoke to the lovely Jennifer on twitter and she dropped a bottle of Jiggle Juice and Sunshine Jiggle off to my house as a replacement which was awesome. That is customer care.

      I miss Northcote Brewery!

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  16. Crikey, Anon is a bit feisty.

    I read the article nodding in agreement but disappointed you didn't name names. Then I thought about it and I don't think that would have been fair. Every brewery can have an off day, as can every pub in the way they handle it and indeed every staff member in the way they treat bad beer.

    I would give it a second chance, try the beers somewhere else to see if it is the brewery and, if you can face it, go back to the venue to see if the same happens again - that'll help you decide where and what to drink and where in the future.

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