This weekend, we found ourselves at the Southampton Arms in North London with one of the friends who introduced us to it not long after it opened.
Although it’s more-or-less his local, he actually isn’t remotely interested in beer. In lieu of Becks or Staropramen, he drinks Camden Helles, but under protest.
Nonetheless, he also dutifully tried every hoppy ale that we brought back to the table, screwing up his face in disgust at each one.
His verdict, at the end of the night, was damning. Where we’d detected elderflower, citrus, grape, and so on, he picked up only one thing.
“All these beers… all these weird beers you drink… they just smell of cheap hairspray!”
In a funny way, we know exactly what he means.
That’ll be the butane.
Or the hairspray we were huffing.
I’m heading to the Southampton in just over a week – excited!! What was on during your visit?
Dan — top tip: don’t go on a Friday or Saturday night!
They had Jarl (hooray, first time, loved it); Brodie’s Hoxton Special IPA (very impressive); Thornbridge Kipling; a couple from Summer Wine; a By the Horns Wheat Beer; Ballards Mild. Think that was it. No shortage of nice stuff to drink, at any rate.
If every pub on my crawl route has a selection like that (which I think is possible), then I’m going to be in trouble. How will I be able to try a reasonable sample?? It’s a very pleasant dilemma I suppose.
Can help to have a theme: all London beers, or all IPAs or something like that.
Superb pub – went there at the beginning of December. Excellent range of beers and broad clientele – particularly pleasing to see so many young people. I went on a Saturday afternoon and it was very busy, but not overcrowded, and I’ll certainly be heading there again.
It’s all these “tropical fruit” hop flavours people rave about, I’m guessing – I’ve never actually tasted them in any of the beers that are supposed to have them, but they sound highly offputting and un-beerish.
At least, I’d never tasted those flavours until this afternoon, when I tried Red Willow Sleepless (“American amber ale”). Red Willow are my current favourite brewery; I’ve not just enjoyed but raved about everything of theirs I’ve ever had. Until today. Sleepless is a big complex flavour, with a malty body and a big thud of old-school IPA bitterness… and tropical fruit. Sweet tropical fruit. I couldn’t get my head round it at all. By the bottom of the glass I was telling myself it was kind of like a pineapple version of Orval’s marmalade flavours, but it didn’t quite work.
I said something similar (but briefer) over at Dredge’s a while back, and he was genuinely baffled – “why wouldn’t you want to taste tropical fruit in beer?” Maybe it’s a generational thing.
Darren — Saturday afternoon is when we’ve been in the past and it’s perfect — buzzing, but not rammed. Saturday night was packed to the rafters. We’ve got a post brewing on whether the current boom is a trend or part of a more general change: lots of young people in, but many drinking wine, or trying to order Stella…
Phil — the first time we clocked tropical fruit flavours/aroma was in a German wheat beer (Distelhaueser, as it happens) where we were both struck by a big hit of pineapple, probably from yeast rather than hops in that case. We like it but we can see how it might not appeal. (Do you like tropical fruit more generally…?) Of course, on the flipside, there are now a few people complaining about dusty, earthy English hop flavours and aromas… horses for courses…
On ‘hairspray’, I guess there’s only a short leap from “flowery” to “perfumey” to “hairspray”, and Jarl was certainly flowery.
Happily, the Southampton is my local and, somehow, I always seem to manage to find a seat, no matter how busy it is. It’s a strange phenomenon (and one replicated in other pubs)! But, Dan, I’d echo the mild caution that it gets very busy on weekend evenings. Particularly around 10, when everyone is chucked out of the garden.
So if you want a vaguely quiet pint, I wouldn’t recommend visiting then. All evenings are pretty busy, though less so than Friday and Saturday. I love the buzz of the full pub and the fact that it’s so busy, with a frequently very diverse crowd, is really lovely to see. But my favourite times are lazy weekend afternoons and the end of the evening, close to last orders, when it’s calmed down a little and Julie London is on on the record player.
I lived a two minute walk away, in it’s former, frankly terrifying, incarnation. As soon as I move, it gets good. Which is mildly frustrating but probably also quite healthy. The fifteen minute walk means that I’m not tempted to live in there, just visit regularly.
It’s the sweetness I can’t handle – which is odd in a way, because I’m a huge fan of old ales and strong milds. But when there’s sweetness on top of those astringent, assertively bitter hop flavours (herbal, smoky, lemony, stale-beer-y*), that’s a combination that just tastes wrong.
*A while ago it seemed as if every Marble beer I tasted was off – there was an edge to the flavour, and especially the aroma, that reminded me of stale beer at best & vomit at worst. Then one day I went to a Meet the Brewer and met Dom, who had with him samples of the hops they were using – one of which smelt, to my nose, almost exactly like stale beer & vomit. Perhaps I need to recalibrate my nose.