A trip to our local Waitrose yielded a couple of interesting beers but primarily a brace of Goose Island IPAs as they were two for £3, an offer than no sane beer geek would refuse, so neither did I. The first one I sampled that night and I was, sadly, less than impressed. It seemed for all the world like an American version of an English IPA, a caramel malt and some marmalady hops with a hint of tropical fruit but not the hop punch that I expect from American IPAs. I put the other one on the beer shelf for this weekend. Last night it was my first beer and as enjoyable as it was the first time I didn't expect anything else. To my surprise this beer seemed to have more of the mango and grapefruit that I had expected, and was an altogether more interesting experience. I tend to keep my beers at room temperature and only chill them if, well, it seems like a good idea, so I can only conclude that six days rest at 18-20°C improves a bottle of Goose Island IPA that has travelled across the Atlantic, sat in a Waitrose distribution centre, travelled thence to Otley and then to my house. I may have drank it from a thistle glass instead of a straight half pint stem glass.

Could it be that increase in temperature? I suppose the bottles have been in a temperature controlled environment all the way from Chicago to Otley, and then they get put in our car and brought home. This is, I suppose, true of everything we buy in a supermarket, but where beer is concerned it seems to be more important than a lot of things. It makes me think that a lot of people don't get that flavour as the beer will have been shipped from brewery to bar, stored in a fridge and poured into a cold glass, and suddenly the hoppiness of a lot of American beers makes sense, so that they shine through that serving technique, and also the blandness of others as much of the time it doesn't matter.

We have it easier here: 'craft' brewing is recovering the ground lost from mass production. It's brought the handpulls back to life on the bar. It's found a better use for the risers. British brewers rarely seem to be precious about how to drink their beer. Some drinkers might beg to differ but it's their choice. I like to experiment, with my beer and the beer of others. It helps me understand how beer and its ingredients work after the dirty bit has been done and it's something that we don't do enough of.