Various ways of getting the best pint

In his weekly The Bar Man column, columnist Jeff Hoyle discusses various ways of putting a pint together…I don’t mind a pint of Guinness. If there is no cask beer available, that might be my choice. In the old days, which might have been a bottle as in the north of England it would have been bottle conditioned, with the beer containing live yeast, brought over from Ireland in a tanker and bottled by a local brewery.In the South, it was more likely to have been brewed at Park Royal in West London, but this ceased production in 2006. Perhaps the company wishes that it was still brewing as there have been reports of Guinness shortages and rationing in some pubs. Apparently, it is the drink of choice for lots of the younger generation and many customs and myths have grown up around the drink.

One of them is the correct way to pour a pint. A clean and slightly chilled glass is needed. Some websites recommend a mini-fridge for the Guinness glasses. A 45 degree angle for the initial pour before a rest of 119 seconds precedes the second pour, with the glass upright and the creation of the characteristic head. Does this improve the product or is it performance art? I know that it can be a pain if you are waiting at the bar for a large round of Guinness to be poured, or if the Guinness is the last drink in an order, not allowing the bar staff to prepare the rest of the order during the waiting time.I also remember ordering a pint of the black stuff at the Flying Fish in Carbrooke and being surprised when the barman produced a can which he poured into a glass and then stood the glass on some kind of vibrating metal plate to produce the typical head. It tasted OK to me, but them perhaps I am some kind of philistine, as I brew my tea by putting the leaves in a mug and adding boiling water. No tea ceremony for me.Guinness is perhaps more like coffee which seems to come in infinite variations. Back Velvet, Guinness and Champagne was created to mourn the passing of Prince Albert while Black and Tan is a combination of a bottle of Guinness and a bottle of Bass poured so that the beers do not mix in the glass. The modern generation have taken the experiments further with the mass availability of the non-alcoholic version allowing them to order a semi-skimmed Guinness, half of regular and half of the 0.0% version, producing a pint of about 2.1% with the same taste. I would be interested to know if anyone has tried that with Adnams Ghostship. Martyn Cornell, a founding member of the British Guild of Beer Writers, recommends mixing the 0.0% version with the foreign extra stout (7.2%) to create a drink of about 3.6%, and I am sure there are many other combinations available with West Indian Porter and cold brew coffee beer currently available from Guinness.There are, of course, other porter and stouts available. I wouldn’t drink them all the time but a small one at the end of the evening can be delicious and it is surprising how many of the perfect beer scores we receive are for stouts. Over the summer we called into the Durham Brewery in Bowburn and picked up some of their bottles including an Imperious, a 11.2% stout aged in barrels, Islay whisky in this case, though this year’s production used rum barrels. More like a fine wine than a beer, it saw in the new year in style. No chance of me mixing that with 0.0%bar.man@btinternet.com