We are in the land of Real Ale now and the plethora of hand pumps in the pubs is a joy to behold. I will definitely have to get one of these when I get home. Although I was expecting to see a few CAMRA diehards amongst the free houses here in jolly old England, I was not expecting to be served cellar temp, near flat but creamy smooth ales everywhere I’ve been. After snarfing down 2 litre plastic bottles of Croatian “Pilsner” for the previous month, this is quite a change. (To be fair, it was deodorant-failure hot in the Balkans and the beer was only 1€ a litre).

British pubs are quite the institution as well. Part of the national heritage as it were. While we have our Lumsdens and Hallertaurs, they just can’t compete with your average English pub, which has been serving “fine Ales, Stouts and Porter” since before Able Tasman got sent packing by some Maori in Golden Bay. For example, this lovely pub below, currently ‘the Garrick’ in Stratford-upon-Avon, dates to at least 1594, and I’d bet my codpiece Shakespeare had a few pints here.

Actually, our first stop in England was Canterbury in County Kent. We had wanted to see the famous Cathedral, but it was closed this day for the ordination of a priest. Imagine that! Bastards…anyway we consoled ourselves with some local beer. You may have heard of Kent before.

Hops have a long history in Britain and one of the first places they were established was Kent. During the Hundred Years War (1336-1453) Flemish farmers fled their homeland seeking to escape the fighting. Many ended their journey in Southeastern England in the region of Kent. It is generally believed that these farmers introduced the first hops to the area and by the mid 1500s hop cultivation was well established. The Golding hop varieties all are descendants of an ancestral Old Golding, which was a descendant of the semi-wild Canterbury Whitebine. The Old Golding variety came about much like English Fuggles; an accidental discovery in someone’s garden. In this case, it was a Mr. Golding, (there seems no hard evidence of his first name) who lived in West Kent. According to William Marshall’s book The Rural Economy of the Southern Countries, “(1790) Mr. Golding of the Malling quarter of the district; who observing, in his grounds, a hill of extraordinary quality and productiveness, marked it, propagated from it, and furnished his neighbours with cuttings, from its produce.” So, Goldings were probably being grown in East Kent possibly even before 1790, but it was not until 1838 that it was sold as “East Kent produce.” A name given to distinguish it from the, thought to be, lower quality hops grown near Maidstone in Mid-Kent. East Kent Goldings have long been celebrated, held up as one of the quintessential English hop varieties. In 2013, East Kent Golding hops were given protected designation of origin. This means that any hop using the name East Kent Golding must have been grown and processed within the relatively small area of East Kent. Shepherd Neame is an English independent brewery founded in 1698 in Faversham, Kent, and family-owned since 1864. (Plagiarised from Wikipedia)

Despite the build up, this proved to be a rather dull beer. Style 17A British Strong Ale. The aroma lacks any complexity, either of malt or hops. The brewing sugars increase the alcohol but keep the body on the thin side. It is deceptively light and smooth and goes down more like a “session beer” despite its 6.5% abv. On the up side, there are some amazing draft ciders on tap overhere. More on that next time.