Beer Shop, St Albans Central, St. Albans

This is a small bottle shop that, unlike many other such venues I've previously visited, seems to be just as popular for on site drinking as it is for off sales. It's set in a simple shop unit with exposed floorboards, whitewashed walls and a small servery in the rear right corner. Both side walls are covered from front to back with shelving units and fridges full of beer, and judging by their stock, it seems as though they specialise in larger, wine bottle-sized beers, although there are still plenty of regular-sized bottles and cans too. Everything seems to be logically ordered by style and country of origin, making it easier to track down the ideal brew. Hops line the shelving units in an effort to give the space a bit more of a pubby feel, whilst a collection of keg inserts run across a ceiling beam. The bar has a small, makeshift looking counter with all the taps mounted on a wall to one side, with helpful beer boards above detailing strengths, styles and prices. Loads more shelving full of expensive looking bottles stands opposite the bar, along with a shelf for ciders and another for hot sauces. There is a small seating area out the front with some uncomfortable looking benches alongside a busy road and a decent 90's indie soundtrack played in the background throughout my stay. I counted ten craft keg beers on draught and ended up trying Otherworld Tui NZ Pale Ale at £5.80 a pint. Other draught options tended to be from well respected or obscure microbreweries. The bar staff were a very personable and friendly duo who seemed to be extremely knowledgeable about their beer and had a good rapport with their locals. I'm not much of a fan of this type of bar, as they usually result in an uncomfortable experience where you feel like you're getting the the way of shoppers. This place bucked that trend, on a Saturday evening at least, by having much more emphasis given to their on sales, and I was happy sat amongst the locals enjoying a beer I'd never heard of and eavesdropping on their beer geeky conversations. Date of visit - 27th January 2024

The name for this place speaks for itself. It's a simple shop surrounded by fridges full of cans and bottles and with a small bar at the rear serving 10 beers from taps on the far right-hand wall. One of the beers available for our Friday afternoon visit was a cask ale, which was Beak Lulla. Craft beers were Gravity Well Novikov Principle, Pastore Big Easy Banana Pastry Sour, Cloudwater Chubbles 2024 & Chubbles Enhanced, Baron Fill Your Boots, Staggeringly Good Cocoadoca, Boon 2-Year Unblinded Oude Lambiek & Rivington I Wear Suits Now. My drinking partner and I both had the Lulla, which was very tasty for such a low-ABV beer (3.4%), but was served a little too cold for my liking. As you would expect, staff were very knowledgeable about their beer selection. There was one other drinker there when we arrived and somebody else came in to pick up a couple of boxes of pre-ordered Tring beers. With just a single table, which could probably accommodate 8-10 people, in the centre of the room, this is probably not the sort of place where you would want to spend hours. However, for a brief stop when touring some of the local pubs, it's well worth a visit.

Official site of Beer Shop - www.beershophq.uk

Official site of Beer Shop - www.beershophq.uk

As noted below this is one of those micropubs that is little more than an off licence. There are some stools by some of the shelves but if they are in use it must just obstruct people searching for off sales. The makeshift set up of a few casks by the window is still there and provided welcome seating. On my early Saturday afternoon visit I was the only one not getting take outs. The beer is served on the far right from taps coming out of the wall of I assume a cooled cellar. I think there was around seven but it was a bit congested with people getting off sales. They can't afford to get too busy here as they don't even have a proper glass washer. I noted two from Redwillow, a Siren beer and the Arbor Why Kick a Moo Cow (£4.10) which was expensive for a micropub and somewhat cloudy but tasted good. I had a brief glance at the bottles and a litre bottle of 10.7% Imperial Stout caught my eye but it was priced at twelve quid! With the cloudy expensive pint I wouldn't rate this higher than five as a pub but as an off licence I would rate it at nine. I wouldn't take the average as it is 90% off licence in my book so I'll leave it as unrated.

A specialist beer offy with on-sales license which opened in 2013. There is no proper seating area or anything like that (though there are a small number of beer barrels with cushions by the door). No drinks allowed outside either, though they are planning on getting a licence to allow this. Five on, coming out of a tiled wall; Willow Shameless, Tring Kotuku, Hamerton N7, Leighton Buzzard Centennial and Northern Monk True North (good). Heat-based scratchings and biltong available. Take outs are obviously available. Tough to rate as it isn’t a pub in the regular sense (and barely even a micropub) but the selection of beers make it worth taking in when quiet.