Trembling Madness York

There is something calming about walking around York centre. Yes it is busy, and you are forever being slowed down by groups of tourists, however the old buildings and traditional back street shops have that much character that you can never get tired of.
We popped over to York for no particular reason, just feeling in the mood for a bit of window shopping...and a fat rascal from Betty's!
Cue the exciting look on my face when we walked past a beer shop, not just any beer shop...but the best beer shop in York!
Trembling Madness is situated on Stonegate in York. Walking down the cobbled street you could almost miss it. From the front it looks like just a little shop, but don't let the small shop front deceive you...it is like the Tardis of the beer shop world.
Upon entering you are greeted with a selection of Cider and fridges full of canned favourites from the US & Europe. This room was exciting enough, until we spotted a separate room towards the back. I can not put this room into words so please refer to the pictures! Wall to wall beer, including known brands from all over the world as well as a huge selection of craft beer's from small and local breweries. Their website boats that the store has 5000 different tipples ... WOW !
Not to end there, the stairs downstairs lead to a huge selection of spirits....and upstairs their own bar! How had I never seen this place up until now. Visit their site at http://www.tremblingmadness.co.uk ... or just visit the store!

After about 15 minutes of browsing we finally make a decision as to what tipples we would purchase. Liz went for a cider, not just any cider but Rum & Poached Pear Cider 4% from Blind Pig. The cider had a subtle scent of white rum (reminded me of our 'house' Havana Club from our home bar). The poached pear was quite a subtle but sweet flavour and a welcome addition to the rum. As a cider this was still very refreshing as you would expect. The guys at Blind Pig also do a Whiskey, Honey & Apple Cider and a Bourbon & Blueberry... we will certainly be purchasing these on our next visit.

My choice of beer was a little harder to come across than with Liz and her cider. I think I picked up and put back about 8 different beers before I came to it. I put down a trappist beer, a Thornbridge bottle as well as various different Belgium beers (the reason being I wanted to save that sort of purchasing for our upcoming trip to Bruges). As we were in York I finally decided to pick something local. The York Chocolate Stout 5.9% from Rudgate brewery does exactly what it says on the tin. Sometimes I find that chocolate stouts are a bit too heavy and should be saved for a day when you are 'just having one'. This however did not sit too heavy, even with the strong flavour. It had a good mix of sweetness and bitterness that is found in good quality rich chocolate. For a city with such a long chocolate heritage, this really hits the spot.

Next time we visit York we will be taking a bigger beer budget! One thing for sure we will not eat lunch first, as their pub is on our list of places to lunch!

-Sam

n.b following our visit to Trembling Madness it turns out that the Blind Pig Cider is actually made my Heineken...surprising !

Back to the farm...new tipples from Keelham Farm Shop

We have had a few expensive weekends in our house recently, built up of visits from friends and family members...with a significant amount of Prosecco consumed. This weekend we decided that we needed to have a quiet one. As a sneaky treat for the quiet weekend we decided that we were going to have steak night, so where else to visit but our favourite farm shop....Keelham.

My last post about Keelham will let you know all about this place, so I shall not repeat myself.

As we pulled into the carpark we saw a big sign stating that the Keelham Beer Festival was on...gutted as I was the designated driver for the day.
Unlike a typical beer festival the Keelham Beer Festival was business as usual for the shop, just with an added extra. At the end of most of the aisles were tables where local breweries (all stocked in the beer section) could showcase their brews and hand out shot sized samples. Apar


t from my recent discovery of Beer52 (and love of American IPA's) I generally tend to stick to local breweries. This made me feel less bad about not being able to sample everything.
Visiting breweries included Saltaire & Ilkley which are both on my doorstep...if you ever see their beer stocked in your local shop, or on offer in the pub then please try them, you will not be disappointed.  http://saltairebrewery.co.uk/saltaire/  http://www.ilkleybrewery.co.uk

The reason why I am writing this blog is because (if you read my last Keelham blog you will know) that this is the only farm shop I know that have their own beer. Whenever we visit I always pick up a bottle of Tipsy Pig. This time was different !
The shop were running a competition to find the next 'own brand' beer. With the name already chosen (Squiffy Sheep) all they needed was a decision on the brew. The choices were Fruity & Spicy Bitter, Chestnut Bitter and Golden Bitter all brewed for the shop by the Dark Horse Brewery based in North Yorkshire.
After picking up a couple of bottles I have to say that the Golden Bitter was by far the favourite, it was a little stronger than the Tipsy Pig and had a dark bronze look to it. It was not the most extreme in flavour, but was really fitting as a typical Yorkshire session ale. I may be biased to this as it reminded me of my beloved Black Sheep Ale.

If you get the chance to pop in, have a try and let them know your favourite...you never know it may just become available on your every visit!

As we walked out of the shop, beer, steak & cheese in hand we noticed one more stand by the door. How did we not know that Keelham now had their own cider!
I had to turn around and pick up a bottle for Liz.
At 6% this cider was very crisp and refreshing. It had a lot more taste than your typical branded ciders, but not as much as the high strength ciders that are found at festivals. This was a winner for Liz as she only likes fizzy cider. We would choose this over a Strongbow or Thatchers Gold...however Liz is still pushed more towards the fruity ciders of Rekorderlig.

Has anyone found any other local places like Keelham that do their own beer?

-Sam

Kopparberg Frozen Fruit Cider

If you have not already guessed from my previous blogs, I am a big fan of beer.
However as the Mrs is not keen and only really drinks cider I have grown fond of having the odd pint of cider every now and again.
When I worked in the local pub as a teenager we had a couple of punters who were really into their cider, because of this I developed a taste for proper Somerset Cider...mainly Scrupmy, which lets face it you can only have one or two before enough is enough.

Like I said, the other half is a bit fan of cider (I almost put 'big cider drinker' but I might have gotten into trouble!). Whenever browsing for a tipple to go with our tea she tends to pick up a fruit cider, mainly the big brands like Strongbow, Kobbarberg & Rekorderlig.
With the weather being as nice as it was I decided to buy her a treat, this resulted in purchasing something completely new from Kobbarberg.....Frozen Fruit Cider. Now unless you are really into fruit cider this may seem like a bit of a gimmik, but with the availability of buying cans of G&T and rum and coke in the supermarket this seems like a natural progression for the big brands to introduce something new as we approach pimms season.


I purchased both of the Frozen Ciders so that we could have a good compare of the products. We picked them up in Morrisons for a rather extortionate £2.99 a bag !! (I thought they were an introductary price of £2....I was wrong). The idea behind the ciders is that you throw them in the freezer for 8 hours and just cut off the top. If you buy these for the summer put them in the freezer on a morning, we left ours overnight and had to let them defrost for a hour or so in the fridge.

So lets start with the Strawberry & Lime.

 I do enjoy a mixed fruit Kopparberg normally when Liz buys them in, however with the Strawberry & Lime I just found it way too sweet. It was even sweeter than a Slush Puppy! At 4% you could really taste the alcohol, as it was mainly ice going up the straw every now and again you just get hit with the alcohol. For me it was just too sweet, now I know that fruit ciders and the 'new' alcopops and are designed to be just like pop, but this was just too much. 3/10

The next Frozen Cider is the Elderflower & Lime.

Similar to the first cider, this was 4%. The similarities end there!
More so than the Strawberry, the Elderflower had a real kick to it. It had a sweetness that you would expect with cider but was not overly sweet. For me, I think I enjoyed this as it reminded me of a iced slush drink that we had beside the pool in Cuba last year. The lime flavour came out quite strongly. On speaking to Liz about this one I all of a sudden had an brainwave...what would make this drink even better? A shot of Gin.
Now Im guessing that Kopparberg intended for these just to be drank as they were on a sunny summers day, but put this in a tall glass with a shot of Gin and a wedge of lime and you would have a really cracking cocktail. On reading this back I am unsure whether my 'brainwave' was a good thing of not for this drink, as it makes it seem like it is a mixer. Anyway, this Frozen Cider is definately worth a try. 7/10

On writing this blog I asked myself (and the cider expert) would we buy these again? Now that would defiantely be price dependant, I think that at £2.99 Kopparberg will really price themselves out of sales, as there are many iced cocktails available on the shelves for a much better price. If they were better priced we would certainly purchase the Elderflower one again...that or pour the bottled version in a freezer bag and make our own.