Thread: Room Temprature Beer or Ale ?

Originally Posted by gregs656

If you can find it, try speckled hen. Extremely popular around these parts and might be produced in large enough quantities to make it across the pond.

I read something quite recently about the american thing of chilling lager to ice. Trouble is I can't remember where I was reading it, or why, so doubtful I will find it again.

I have had speckled hen before and it is good. I also like some of the offerings from Fuller's.

As for the lagers, yes they are (or should be) served very cold here, and (for establishments that know their brew) Lagers should be served in a mug so you have a handle to keep your hand from warming it. Opposed to one of the many other glassware varieties used for the other types.

I had some good lagers in Australia, they keep them so cold you feel like you snorted a slushie. Half your face freezes up.

Very civilized :-)

Room temp....
Well what temp is your room?
Summertime in Arizona -- chill the beer.
Winter in Wyoming as the temp sinks below -40
an interesting thing happens. You can leave it
out for a while then strain out the frozen bits
and have a much stiffer drink. Different beer
freezes at different temps too.

A good well brewed beer does taste better when
it has a good head in the glass and is not freezing
cold.....

I am lucky enough to have a pub near me with a beer engine. I have sampled the same beer side by side out of a regular keg, and out of the beer engine. Some people might consider the beer engine beer to be warm, and flat. When you taste the same beer side by side, it is amazing. The cold, highly carbonated beer just lacks so much flavor. The warmer beer just explodes with flavor.

You can get an idea of what I am talking about with any decent beer, maybe Samuel Adams. Get one ice cold, and let the other one sit out of the refrigerator for five or ten minutes before you open it. If you have any taste buds at all, you will notice a huge difference in flavor.

I only drink real ales these days, hoppier the better, and they should be served at "cellar temperature" which is around 12-14C (54-57F for our American friends!) Any colder and you lose the flavours of the beer.

Lagers should be colder as they taste foul when warm so I can understand the horror of Americans at the thought of beer at our temperatures. They are thinking of lagers at Best Bitter temperatures!

We don't drink warm beer here in Britain! That would be above room temperature, not nice. We drink it at the correct temperature.

Mind you, I've had mulled ale and cider several times and that is Warming beer!

Gareth

The key here is that room temperature in England back in the day was the temperature of the cellar where the beer was kept! Obviously in winter, that was pretty darn cold, and even in summer is still pretty cool.

I used to work in a pub that had an old underground cellar dug under the pub and it was pretty cold down there all year round. It cant have been more than about 10 or 15 degrees, even in summer. In winter it got down to about 5 or 6 degrees. Some more modern pubs have cooler units in there to keep the temperature down.

So when people talk about the Brits drinking beer at room temperature, it was still pretty cold..! Hehe! Certainly, I've never heard of anyone drinking warm beer!

I like my beers chilled, but not ice cold. Thats the belgian beers like Leffe and Hoegaarden.

Proper English beer (the brown stuff with little fizz) should be served a little warmer. As Gregs656 and welshwizard say, about 10 - 14 degrees is better here, otherwise you lose some of the flavour to the cold.

Some of those British beers are great though! I remember going to a beer festival here in London and some of them were so thick and strong you had to eat the last half inch of the stuff with a spoon! Hehe!

Some of the ciders are great as well. You dont want any of that fizzy yellow water though, you want the cloudy flat stuff. One of the best ones I ever had was down in Cornwall, and the guy brewed it in old bath tubs in his barn. It came out of the tap at around 9% strength, but it carried on fermenting in the barrel, so by the time you got to drink it, it was nearer 11%. Five pints of that and you didnt know what day of the week it was..!

Originally Posted by TheBaron

I have had speckled hen before and it is good.

It's actually: 'Old Speckled Hen' It's named after a car believe it or not.
There is a another from the same brewer called: 'Old Crafty Hen'