Tag Archives: Mick Harts Guide Bottled Beers Kaliningrad

Kanapinis Dark Beer in Kaliningrad How Good is It?

Craft, Imported and Specialty Beers: Kanapinis (dark)

Mick Hart’s difficult job of reviewing craft, imported and specialty beers in Kaliningrad

30 January 2024 ~ Kanapinis Dark in Kaliningrad How Good is It?

Leonard Cohen named his valedictory album You want it darker. Certainly, there were two periods in my own life when I wanted nothing more. The darkness of the two epochs were not exclusive to themselves, they commingled with each other, but the impulse to which they responded rose to prominence at separate times and the realm of human existence in which they dwelt could not be more distinct, or instinctively categorical, for one had to do with thought and feeling, the other with carnal desire.

As for the first, my predilections were helped not a little by the dulcet tones and soul-venting lyrics that Mr Cohen excelled in, but the inspirational spring that fed the river of melancholia arose from the deep and dark Romanticism of the celebrated American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The second instance I will leave unread, preferring for the moment to consign it to the incubation of your fetid and, I suspect, already bated penchant for perversion, and whilst you are trying to work it out, we will think of and also drink another outstanding beer, one that is dark but sweet not bitter.

Kanapinis Dark Lithuanian beer — **Kanapinis Dark, easier to drink than to say!**

The beer in question, and there is no question in my mind that in the land of beautiful beers it is the half-sister of Aphrodite (clue!), is the dark and dusky version of a Lithuanian beer whose unalloyed and succulent pleasures I sought to describe in my last review. I refer, of course, to that wonderful brew Kanapinis (light).

Kanapinis Dark in Kaliningrad How Good is It?

Santana Abraxas sang, “I’ve got a black magic woman” (clue!); Leslie Phillips, that smooth, saucy old English philanderer of the British silver screen, was forever forgetting the Black Tower (clue!) and forgetting to put his trousers on; the Rolling Stones told loyal fans they wanted to ‘paint it black’ (clue!); Deep Purple rocked ‘Black Night’ (clue!); Black Sabbath were black by name and also black by nature (clue!); and in the blackout during the war to numerous men-starved English women Americans came as Errol Flynn and left as Bertold Weisner (clue!).

Kanapinis dark is one of those brews that contains no additives. Water, caramel, barley malt, hops and beer yeast, that’s what’s in it. The brewers, Aukštaitijos Bravorai, have remained faithful to the traditional brewing method for many years, honouring the original recipe, open fermentation and a lengthy and assiduously monitored maturation process.

The Kanapinis siblings, the pale and the black, remind me of black and tan, not the one you can’t say in Ireland but the one you can make in a glass. They co-exist as though in the unification of innate quality, they are irredeemably colour blind, as though no one or the other vie to be thought of as anything more, and thought about together, as a lovely potable, quite inseparable, palate-tactile portable pair.

Beer review links:

[Butauty] [Kanapinis (light)]

Taking the top off a Kanapinis ~ and remember, Kanapinis has one of those lightning toggle tops otherwise known as a Quillfeldt after the excellent chap who invented it ~ the air apparent is aerosoled with a sweet and musky smell, an enticing natural blend infused with heady caramels subtly tinctured with flavoursome malts, and when the beer pours into the glass it does so with a rich, a prepossessing chocolate head, the sort of thing that would be hard to sip if you had recently taken to wearing an RAF moustache and had as yet to learn proficiency in how to manoeuvre it properly.

“Please excuse my presumption, sir, but do you possess a licence for that hairy thing above your top lip?”

Without a Freddie Mercury or anything of the like to impede your drinking progress, the frothing foam incurs no danger, and once you have taken the plunge and dived headlong right in there, having sampled (and thus pre-judging) the quality of its paler version, the first sip is exactly as you know it should be, and had no doubt it would be. It is as promising as it smells, as seductive in taste as it looks and as satisfying from fart to stinish as any beer that you’ve ever made love to, and you can’t say darker than that!

Kanapinis Dark in Kaliningrad How Good is It?

Frank Sinatra, I’m sure, would be monotoned pleased to hear you say that Kanapinis goes ‘all the way’. Still, there’s little to choose between the two sisters, as both are full-bodied brews, and if ever colour was not an issue, then here is the perfect example: Sup! Sup! Sup! Ahhh!

If I had to choose between light or dark, the choice would be a difficult one, but should you care to bank roll me to a bottle of the dark stuff, I would thankee most kindly, sir, and do my best to get stuck in.

Old beer drinkers never shrink (except on the worst occasions) when it comes to revealing their true colours.

BOX TICKER’S CORNER
Name of Beer: Kanapinis (Dark)
Brewer: Aukštaitijos Bravorai
Where it is brewed: Lithuania
Bottle capacity: 1litre
Strength: 5.3%
Price: It cost me about 288 roubles (£2.62)
Appearance: Dark and charcoally
Aroma: Musky malts and burnt caramel
Taste: Yum Yum
Fizz amplitude: 3/10
Label/Marketing: Pop Art/Cartoon
Would you buy it again? And again

Beer rating

About the beer: Aukštaitijos Bravorai | Kanapinis
The brewer’s website has this to say about Kanapinis dark:

“CANNABIS unfiltered dark beer: This beer is brewed using only natural ingredients ~ water, malt, hops and yeast. The combination of caramel malts used in the production of this beer gives this beer a rich ruby colour and a light burnt caramel bitterness.”

Brewer’s website: aukstaitijosbravorai.lt

Wot other’s say [Comments on Kanapinis (dark) beer from the internet, unedited]
😑Taste is close to aroma, but with harsh yeasty note.
[Comment: Yeasty note, yes; harsh, no]

😐Kanapinis Dark is, frankly, so-so. If you can still feel the taste in the first half of the sip, then there is practically nothing left of it.
[Comment: A man with a rather peculiar tongue!]

Butauty Beer in Kaliningrad How Good is It?

Craft, Imported and Specialty Beers: Butauty

Mick Hart’s difficult job of reviewing craft, imported and specialty beers in Kaliningrad

6 November 2023 ~ Butauty Beer in Kaliningrad How Good is It?

Quillfeldt! No, it’s not the name of a beer and neither is it a term of abuse. It is in fact the name of a gentleman, Charles de Quillfeldt, to be precise, the inventor of the ‘flip top’ or ‘lightening toggle’ bottle stopper, whose name is eponymous with his marvellous creation.

Qillfeldt’s bottle closure system consists of a hinged wire frame attached to a stopper which, being harnessed to the bottle neck, allows it to be removed and replaced with ease and relative swiftness. (Just the job in a thirst emergency.) Since the stopper is attached to the bottle, it is impossible to misplace it, enabling the bottle to be opened and closed at will, a thoughtful contraption and that’s a fact, although in my experience a quality bottled beer once opened will never have need to be sealed again.

Butauty Beer in Kaliningrad

Butauty beer, by Lithuanian brewers Vilniaus alus, has such a top, or should I say had, as recent information discloses, without revealing why, that production of this beer has ceased. That being noted, however, as recently as last week I discovered a shelf full of Butauty in one of Kaliningrad’s Victoria supermarkets, so either someone is telling porkies, or the beer displayed is remnant stock.

Nevertheless, as I drank it, liked it and also made notes about it back in 2022, I shall now proceed to review it, even if it has become just an affectionate bittersweet memory.

It isn’t, not bittersweet that is. It has a slightly bitter twang, but overlaying that a predominantly burnt, smoky, caramel flavour, slightly aromatic, one might even venture to say subtly aromatic, with a deep and generous peaty aroma.

When my Quillfeldt flew off, a bit like my toupee did last summer, as I was racing along in an open-topped car, the aroma genie popped out as if it was old Jack from his box, and started into shouting up my nostrils, “Get a load of this! It’s deep and richly peaty!”

And isn’t it just the truth.

Butauty Beer in Kaliningrad

In the bottle, the beer looks as black as your hat, or most parts of South London, but once you’ve outed it into your glass, it could be any one or other of fifty shades of grey.

Butauty gives good head, the sort of rich, frothing, foaming head that they used to like up North in England before the Daleks invaded the area and everything went south ~ although it didn’t help them any. But like a lot of endangered English traditions, the head shows little resolve. It fizzles, farts and splutters and by the time you’ve come back with your crisps, it’s as shockingly gone as a case of white flight.

I, personally and in particular, have never cared much for a big creamy head. As far as I am concerned, beer can be as flat as a triple ‘A’, as long as it retains its zest and unique flavour. There’s nothing much flat that I can’t handle, although I don’t care much for the Fens. Mind you, with its rich peaty smell and Fen-like hue, Butauty beer, at 5.5%, has an earthiness about it that would fable well in the Cambridgeshire Badlands, ‘Ay up, and Jip Oh!’, except, of course, it hails ~ or did hail ~ from Lithuanian brewers, Vilniaus alas ~ sorry Vilniaus alus (with a four-letter word like ‘alus’, it could have been far worse!).

Among Butauty’s internet reviews, many are rather scathing. I just don’t get it (You’re not the only one! Have you any suggestions?). And, if what is written is not a black lie, and the beer is no longer produced, no one will be getting it.

I, for one, and some others I imagine, can honestly say that I like this beer. It smells like good beer should smell and is right tasty, I’ll tell you that!

Should the rumour of its demise be credible, it will indeed be a sorry day for beer connoisseurs wherever they are, and yet we must take heart, for there is consolation in everything: as Bogart once famously said, “We’ll always have Quillfeldt.”

BOX TICKER’S CORNER
Name of Beer: Butauty
Brewer: Vilniaus alus
Where it is brewed: Vilnius, Lithuania
Bottle capacity: 1litre
Strength: 5.5%
Price: It cost me about 280 roubles [in 2022] [Note: recent supermarket price is 490 roubles, £4.30]
Appearance: Dark
Aroma: Caramel and peat
Taste: Complex taste of all things dark and beautiful
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: Olde Worlde Parchment
Would you buy it again? If they ever start producing it again, anytime

BEER RATING:

About the brewery: Vilniaus alus
Vilniaus alus’s claim to fame is that it is the only brewery of beer and natural drinks in Vilnius. The brewery is proud to assert that no chemical additives are used in their beers, guaranteeing quality products wholesome in natural ingredients. Both bottled and draft beers are produced, and the company exports to Europe and to the USA.
Vilniaus alus

Wot other’s say [Comments on Butauty from the internet, unedited]
😊Caramel bitterness, like a pleasant surprise, Doesn’t taste bitter, but pleases with its taste, like a little whim

😒Butter, caramel, diacetyl. Powdery mouthfeel. Nutty with a bitter note. But destroyed by rancid butter.

🙂 Good chocolate stout

😮Lithuanian Shit! [I say! Steady on!]

The right connections
Cultura Kaliningrad ~ a world-wide beer bonanza
Variety of beer in Kaliningrad

Cultura Kaliningrad a World-Wide Beer Bonanza!

Cultura Bottle Shop in Kaliningrad

10 August 2023 ~ Cultura Kaliningrad a World-Wide Beer Bonanza!

The beer reviews that I have written to my blog number in the region of twenty five. That I have managed to fit these in between drinking beer is astonishing, but somehow they have taken shape. In these reviews I have dealt exclusively with beers sold through supermarkets, predominantly in PET bottles in regulated volumes of 1.35 to 1.5 litres, but the fact that I have homed in on this category of beer does not mean that during the course of my beer-drinking lifestyle, I have not permitted myself the pleasure of quaffing offerings of a more specialised nature, beers which by their craft or import status are generally considered more exotic and, as a consequence, more expensive.

Thus, in addition to my reviews of the best and the worst of Kaliningrad’s ‘run of the mill’ bottled beer, I give you fair warning that I am now about to embark on the no less difficult appraisal of craft and speciality imported beers.

As in my last series of highly professional and sensible reviews, it is my intention to stick to beers purchased through supermarkets and/or specialist beer-selling outlets, in other words from what we call in England off-sales rather than licensed premises, such as bars, cafes, restaurants and hotels or, to be more precise, beers sold in bottles as distinct from barrel-stored, tap-dispensed beverages.

Whilst supermarkets and smaller shops in Kaliningrad may stock one or two more exotic brands of beers supplementary to their standard fare, such commodities are typically to be found in greater abundance and choice in specialist retail outlets. A number of such establishments abound in Kaliningrad, but one of the best by virtue of its diverse selection and quality has to be Cultura.

Cultura Kaliningrad

Cultura’s pedigree is accredited by discerning beer-buying and drinking afficionados, whose approving comments feature regularly on various beer-tickers’ websites.

Cultura is situated on one of Kaliningrad’s busy city thoroughfares, Prospekt Mira. As with many other shops in Kaliningrad, it is located on the ground floor of a three or four storey block of flats, whose size and scale dwarfs its presence and understates its potential. Indeed, if it wasn’t for the fact that seasoned beer drinkers are like seasoned hunters — they have a nose for their quarry — the shop and its myriad delights could easily be passed by. True, the Russian word for beer (peeva) is large enough not to be missed, but the back-to-basics look, which may or may not be designer inspirited, is a little too convincing when viewed against the backdrop of the tired old flats in which it is framed. However, first impressions can be deceptive, and don’t we drinkers know it, and any misgivings and apprehensions that may be unjustly inferred are swept away immediately once you have wassailed inside.

In fact, once inside Cultura one’s senses positively reel! The shop has an awful lot of beer, an awesome lot of different beers, and even after closing your eyes, opening them again, rubbing them and pinching yourself, the notion that you might have died and gone to beer-shop heaven is delightfully ineffaceable.

Cultura Kaliningrad

I am not much of a traveller, so Cultura is my compensation. Its beers, sourced from around the world, enable me to globe trot at will. I can be in Germany one minute and Belgium the next. I can even be back in Great Britain, no passport or visa required, all that is needed is cash and in the globalist era of touch-card technology even that is not an impediment ~ or so they would have us believe!

Cultura is like a library, and whilst not all drinkers are readers and not all readers are drinkers, who could resist working their way through the legion of beer-bottle labels that line Cultura’s shelves. Volumes and volumes of labels and each label speaking volumes; talk about spoilt for choice! Where on earth does one start?

A good starting point could be strength, country of origin, dark beer or hoppy light, bottle size and cost. Alternatively, you could invite your curiosity to take you where it will, which is more or less the path that I took. As I travelled around the world in my own inimitable way, marvelling at the exhibits, as unique and individual as anything in an art gallery, price became a factor, albeit a not defining one, in the process of selection.

Mick Hart samples Kaliningrad imported beers

Above: Mick Hart in Cultura: one photo was taken during the Plandemic; the other later. Bet you can’t guess which is which?!

Translating roubles into pounds based on the exchange rate on any given day is never easy; performing the calculation as an aid to purchasing beer is analogous to acrobatics, and whilst it may not, and often does not, provide the safety net you hope it will, price variations in Cultura are sufficiently dramatic to make falling back on this methodology an imperfect reassurance.

On my first visit to Cultura at the height of the Plandemic in November 2021, the exchange rate was such that it allowed me to cut some slack, and I was not particularly concerned about paying 350 to 400 roubles for a litre bottle of beer (then about £4.50) even though in those days the average price for a 1.5 litre bottle available from supermarkets was under £1.50. “Treat yourself!” I thought, and so I did.

Come 2023, however, I was less complacent. This was the time when the rouble was billed as the ‘best performing currency in the world’, thanks to the fiscal measures taken to equalise the impact of western sanctions. The resultant disparity in the price and value of craft and imported beers had me effectively sanction myself. Unlike the big sanctions, however, whose efficacy are questionable, my little, private sanctions were not so ill conceived that they would come back later to bite my arse; they were modest in proportion and tenable in their application, working on the kind of budget that the Bank of England can only dream of. Even so, speciality beers, particularly imported ones, have always come with a higher price tag wherever you might be domiciled, and those in Cultura are no exception. I will leave you to decide whether or not you would be prepared to pay £15 or more for a litre bottle of beer.

“Ay up, mother, I think it’s off to the working man’s club!” (Note: Working Men’s Clubs are no longer permissible in British society: (a) because we no longer have a ‘working class’ and Benefit Class does not sound near as 21^st century as politicians would like, and (b) to have a man’s club or a man’s thing of any kind in the UK is impermissible under the ‘Everyone has to be Queer Act’ [source: Winky’s Guide to British Law by N.O. Balls])

That having been said, and I am sorry that it has been, but things do have a habit of popping out (when you least expect them to) [source When I Was Young by Y. Fronts], the price range in Cultura is flexible enough to ease the stays on your wallet without making you walk lop-sided. And once everything is paid for, it all fits snugly in a nice paper bag.

There are red flags and red lights: one is to a bull which the other is to need, and there are green lights that mean Go. Which is why I went to Cultura. No one should court seduction until it becomes a vice, but every once in a while passion needs an outing. Remember the words that your maiden aunt should have listened to but didn’t: ‘a little of what you fancy does you good!’

Cultura has a lot of that little and plenty more besides. You won’t be sorry you went there!

More beer delights in Kaliningrad
The London Pub
Sir Francis Drake
Four great Kaliningrad bars
Dreadnought

The main thing

Cultura Bottle Shop
Prospekt Mira, 46-48, Kaliningrad, Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, 236022
Tel: +7 911 860-78-50

Opening times
Fri & Sat 11am to 1pm
Sun to Thurs 11am to 10pm

Website
https://vk.com/culturabottleshop/

An Art to Brew Beer in Kaliningrad

An art to drinking beer in Kaliningrad

28 April 2023 ~ An Art to Brew Beer in Kaliningrad

Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)

Article 25: An Art to Brew

I bought this beer for two reasons: one, I liked the label; and two, I liked the dumpy bottle with a carrying handle attached to the top.

In order of attraction, the label appealed to me because it appeared to me to be something to do with steampunk. At the time I hadn’t got my glasses on and at the time I was more interested in getting something into a glass, preferably something called beer, and drinking it.

The steampunk allusion, which was also an illusion, was purely provided by pipework. It could have been a pipedream, after all steampunk is still a relatively young person’s predilection, but even without glasses and in my ardent desire to fill one, I could make out something that was illustrative of line-drawn plumbing, which was good enough for me.

The shape of the bottle with its plastic swing-tilt handle has two strings to its bow: novelty is never dull, and handles are good for carrying things with. So, I picked the bottle up by its handle, paid for it at checkout and out of the shop I went, all steampunked-up and ready to go.

At home, tucked away in my ‘never to grow up’ drinking den, my wife cleared up any pretensions I may have fostered about the nature of the illustrated label and also assisted me in interpreting what I was having trouble with: surely this beer that I had just bought whilst in a steampunking mood and carried home with the help of a novelty handle could really not be called ‘The Art of Brewing Czech Bar’?

Good Heavens! Whatever Next?

That’s easy. Next was getting it out of the bottle, into the glass and drinking it.

At last, it was where it should be. But first the aroma.

The beer had a bitter, hoppy smell, and I liked it.

I put my glasses on and looked at the glass. It was in there, alright, and it was giving me the three ‘Cs’: Crisp, Clear and Clean. It had poured with a big head but, being a modest kind of beer, became less big headed as each second past until effectively self-effacing itself.

The first taste proved to be not as bitter as I thought it would be. You could say that it erred more on the soft and mellow side ~ and that’s exactly what I am saying.

No one that I know of has ever ridiculed themselves by calling me a sweet man, either behind my back or in front of it, and I am not about to make the same mistake with this beer. What was sweet about it was that it was dry, not as old boots but pleasantly dry: it was the Hush Puppies of the 2020s, which is not as daft as you sound, at least not when you marry the concept to its leading attributes, which are, as I have noted, soft and mellow.

Are you familiar with the word ‘lacing’? No? Well, you haven’t read enough typically serious beer reviews, have you! But what the cliché doesn’t know the heart won’t grieve about, so we will have no more nonsense where that is concerned. And who cares anyway, if the foam from the beer sticks to the glass or not?

What is more significant is that the dry initial taste travels successfully through the finish and as for the aftertaste it is continuity all the way.

Let’s hear it from the brewers

“Beer varieties brewed under the Art of Brewing brand have a noble taste. [It is a] Golden lager, brewed according to the classic Czech recipe. [Its] bitter richness and pleasant sharpness in taste is achieved through the use of a special combination of hop varieties during brewing.”
The Brewers

Those nice chaps from the Trehsosensky Brewery are not not to be believed. In fact, having sampled other brews in their stable (What is the strangest place where you have drunk beer?) my verdict is that there is absolutely nothing deceitful, underhand or horrifyingly globalist in what the brewers have to say.

An Art to Brew Beer in Kaliningrad

I’ve read reviews about this beer which, although not exactly scathing, have taken a begrudging stance, implying that it is passable but dull. I do not agree. An Art to Brew Czech Bar stands head and shoulders above mediocrity and, whilst it may never take the crown from beers acknowledged universally to have travelled every road of excellence and made it to illustrious, it has enough going for it in singular taste and quality to nudge it around the bend into the aspirant class. Doubt what you hear? That’s odd, because I am typing this, not talking to you, but now I can tell you straight, you should road test one today!

😀TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: An Art to Brew Czech Bar
Brewer: Trehsosensky Brewery
Where it is brewed: Ulyanovsk, Russia
Bottle capacity: 1.3 litres
Strength: 4.9%
Price: It cost me about 137 roubles (£1.50) [at time of writing!]
Appearance: Golden
Aroma: Bitter and hoppy
Taste: Dry, mellow with a delightful hint of bitterness
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: Intriguing
Would you buy it again? Anytime
Marks out of 10: 8

*Note that the beers that feature in this review series only include bottled beer types that are routinely sold through supermarket outlets and in no way reflect the variety of beer and/or quality available in Kaliningrad from speciality outlets and/or through bars and restaurants.

Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

Bull-headed whilst drinking Taurus

11 March 2023 ~ Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)

Article 24: Taurus

Oh, come on! Even those of you who are far too rational to have any truck with mystic nonsense know that Taurus is an astrological sign and, for what it’s worth, the second astrological sign in the modern zodiac. No, not the Ford Zodiac. Who remembers those long bench seats and that tricky column gear stick?!

The zodiac sign for Taurus is the bull. Zodiac people are said to be hard-headed, down-to-earth, tenacious, reliable, loyal, and sensual. I wonder if the latter quality is why so many wear the cuckold’s horns?

Reviewing Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

So, this beer that I am reviewing today, this pilsner, is named after the second sign of the zodiac. It has a bull’s head on the label, so it must be so, but we won’t know if the label stands for zodiac sign or something else until we attempt to drink it. Well, they ~ the brewers and distributors ~ are hardly likely to adorn the bottle with a hefty pile of bull droppings, are they?

Now, I’m not a pilsner man … blah … blah … blah …. Yes, you’ve heard it all before, but that does not mean that I am not afraid to try it. I once tried a liberal girlfriend. At least, I think she was a girl? Maybe, she was a feminist.

There are some out there who say yes, but … and they don’t get any further because they are drinking a good strong ale, but others say a pilsner is a pilsner is a pilsner, and most of them are me. But what the tongue doesn’t taste the tum can’t grieve about, so whilst you can’t teach your grandmother to suck eggs (why would she want to?), you can occasionally, on a hot afternoon, get a real-ale drinker to forget his religion and sip an ice-cold lager.

And if that lager is pilsner, make sure that it is ice cold, or it could taste like the bull I am hoping this pilsner will not be.

Mick Hart reviews Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

So, off we go with the top and up to the nostrils: ‘Dull, sour smell’ ~ make a note of that.

I pour it into the glass, and it looks light. I am relieved about that; don’t want to be asking, what did you do with the water that you washed the bull’s hind quarters with?

I sip it; I taste it; I swig it: Dull metallic taste. “Just as I thought, Watson!”

“Well, you silly bugger Holmes, why on earth did you buy it?”

“Why, because I have this ‘Year of the Bull’ tea towel, which I knew would make for a very interesting photograph even if the bull’s head attachment makes it a very inconvenient tea towel.”

“What a load of bullocks!” In the farmer’s field opposite. {Watson is looking out of the window into the farmer’s field opposite.}

The strength of the beer is not OTT. It weighs in at a very respectable 4.6%, which in the hereabouts, Kaliningrad, would be seen as lightweight but in the UK regarded as A-OK. For example, a matador could drink it and still not be incapable of waving his little red handkerchief.

As with many lagers, iced over from the fridge as if imported from a Siberian winter, pilsner is nothing to do with taste but all to do with coldness and getting it down your throat, hence the expression ‘Lager Louts’. Obviously, no regard for taste and quality equals no regard for decorum.

Drinking Taurus Beer in Kaliningrad

Some pilsner lagers evade the spell checker and by the time you have finished drinking them, let alone writing about them, they have turned into something else. I am relieved to say, however, that Taurus does qualify as a pilsner, not a pisner. It has all the ~ we won’t say qualities, but we will allow ourselves to use the word usefulness ~ of an alcoholic drink that comes in handy on a hot sweaty day.

And that was the penultimate sentence, which leaves you wondering how exactly, given the Taurus-bull connection, I resisted including a word like bullshit.

😀TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: Taurus
Brewer: Kalnapilis Brewery
Where it is brewed: Panevėžys, Lithuania
Bottle capacity: 1 litre
Strength: 4.6%
Price: It cost me about 127 roubles (£1.38) [at time of writing!]
Appearance: Light
Aroma: Dull, sour
Taste: Typical pilsner
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: A load of bull
Would you buy it again? Hmm, debateable …
Marks out of 10: 4.5

Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad

Some call it Nemetskoe of Bochkarev; I say euk!

Published: 10 February 2023 ~ Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad

Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)

Article 23: Hemeukoe Pils

Illustrations of classical architecture attempting to convey the innate quality and time-honoured grandeur that we associate with ancient Rome, together with heraldic symbols are not necessarily the certified hallmark of either a good or barely drinkable beer that we might be beguiled into thinking it is. And thus, we have a case in point: Hemeukoe Pils.

The packaging of Hemeukoe (Nemetskoe) Pils reminds me of a house I know in Northamptonshire made singularly unmissable by a pair of concrete horse’s heads squatting on its gate posts. Are such embellishments an admission of, or indeed an admission to, the aristocracy of quality? No, and they never have been. But from their ostentatiousness you do get a whiff of something else.

That whiff, once the top has been removed from the Hemeukoe Pils’ bottle, reminds me of a lot of things, none of which belongs to beer. I am not going to tell you what it is exactly, because exactly doesn’t come into it, but try to imagine something pungent strained through a pair of unwashed gym shorts.

Urban gentlemen of the road, those who doss down on the forecourts of London’s mainline stations, could feasibly conclude that the smell is not unlike that damp sheet of cardboard they rescued from Asda’s bin last month and on which they have slept every night since.

The smell improves in the glass but doesn’t become a bouquet of roses. It is rather like opening the window of a sleep-in-late hormonal teenager’s bedroom. And that’s as good as it gets.

Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad

It does say ‘Pils’ on the bottle, but very soon I got to thinking that perhaps they spelt it wrong, when what they intended to print was not exactly ‘Pils’ but ‘Really Peculiar’.

Ambiguity in the smell was repeated in the colour. At arms length, it looked yellow and slightly hazy in the glass, but on closer inspection neither here nor there nor even anywhere. It was as it was and what that was, was strictly not what I thought it would be: Pils.

The colour was like nothing I had ever seen; the taste like nothing I have ever tasted, wished I hadn’t and would never want to again. In both respects, it even excelled the Baltika 3 taste problem. And that ~ as The Velvelettes once warbled ~ is ‘really saying something’!

Sweet and buttery with a chemical twist, the latter usurping the former and occupying the aftertaste like 1940s’ Germans in Paris, this was my first taste of Hemeukoe Pils; was it trying to tell me something?

For a moment I thought that this something had something to do with identity and was something to do with Kvas, but before I could completely trash the dynastic reputation of a soft drink which in Russia is regarded as a national institution, the taste had turned to strong, rank tea, heavy on the tannin.

Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad

Whatever you may say about its taste, there is a lot going on in Hemeukoe. It is just not going on in a very complementary or remotely satisfactory way.

There is an ascending scale of sourness in the aftertaste, which in its unexceptional way hangs on the back of your throat and leaves you wondering, anxiously, whether come the morrow, you will still be on good terms with your digestive system and bowels.

Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad is not good

It was late at night when I was drinking Hemeukoe. It was the only beer that I had in the house, so even had I spotted the clue secreted in its name ~ Hemeukoe ~ the anagram would not have, could not have, saved me from indulging in what was without exaggeration quite simply the most appalling brew I have ever had the misfortune to sabotage my vitals with, and one which I ardently hope I will never experience again.

I am tempted to say that you could do worse if offered a glass of this than to politely refuse and remain an onlooker. Never mind the prejudiced cliché that innocent bystanders always get hurt, refusing to drink Hemeukoe Pils might well just prove to be the exception to the rule.

A friend of mine who considers himself to be something of an expert where beer is concerned disputes the taxonomy of Hemeukoe Pils, claiming that HP is not so much a beer as an alcoholic infusion, and it is this that makes it taste like nothing on Earth and more like something imported from the planets Heavy and Oily.

Even without empirical evidence I might be inclined to agree, but I was busy jotting the name of the beer onto a piece of paper and committing it to memory in order to ensure that even if my life depended on it, I would never make the mistake of buying Hemeukoe Pils again.

TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: Hemeukoe Pils (Nemetskoe ot Bochkarev
(German from Bochkarev)
Brewer: Heineken
Where it is brewed: Saint Petersburg
Bottle capacity: 1.35 litre
Strength: 4.7%
Price: It cost me about 137 roubles (£1.54) [at time of writing!]
Appearance: A washy brown colour
Aroma: It doesn’t smell like beer
Taste: It doesn’t taste like beer
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: Bold to the point of misleading
Would you buy it again? Read the review!
Marks out of 10: 2

Bochkarev British Amber Beer in Kaliningrad

**Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)**

Published: 31 August 2022 ~ Bochkarev British Amber Beer in Kaliningrad

Article 22: Bochkarev British Amber

My wife bought this beer for me.

“What have I done to deserve this?” I asked.

Then, when I had drunk it, I asked the same question: “What have I done to deserve this?” ~ but in a different tone.

The important thing is that we wouldn’t be allowed to drink it in the UK, at least not unless we wrapped the bottle in a flag of a different country, as the Union Jack has been radicalised by oversensitive ethnics operating under the auspices of liberal-left self-culture loathers.

Recalling how racist it was to fly the national flag during the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, I wasted no time in removing the cap from the bottle, took a quick whiff, made a couple of notes, decanted it into my beer glass and hid the bottle behind a nearby chair. And then I remembered that I was not in the UK but drinking beer in Russia, where, oddly enough, nobody seemed to mind if my bottle displayed a Union Jack or not.

I must say that whenever I see bottled beers which are flag- or otherwise-affiliated with countries of distant origin, particularly western countries and more specifically England, I tend to avoid them or, failing that, buy them out of curiosity but rarely make the mistake again.

Thus, I remind you that it was not I who purchased this ‘anglicised’ beer, but my wife. Not that I am complaining: Wives who buy husbands beer are why they are wives in the first place, not left on the shelf like Watneys; they exhibit a finely tuned awareness of the status quo and a responsibility to it that makes anything, even anything vaguely feministic, almost acceptable and often excusable. But as redeemable as such commendable actions are, what wives don’t know about beers you couldn’t fit into Biden’s mind, so let that be an end to the matter.

Relying on the same nose that I was born with, rather than a sex-changed appendage, whilst making allowances for its toxic masculinity, it had me know that the Beer that I was smelling was a hoppy thing overly mixed with blackberries and infused with the essence of Vimto.

The mixture poured into the glass rapidly. I was thirsty. It gave a froth and then quickly took it back again, like a present I didn’t deserve, and what was left on the sides of the glass couldn’t be bothered to stay.

The first sip was like thrusting your head into a mixed bag of fruit in search of hops ~ “Come out with your hops up, we know you’re in there!” And sure enough, after some coaxing the hops came out, yet not with a white but purple flag. Can you drink a colour? The chemical fruit intensifies as it descends in the gullet, yet although the hue is a faint light amber your mind is fixed on purple. I believe it’s what’s called a trick of the light.

Bochkarev British Amber Beer in Kaliningrad

At a very sensible 4.3% OG, alcohol content can play no part in delivering the firm impression that you are consuming a very sweet energy drink packed with glucose and fructose or that, whilst you were looking the other way in search of a real beer, someone snuck up behind you and stuck a stick of rock in your glass. Similar things can happen, I’m told, if you turn your back in Brighton.

With this exception noted, I have to say that Bochkarev British Amber is possibly the most unBritish beer that I have ever tasted, and if this is Heineken at its best then thank the lord that they have Fd off from Russia (ie, Finally decided to go).

I do not pretend to speak for everyone, since your taste is probably different to mine and mine is probably better. Nevertheless, Bochkarev British Amber could explain why certain Russian celebrities took European holidays at the coincidental times that they did and that when Heineken took a similar holiday they returned to the safety of a decent beer. Like the death of Freddie Mills in 1960s’ London, Bochkarev British Amber ~ what it is made of, why they bother to stew it and why they call it British ~ may forever remain a mystery.

😁TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: Bochkarev British Amber
Brewer: Heineken Brewery
Where it is brewed: St Petersburg
Bottle capacity: 1.35 litre
Strength: 4.3%
Price: It cost me about 187 roubles (£2.53 pence) [at time of writing!]
Appearance: A shade amberish
Aroma: It doesn’t smell like beer
Taste: It doesn’t taste like beer
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: Counterfeit British
Would you buy it again? No
Marks out of 10: 2

Cesky Kabancek Beer in Kaliningrad

**Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)**

Published: 5 August 2022 ~ Cesky Kabancek Beer in Kaliningrad

Article 21: Cesky Kabancek (Czech Boar)

Before we start, take a look at the photograph that follows.

I know what you’re thinking. Well, that’s a rum way to introduce a post that purports to be a beer review. But what do you see on the table, apart from that lovely old biscuit tin from England? You see a bar of chocolate, two sachets of meaty cat food, two packets of crunchy cat biscuits, a 1000 rouble note and a pile of medications. My wife, olga, left these for me before setting off for a weekend at the dacha, knowing that in her absence I would be sedulously embarking upon another rigorous research project into the variegated world of beer tastes and qualities. The contents of the table represent a weekend’s survival kit. Not that I was about to sit down with a beer and two plates of cat’s grub. I’m odd like this: I much prefer peanuts, olives and cheese myself, but the moggy needs his food as much as I need my beer. He also likes the odd piece of chocolate. He’s a most extraordinary cat: a ginger version of Tomcat Murr.

The 1000 rouble note would eventually be exchanged for a beer from the local supermarket, along with carefully selected not-for-cats snacks and as for the Gaviscon and Omeprazole, well I should think they are self-explanatory.

The beer that was given to me in exchange for that piece of paper with the figure 1000 printed across it, comes wrapped in a brown paper bag. The bottle within the bag has no commercial label, just one describing the contents, where the beer is made, who it is who makes it and other official trading stuff. All this is written on a small, plain label and in print the size of a pin head, so once the bottle is out of the bag, without the aid of a microscope, you won’t know what you’re drinking.

The bag says it all, however, and in a rather cute and attractive way.

Working purely from presentation, initially I could not make up my mind whether this beer fitted comfortably into my ‘bog standard beers from supermarkets’ category or whether it should be included in a new series on which I am currently ‘working’ (ah, hem) titled craft and speciality beers.

Eventually, and rapidly, pressured by the desire to sup not think, I decided to go ahead and review it within the beers purveyed through supermarkets’ category, justifying my verdict on the grounds that since it was bought in such an establishment who could argue otherwise.

However, not wanting to expose myself for the guzzler that I am, before whipping the top off and splashing the beer eagerly into my glass, I took a calculated moment to observe the packaging ~ sort of thoughtfully like ~ as if by doing so I would exculpate myself from all and any accusations of being nothing more than a beer-swilling lush.

Ye of little faith might consider my brief excursion into the world of packaging to be nothing more than a rather crude and obvious workaround, but the benefit of the doubt seems to lie in my favour. At least I am inclined to think so. Why else would I linger lovingly at the sight of a pig with a snarled snout and two curling tusks when I could be getting it down my neck? I believe that this particular method of beer drinking, of ‘getting it down one’s neck’, is reserved for the benefit classes (formerly working class) who populate Northern England, some perilously close to Haggis country where goodness knows where they ‘get it’, possibly up their kilts!

But of tartans and tarts there were none. The brown bag into which the bottle is dunked has a big-toothed porker (Does she come from Rushden? Check for tats!) standing proudly above a foaming tankard of beer (I suppose she must.) beneath which is written ‘Live’ ‘Nonfiltered’. This tells you that the beer is made from natural substances with no additional additives and/or preservatives, which also tells you that it has a lower shelf-life threshold than its filtered counterparts, so you’d better get it down you, one way or another, as swiftly as you can.

Above: It’s worth buying the beer for the packaging!

I’d looked at the bag for long enough (Am I still in Rushden?) Now it was time to dispose of the beer.

For this purpose, I selected one of the Soviet tankards given to me by Stas, which once occupied the little drinks cabinet in Victor Ryabinin’s Studio. Beer and sentiment go well together.

The first whiff of Cesky Kabancek does not go against the grain, but it is definitely and robustly grainy. It smells like a brew with tusks, but with an OG of 4.4%, which is pretty tender in this here drinking neck of the woods (Get it down your neck!), the aroma belies the alcohol content. Intermingled with the boar musk, subtle scents of an aromatic nature rise but struggle to the surface adding a touch of Je ne sais quoi. But who cares what it smells like when you are showing off in French?

Cesky pours into the glass in a light ambered way and because it is unfiltered, it is naturally hazy. After a couple of bottles most beers look hazy; after seven so is everything else.

“Excuse me, do you have the time?”

“For what?”

“I mean the time!” pointing at my watch.

“Yes, I do thanks.” Relenting and looking at watch: “It’s seven pints past sobriety …”

As a beer connoisseur, not a lager lout, I would only be drinking one litre of Cesky, and after another would call it a night. Or anything anybody wants me to.

I said, before everything went silly, that on taking the top off the bottle the beer had thrown a grainy aroma, which was no word of a lie, but the taste had a lot more going for it. It was fruity, zesty with a clean refreshing finish and a mellow aftertaste. It had palate appeal and, at 4.4% strength, recommended itself as a good session beer.

Nevertheless, if it is a real Czech beer that you are after or even expecting, Caveat Emptor!

Just because I was satisfied with it, does not mean that everybody, or even anybody else, shares the same opinion. Beer reviewers far more accomplished than myself appear to have ganged up on Cesky Kabancek and are telling the world via the internet that it is not all that one would want it to be.

First off, what is all this with Czech and boar! When did Czech and boar ever go together? You’ll be naming British beer Brit Mountain Goat from the Fens next! Thus, the consensus has it that Cesky Kabancek masquerades as Czech only insofar as the packaging allows. Once inside the bag, all you’ve got is a plain PET bottle and once inside the bottle you’ve got a ‘beer drink’ as distinct from beer. Why is this? Because the mix is said to contain ‘fragrant additives’ and has loosely attributed wheat beer characteristics.

For all this ~ what would you call it, skullduggery or effective marketing? ~ the brew is easy to drink, satisfying and has no definable flavour drawbacks or repercussive faults. And if I was not to tell you the truth, then I would be lying, for I consider Cesky Kabancek to be one of the better brands from Baltika Brewery that I have drunk so far.

As they say in beer-drinking circles, and even somewhere outside of them, there’s no accounting for taste!

😁TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: Cesky Kabancek
Brewer: Baltika Brewery
Where it is brewed: St Petersburg
Bottle capacity: 1litre
Strength: 4.4%
Price: It cost me about 187 roubles (£2.53 pence) [at time of writing!]
Appearance: Hazy amber
Aroma: I’m working on it!
Taste: A little bit of this and that
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: A convincing paper bag
Would you buy it again? It depends on the competition
Marks out of 10: 6

Lidskae Staryi Zamak Beer in Kaliningrad

**Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)**

Published: 30 June 2022 ~ Lidskae Staryi Zamak Beer in Kaliningrad

Article 20: Lidskae Staryi Zamak

Note: Many thanks to Mr … er, I think his name was Mr Sober, who wrote to inform me that the bottle photographs originally included in this post bore no connection whatsoever to the beer that I was writing about. What better recommendation for Lidskae Staryi Zamak beer could you ask for!

Needing an excuse to drink beer is not an affliction from which I personally suffer, but with all these articles in the UK media obsessing on the possibility of WWIII and nuclear strikes, I thought it would be prudent of me to take cover in my local shop and dodging incoming sanctions come out with a bottle of beer, or two.

Leonard Cohen named his valedictory album, You want it darker. But I didn’t. I was looking for a light beer, which is to say a light-in-colour beer. The strength was of no importance, but I did want something with taste.

Having enjoyed the Belarus-brewed beer Lidskae Aksamitnae, I opted to try the light version, Lidskae Staryi Zamak. If I had wanted a strong beer, I would not have been disappointed, as Staryi Zamak weighs in at an impressive 6.2%, which is higher in alcohol content than its ‘black as the ace of spades’ brother.

They tell me that this is a bottom fermenting beer, which could mean different things to different people, but for beer afficionados and brewing types, this information has important implications, which neither you nor I will dwell on because we are far too busy taking off the bottle top and smelling.

“Hello, is that Nose?”

“Hello, Nose here.”

“Tell me Nose, what do you detect?”

“Beer!”

“Yes, well, that’s a good start. Anything else?”

“It’s pungent …”

“Still talking about the beer?”

“Yes. No, wait a minute, it’s grainy; yes, definitely grainy. No, hold hard, its … it’s fragrant, a teeny-weeny bit fragrant … Oh, what a to do! It’s so hard to smell anything with the wokist stench of fear rising from Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter …”

“What’s that, Nose. You’re cracking up. Did you say musky or melon?”

“Bottom fermenting …”

“We’ve done that one. I know, what about all three?”

“Ay?”

“Pungent, grainy and fragrant?”

“If you like. But he’s still a transphobe!”

Hmm, must be a liberal-left nose.

We won’t ask liberal-left tongue about taste. It will be far too busy in the coming weeks now that Elon Musk is taking over Twatter.

Lidskae Staryi Zamak Beer

To recap: here we have a 6.2% pale-straw coloured, bottom-fermenting lager, with a pungent, grainy, fragrant liberal-left nose.

Moving on to taste, all these things are present (except the liberal left, thank heavens). Lidskae Staryi Zamak is an interesting blend of flavours, sweet and bitter at one and the same time but rhapsodically blended with no ragged edges. The finish is light and hoppy, although the aftertaste becomes, owing no doubt to the strength, substantial, not heavy exactly but mature and rounded ~ shaped largely like most women after they’ve gone through the menopause.

Corsets nice to drink with food, but have you noticed how irritating some beer reviewers can be in this respect? It’s all very well to say that this beer or that beer goes well with whole roasted peacock, stuffed venison and absent McDonald’s but unless you are Henry the Eighth such lightweight delicacies may not be at hand (which is especially true of McDonald’s). I’ll settle for saying that you won’t go far wrong with a big bag of nuts, a packet of flavoured crisps and a bowl of olives.

Lidskae Staryi Zamak, not to be confused with You Big Hairy Wassock, which is a beer that is drunk in the North of England whilst wearing a pigeon and fancying flat caps (latterly scarves more likely), is a good strong and full-bodied beer but not so overpowering that it does not possess the potential to bring out the best in good-flavoured foods and selected piquant snacks.

Lidskae Staryi Zamak Beer in Kaliningrad — Lidskae Staryi Zamak Beer

I like this beer as much if not more than I liked its black sister (or was that it’s black brother?), Lidskae Aksamitnae. I enjoyed it. It clung to the glass, as I did, and after a couple of bottles I also clung to the stair rail.

I was head over heels, with delight that is, which is a big improvement, I’m sure you’ll agree, on the alternative arse over head. And the overheads are by no means bad at 197 a bottle (we are talking payment in roubles, of course!).

😁TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: Lidskae Staryi Zamak
Brewer: Leedska piva
Where it is brewed: Lida, Belarus
Bottle capacity: 1.5 litre
Strength: 6.2%
Price: It cost me about 197 roubles (2.20 pence) [at time of writing!]
Appearance: Pale
Aroma: Subtle mix of grain and herbs
Taste: Full bodied, rounded
Fizz amplitude: 3/10
Label/Marketing: Traditional
Would you buy it again? I am quite sure I will
Marks out of 10: 8

OXOTA Beer in Kaliningrad

**Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)**

Published: 30 March 2022 ~ OXOTA Beer in Kaliningrad

Article 19: OXATA

I have often seen it, but I’ve never tried it, but when I saw a chap in front of me paying for two bottles of it at the local supermarket checkout, I decided that it was high time that I did. I’m talking about Ohota Krepkoye beer (OXOTA beer), a strong Russian beer from the Heineken Brewery* in St Petersburg with an OG of 8.1% and a label affirming real men, and now me, drink it.

The bottle looks as though its 1.5 litres, but when you check the small print you find that it is 0.15 litres short of the full 1.5. I know a lot of people like that.

The label tells you straight away that this is no namby-pamby, Nancy-boy brew. The bold shadow-highlighted 3-D typeface charges across the bottle against a deep red sash and above it is a man who has an awesome chest with a rifle slung over his shoulder. If you have ever harboured a secret desire to appear really incongruous, try carrying a bottle of this beer whilst attending a gay parade!

Before I had taken my first sip, I knew instinctively that this was the sort of beer that you could very easily get pissed on but not take the piss out of. Excuse my professional beer critic’s language.

The aroma struck me initially as though possessing a spicey, citrus twang, but, before decanting into my trusty Soviet glass, I paused a moment, a little affectedly I thought, took another whiff and changed my mind. It was now, I opined, decidedly sweet and disconcertingly antiseptic.

It poured into the glass with a disappointingly weak head which dissipated rapidly. Once out of the bottle, I was relieved to find that the clinical smell had gone, replaced and overpowered by the sweeter notes.

Not the dark, deep colour I had anticipated but a mid-amber, the beer had, I was surprised to find, not a rich sweet taste but a sweet tart taste laced with a touch of burnt charcoal.

OXOTA Beer in Kaliningrad

The quite glutinous finish gives way to a strong throaty aftertaste, which is not at all unpleasant, and, whilst you secretly wonder how it received a World Beer Award in the ‘Silver’ category, as the medallion on the front of the bottle signifies, there is no doubt in your mind, and also in your mouth, that the brew is persuasively moorish.

Affirmation that this is a real man’s drink is not backward in coming forward. I could feel my liver shrinking and my ego getting bigger with each successive sip.

The heady aftertaste taps into your long-term memory, summoning vague recollections of cautionless drinking sessions undertaken in the first flood of youth. How much of that memory would survive intact should you overdo an OXOTA session really does not bear thinking about.

One thing’s for certain, OXOTA is a good buy if you want to say goodbye and rather quickly to that irritating condition otherwise known as sobriety.

Footnote:🦶 I picked up the rumour from somewhere that the Heineken Brewery is one of those companies that virtue signalled their allegiance to the United States-led globalist war on Russia by buggering off. But take heart, Hart, I said. Buggering-off breweries mean a larger share of the market for those that are smart and don’t budge and a chance to expand and diversify for those that seize the initiative.😁

😁TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: OXOTA (Ohota Krepkoye)
Brewer: Heineken
Where it is brewed: St Petersburg
Bottle capacity: 1.35 litre
Strength: 8.1%
Price: It cost me about 137 roubles (1.06 pence)
Appearance: Mid-amber
Aroma: Predominantly sweet
Taste: Tart, not excessively sweet
Fizz amplitude: 3/10
Label/Marketing: A big strapper with a large rifle
Would you buy it again? If the need so takes me
Marks out of 10: 6