Beer that is not so good but not so bad either

[image image_id=”2218″ align=”left”] Today three of us went out for the [link2post id=”102″]best burger I have ever had at London’s best meat restaurant[/link2post]. After such heady heights two of us thought a beer was in order; we trekked past Spitalfields Market and finally found a boozer with seats and real ale on offer. Not just any old real ale, but Timothy Taylor’s Landlord.

I’ve [link2post id=”285″]blogged about this beer before, it is one of my very favourite Pale Ales. At its very best Landlord is a refreshing, lively beer of floral hoppiness and vibrant bitterness. However, like all real ales it is a fragile flower and needs to be treated with care and respect if top condition is going to be maintained. This boozer hadn’t quite taken enough care; to me it seemed a tad flat on the palate and there was some dirtiness to the nose. My drinking chum Peter thought I was being overly-critical, but then he often does.

That being said, it still had most of the desired complex hoppy aromas and even if it did lack a touch of life it was reasonably refreshing and easy to drink. It seems that some things are so lovely that even when they are not so good they can still be good enough.

I enjoyed our little trip to the boozer. Whenever I share a pint with someone civilised I recall a trip to an Oxford boozer many years ago. A lady of rather advanced years was sitting at a bench with a boy who must have been about five. Suddenly, the woman fixed the little boy with a look of serene tranquility and asked him, “There is nothing like spending the afternoon at the pub, is there?” The child’s answer, clearly derived from much experience, was a simple, “Oh yes granny!”.

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