So UK folks, which ales should I be trying next time I'm in the UK?

international break and good things don't come hand in hand, so just enjoy it while it lasts

I can assure you this is very much subjective. Talking about beer is what my dad does.

Most important thing is to find a good pub that looks after its beer and has lots of guest beers.

I would check the CAMRA web site.

You realise that this is just a function of travelling right?

When you are at home its much easier to access more niche less mass commercial products than when you are traveling, because the latter requires some local knowledge.

very true

what sort of beers do you like?

digressing to football for a minute, interesting reading, would be hilarious to see city fans' meltdown when they can't spend a billion on transfer fees and not have a better striker than bony

This.

Most pubs on CAMRAs list will be a safe bet. Do not, under any circumstances, buy a bottle of 'ale' and think you're drinking the proper stuff.

well yeah, no ****

And what about the smaller clubs?

You underestimate this particular wine by a lot. It's on the list at MASH in both London and Copenhagen at around the 40 quid mark, IIRC.
I was skeptical, but easily converted.

Who cares?

That's not really an easy question to answer. I enjoy a good Belgian tripel, but I also like Guinness, IPAs (although I've grown a bit tired of them) and Gueuze.

so instead of city paying £250k/wk to pogba + £80m fee to juve they'd be paying £400k/wk and £0

well i can sort of see why the players union would be in favour

Echo the first point. Selection varies tremendously and a lot is down to geography. Can recommend tonnes of beers I enjoyed living in Newcastle which are not widely available if at all in the rest of the country, because they are brewed in microbreweries in the North East.

So the best way to do it is to find a pub that cares about the beer. CAMRA will give you a list of pubs as a starting point but looking at the pubs it lists in my area, you will need to do more research to narrow down. Throw out pubs that call themselves gastro-pubs. It's not that they can't be good at the beer too, just less likely.

Ideally you want hand-pulled ales and steer clear of cask (get a bottle if you must - not the proper experience but neither is cask). If you find yourself in a Sam Smith's pub I really like the Oatmeal Stout.

Yea but if you were traveling in the states I could definitely give you a list of good beers to try that you'd be able to get within 15 minutes of where you're staying

I've had it plenty of times and I'm not underestimating it at all. It's fine for a cheap American Riesling, but it is just that. It's great for girls in their early 20s. At the same general price as Kung-Fu Girl, I can buy Pepiere Muscadet which is mind blowing good for the price and level.

er, by cask you mean keg surely

Yeah, hand pulled = cask.

Yeah you're right. For some reason I always get that muddled and call it handpull vs cask when handpulled ales come from a cask lol. I mean the pressurised taps that draw from a keg obv. It's mass-produced just like bottles but doesn't come with the same guarantee of quality.

Rochefort

I think specific regions of the country probably outshine all of Europe. New England alone, and if you add in new york and just say northeast, fuggedaboutit. Goat ipas, insane stouts, and allagash in Maine is one of the few US brewers that can stand toe to toe with Belgium on belgian beers. They've even done world class lambics, which no one in the US even tries to brew.

Same goes for Midwest, same goes for California/west coast.

USA#1.

Arsenal are free money this weekend

I should be super confident about the game this weekend. Every stat points to arsenal having a cake walk but I'm still worried. I'm a tortured fan and learned I should never be confident about anything arsenal related.

On the bright side Chelsea have to win. Arsenal will be happy with a draw here so mourinhaids bus will will need to shift out of park for once in a game vs wenger. I would expect arsenal to sit deep and soak pressure and play Walcott up top. Not sure who will play on the right wing but my guess would be Ramsey. Though wenger could opt for more pace with ox. Ox as a sub probably is better to counter attack vs tired legs with Ramsey starting to offer more stability.

Would also expect wenger to play Gabriel and kosc to allow them to compact the field and press more effectively when they do have sustained periods of possession.

Mourinho to fiddle a few settings and win 2-0.

Sure, every stat (over 5 games) points to chelsea being ****e, but they are so abnormally ****e at the moment that it doesn't seem sustainable and maybe a few adjustments need to be made to get back to not conceding a billion chances / game.

Baba might become the best Baba ever at Chelsea. I'd probably give him a game even if hard to get much out of a win against Maccabi. Pedro & Willian are missing so that's a big loss offensively / defensively. Ramires will probably have to come in and not sure what he will do with Oscar.

Chelsea has scored 10 goals past arsenal since the last time arsenal scored vs them, pretty impressive for a team that only parks the bus

During that time chelsea were actually good though