Boddingtons Draught Bitter (24 x 440ml Cans)

Product Information

So the assumption must be that the "London" in 1318 is Whitbread and it comes from a "Whitbread" brewery that was brewing Boddies at some point. Are you sure that's the "regular" bitter and not something to do with their bicentenary celebrations that year? Manchester and the North of England were now fashionable in the public consciousness and rejuvenated from an image of industrial decay. I came to Manchester in 1982; Boddington’s was pretty thin on the ground, at least in my usual stamping-ground, but Boddies’ bitter was still spoken of in hushed tones (literally – I remember discussing possible pubs with my brother-in-law, visiting from Preston, and his reaction when I mentioned that one of them served Boddies’: well, let’s go there! The toasty edge makes it a tad more interesting than the ordinary Pub Ale in this infamous brand, while the hops do add a certain grassy bitterishness in the end - but no refinement or complexity at all.

Boddington’s did take over Oldham Brewery in 1982 but kept the brewery open for some years and there does not seem to be a geographical pattern to the deletions. Mind you, similar competition, along with the malt-extract Lass O’Gowrie beers which I found very poor. From July 1991 until 1999, a series of Boddingtons advertisements created by the Bartle Bogle Hegarty (BBH) agency used "The Cream of Manchester" tagline. It is notable as one of the first beers to be packaged in cans containing a widget, giving it a creamy draught-style head. Production was around 250,000 hectolitres (6,604,301 US Gallons) in 2012, with around 80 per cent of production destined for the UK market, and around 20 per cent destined for export markets such as Taiwan, Singapore and United Arab Emirates.This is a subject that holds great interest for me, as I "discovered" Boddingtons soon after moving to Lancaster in 1973, as it was on the bar in my college at Lancaster Uni, and in a few pubs in the area. That's chaotic - perhaps when they were messing around with recipes, or was this when they lost the yeast? Whitbread's superior capitalisation and distribution network allowed it to take the Boddingtons brand nationwide. I have to say on the few occasions I did sample it in the 1977-80 period, for example in the Old Garratt in Manchester city centre, I did rather wonder what the fuss was about. Drop some thoughts on the beer's attributes (look, smell, taste, feel) plus your overall impression.

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Clearly the Tadcaster yeast they acquired after the brewery was destroyed in WWII was diastatic - do we know if it was phenolic at all? Tawny-coloured premium ale borrows sweet raisin, biscuit and dried-fruit notes from the Crystal malt, while fresh, piney herbs emanate from the hops. But oddly the lack of body (combined with rather tentative nitro) brings the modest bitter finish into greater prominence - which for me makes it beat the Pub Ale. We’ve undertaken some light editing for readability and house style but otherwise this is John’s own work.Imperial (2) Truman's Burton brewery (7) Tsarina Esra (1) TT (6) Tuborg (18) Tunisia (1) turfbier (1) TV (2) Twelve Guinea Ale (1) Twopenny (2) U Medvídků (1) ugly fruit (1) UK (37) Ukraine (1) underlet (3) unfermented wort (2) unfiltered sources (1) unions (8) University Challenge (1) Uppsala (1) US book tour (16) USA (423) Utrecht (3) vampire (1) van Vollenhoven's Stout (9) Vancouver (7) Vasa (1) Vassar Ale (5) vatting (18) vegetables (1) Vienna (19) Vienna Lager (24) Vietnam (10) vinegar (1) Virginia (6) Vive la Résistance (2) VLB (2) vodka (3) volume VIII (1) Výčepní Pivo (2) Wadworth (2) Wales (6) wanker (1) War (7) Warwicks and Richardsons (22) Washington (22) water (30) water treatment (13) watering (2) Watney (70) Watney Combe Reid (17) Watney Mann (10) Watney.