Foreign Culture

 

okay ... just wanted to be sure

 

yes, I've tried it only once...and it's awful : peaches with fish

the thing is that most Belgians are crazy about it !!

 

On original topic - warm beer theory..absolutely no. OK beer covers a lot of different types of beers/ales - lagers, bitters, Mild ales, light ales, pale ales, Stouts (Guinness is a stout) and cider. The temperature thing generally depends how they are brewed. They vary wildly in taste, texture, colour/appearance. Lagers are served the coldest because they have the most Co2. You can get them chilled, bottled, in cans or straight from the barrel via the barmaids pump (xcuse the xpression). 

Just to put things into context lagers are the vctf of 'beers'. They are not pure ales/beers but chemically brewed/enhanced, have Co2 added and contain between 4-8% alcohol per measure. So they go to your brain quicker and generally have more of an effect on your behaviour measure for measure. Continental lagers are popular - and Lowenbrau (aka Laughing brew) makes u hallucinate, Stella Artois is termed 'wife-beater' in England - go figure lol. Holsten Pils with a whisky chaser used to be v.popular but pubs stopped serving it - wonder why? haha. Try 8-10 pints in 3-3.5 hours to accomplish near 'mash-up' state.

Popular bitters are beers imo as they're mostly mass produced in a brewery in fact you could say all mass produced or brewery produced beers/ales arent true real ales, just ales but that would start a kbd/mse vs controller flame war. Because some claim hops/barley are hand selected, harvested free from pesticides etc. Mild is almost Guinness like in appearance but not taste. Real ales drinkers will say it has to come hand pumped from the cellar at cellar temp (which is not warm but not cold so as your teeth feel it. It should go down in 5-6 swigs of a pint glass. Real ales are traditionally brewed with certain hops and barley because everyone wants to be at the top of the leader board. Generally beers/ales are mechanically pumped in cities and traditionally hand pumped in rural areas. Its all quality vs quantity vs delivery tug o war! And even then ppl complicate things by mixing beers - Black and Tan, Snakebites, Half and Halfs and shandys. Some t0ss3rs even go as far as putting lemonade tops, lime and blackcurrant etc in there - wtf?

Imo English beers are good but we don't have decent lager and certainly dont order a pint of lager/beer in a city, stick to bottles or real ale lol - Belgian beer is best in the world for me. UT3 with Stella or Carlsberg Export works for me. Thats all I know bout one of my fave topics so skol, salute or bottoms up as the saying goes. 

lol they forgot to include gun crimes per capita and suicide rates  I reckon you're up there with China competing for prime spot!