Readily Available English Bitter?

Thanks for the explanation.

 

I’m the only one of my beer drinking friends who appreciates English beer. Been to England twice, with a 3rd trip coming next year, and will not drink anything but hand pump when I am there. English beer’s beauty is in its simplicity which is something many of the haze and pastry stout crazed folks this side of the pond don’t seem to appreciate.

 

So you turned 21 sometime between June and November of 2007 and joined this site?

 

Yes. I joined when I had been 21 for just 4 months.

My wife is 1.5 years older than me so when she turned 21 we started exploring different beers. Whichever beers looked interesting at the grocery store or when she made a run to the liquor store.

I explored a lot in that time period and really liked the Sam Adams Black Lager.

When I was 22 I got a Mr. Beer fermenter and started brewing.

 

I miss that beer. Luckily we have a local brewery (Notch), who has a seasonal which just hit stores called Cerne Pivo. It's a very good Czech Dark Lager.

Sounds like you had great taste in beer right away! I think when I was 21 in 2003 I was probably drinking a lot of Keystone Light in college.

I got into craft a few months after graduating. I now had some disposable income and started googling "Top Beers". Eventually stumbled upon the Top 100 on Beer Advocate. And so it began...

 

It was very recently available in a variety pack. I had the good fortune that my sister bought the pack and she is 'afraid of the dark' so I got to drink the Sam Adams Black Lager.

I really wish they would go back to producing this beer as a standalone product.

Cheers!

 

Left Hand Sawtooth Ale is supposed to be an english bitter. Fairly available. In Colorado there is an outstanding beer called Little London made by Pikes Peak.

 

Bringing this back on topic.

Redhook ESB was a beer I drank a lot of back then. I can't quite remember if I drank it in the transition before I turned 21 or if it was just common after I turned 21.

I do know I liked Wychwood Hobgoblin a lot after I turned 21 because the bar I went to had it most of the time.

Fuller's ESB was good every so often.

I didn't like Old Speckled Hen though. I blamed the non-brown bottles.

 

Sometime shortly after I began my craft journey I started to develop a love for English session ales. True session ales were a great find if I could find them (4% ABV or less).

I quickly learned the high ABV beers I was getting into created quite the hangover. But stuff ~4% ABV was something you could drink all night long.

And session beers from the UK were quite tasty, it was just difficult finding them.

Fuller's was great as you mention, albeit not quite as sessionable, especially the ESB. My go-to over the years was Honker's Ale. A good English bitter, and if you found it fresh, the hops really popped in that beer. A great compliment to that classic English bitter malt backbone.

 

While I've never been a huge cask enthusiast, I do appreciate the approach and spirit of it.
But anyone who can't appreciate a Fuller's ESB is sick in the head.
SICK. IN. THE. HEAD.
*end*

 

Useful thread, guys. I sought it out it after a friend told me that the reason I wasn't seeing Honker's on the shelf anymore is that Goose Island is stopping (has stopped?) producing it except in kegs, due to a drop in sales. Not sure if this is true, but thought I should find more alternatives than Fuller's ESB, which I like but (as others note) isn't always fresh.

I took the effort to search to see which of the beers mentioned here are currently (or seasonally) available at my local liquor store chain in the Chicago area (Binny's). Here are the results for anyone else in the area with the same question. I added a few other ESBs I found on their site. I also separate 6-pack from other packaging because I want to replace Honker's as my everyday, and other configurations are not as convenient (or affordable).

Quite a few choices. Appreciate all the recommendations.

6-pack:
Left Hand Sawtooth IS
Wells Bombardier

Other packaging:
Fuller’s ESB
Sam Smith Winter
Wyckwood Hobgoblin IS
Coniston Bluebird
Timothy Taylor Landlord
Boddington’s Pub Ale
St. Peter’s Dirty Tackle

Local:
Temperance Smittytown

Seasonal:
Brooklyn Summer Ale
Southern Tier Harvest

Still gonna miss Honker's. Would be cool if GI would keep it around just for old time's sake, since it was their first offering.

 

We always need this type of beer, as an easy to drink, enjoyable, session beer. This for many of us who love good beer, is a beer we can enjoy when we want to drink a few good ones. I lament it's being less common and available.

 

Great Lakes Moondog ESB is quite solid and it’ll be a 2019 fall seasonal.

 

3Floyds is apparently putting Lord Rear Admiral in 12oz 6-packs now.

 

I’d have to drive to Durham, but Bull City makes British Style Ales in many styles. You can buy at the brewery or Sams Quick Check also sells growlers. It’s a 45 minute drive one way, so it tempers my want to drive. They do make great beers though.

 

From what I've heard, Goose is indeed stopping Honkers entirely, which I think is a real shame. I suspect a lot of the problem that the brand had was the fact that the quality began to suffer when AB outsourced it, just as the problem is with the rest of the outsourced brands.

I always go for Fuller's ESB, Temperance Smittytown, Left Hand Sawtooth, or Boddington's. I buy Landlord when I can find it, which is basically never (though it's an amazing beer).

 

I've drank Honkers from before and after the buy-out and I haven't found the quality to have suffered much at all. It would be a shame if they do decide to discontinue as the last six pack of Honkers I had (bottled end of October) to be the one of the best batches that I've had.

 

I am not immune from being biased against AB's outsourced batches. I never did a side-by-side back when the switch occurred, and my memory of the beer that long ago is fuzzy, so I feel that I misspoke referring to the decline as "fact." It's just my opinion of batches here and there since the buyout and likely rose-colored glasses of batches past.

That said, the source of my information is someone close to GI, so it seems that Honkers is unfortunately done.

 

I agree with that take, but I haven't had a Honkers in a few years, so I can only speak from the early days of the outsourcing. I have had the IPA and still think that's the same beer it's always been.

I haven't seen Honkers anywhere in my area -- other than some very old six-packs. Since it was Goose's first bottled beer, I agree that it would be a shame if it was discontinued, but then there's those new owners and all...

To that; I saw Summertime (seriously, in new packaging) on shelves earlier this week -- and that was once discontinued, so you never really know.

 

NO!

I loved Honkers. Not my favorite English Bitter of all time, but it was solid. And as this thread has shown, it was one of the few English Bitters you could reliably find.

Count me as another that didn’t notice a shift in quality post buy out.