Review Posts

Magic Spells Brewery Tour At Home

Magic Spells Brewery are a new East London brewery, very firmly at the 'craft' end of the beery spectrum. They have a familiar enough backstory, starting with (a rather substantial 1/2 barrel) homebrewing background 3 years ago and finally going commercial at the start of this year. At the moment they're still 'gypsy brewing' ...

Masons Dry Yorkshire Gin

Masons are one of the new generation of gin distillers, having been founded just 4 years ago - they launched their first gin on World Gin Day 2013. A few years ago, Karl Mason sent his wife a message via Facebook asking her to have a G&T ready for him when he got ...

Redber Old Brown Java Dark Roasted Coffee

Redber is a coffee roastery based in Guildford, although for those of us not in the area they are widely available online - either through their own website or (as in this case) via Amazon. Their range is fairly extensive and reasonably priced, and after stumbling across this one in the Amazon coffee aisle ...

Badger - An American Venture

One of the things I noted about Badger back when I did a review of their range was that they'd always managed to resist the lure of the "craft dollar", sticking to solid, traditional beers (albeit with a range twice the size it should be). Obviously they took my comments to heart, because they're definitely ...

The Botanist Gin

It only seems right to start my gin reviewing with the spirit that lured me, and much like with my first whisky, it's made by an Islay distillery. The Botanist is produced by the folks at Bruichladdich, so they know a thing or two about making spirit. They are also noteworthy in the world of ...

Muswell Hillbilly Brewers Tour At Home

The London brewery scene continues to grow at a breathtaking rate - the brewery count recently crossed the 100 mark - and it's nice to see that the full range of brewery types are well represented in every flurry of openings, from wannabe-Brewdogs, through brewpubs, all the way to a couple of men ...

Taylors Rwanda

It's been a while since I reviewed a coffee from Taylors, not least because I've tried so much of their range over the years. After starting my exploration of their (then) new Origins range with their Indonesia coffee, today it's the turn of Rwanda - an East African country in the same prime coffee-growing ...

Badger Ales Brewery Tour-At-Home

Badger Ales or, as they're more properly known Hall & Woodhouse, is one of the oldest breweries in the UK. Founded in 1777, they're certainly in the top five preceded only by the likes of Shepherd Neame (officially 1698 but likely much earlier), Samuel Smith (1758) and Young's (whose Ram Brewery probably dates as far ...

Gweilo Beer Tour At Home

Whenever I'm travelling, I always eager to hunt out local beers. It seems odd to fly across oceans to foreign parts, only to seek out something familiar to drink. Not, of course, that other countries' local beers are always unfamiliar; Japan's national beers - Asahi and, to a lesser extent, Kirin & Sapporo - ...

Ginevra Miscela Selezionata

After a long winter of whisky, it's definitely time to get back to the caffeinated side of the fence, with a return to our exploration of Ginevra's range. So far I've been impressed by these Italian coffees, so let's see if they continue to please in 2017. Miscela Selezionata is translated as a "selected ...