A selection of articles I’ve written for other publications.
Never has a gift been so compromised by the manner of its giving. There was delight in beer circles the other day when George Osborne announced not only the end of the hated alcohol duty escalator, but also a further penny cut in the duty of beer. And then Grant Shapps put out that tweet.
Find out moreIn my last column I talked about cider: a drink that most people think is made of apples, and showed often, it isn’t. It’s a familiar story in food and drink: if you want to make sure what you’re putting in your mouth is what you think it is, you’re better off going for smaller producers
Find out moreThere’s no easy way to humblebrag this so let me get it out of the way and move on: I just got back from Chicago, where I was flown and accommodated for a week mainly so I could drink cider. Well, it was one way to celebrate the end of Dry January.
Find out moreI can’t believe you’re 10 years old already. Why, just last week, you were being talked about in the national press as if you were the biggest new arrival since the royal baby.
Find out moreHow much is too much for a beer? £4 a pint? £5? How about £12 for a large bottle? If your answer to the above is anything other than “Well, it depends on the beer, doesn’t it?” then good news! Broader horizons and untold pleasures await you.
Find out moreOddly, around this time of year I increasingly feel like I’m Publican Enemy Number One. It’s weird, because after 11 months of championing food beer and good pubs as much as I can, both in a professional and personal capacity, come January it’s like I’ve suddenly joined ranks with the new-prohibitionist zealots, the supermarket price
Find out moreEver since we’ve been able to make tools and use language, we’ve understood that the year is cyclical. Behaviour that’s acceptable at one time of year is considered wrong at another. Throughout the history of civilisation – any civilisation – we keep a lid on some of our desires and urges so that we can
Find out more“One day I’d like to retire and run a pub.” It’s a dream many of us have. Ditching the grind of the nine to five – or eight to eight for most LondonlovesBusiness.com readers – in favour of standing behind the bar, master of all you survey, polishing the brass while waiting for the regulars
Find out moreThe final weekend at the Alma on Newington Green was fairly typical. As a wet November Sunday gave in to an early dusk, the main bar filled. The large family birthday party, complete with surprisingly well-behaved toddlers, was getting ready to move on, their seats enviously eyed by the newly arrived late afternoon drinkers.
Find out more