� 27 BS

MetroGuide Wine, beers & spirits

Let’s beer it for the girls... Check out most streets

on a Thursday night and the tipple of choice is a 250ml glass of cheap plonk, generic lager for the ladettes and, for the

ladies in posh dresses and heels, vodka with a saccharine mixer. Yet change is (sigh) slowly afoot. Take those women’s wine trips to Burgundy, for example. Then there is Sublimelle, French vinos for British women. This month, M&S introduces ciders and beers – normally the domain of bearded, big-tummied men – with the fairer sex in mind.

Do we really have different palates? ‘Yes,’ say Sue Daniels and Sylvia Griffin, the store’s beer connoisseurs. ‘Women pick up more subtle tones,’ says Daniels. ‘We like more complex beers than we are given credit for,’ says Melissa Cole, Britain’s leading female beer writer. ‘The problem is that women mainly try commodity lagers but are sensitive to stale flavours so they might experience canned sweetcorn, rotting vegetables or damp dog, which is offputting.’

Tonight we’re putting M&S’s new additions to the test. The girls are a varied bunch: Emma, a consultant who doesn’t like cider, Lizzie, a rosé-

swigging city girl, Lucy, a lawyer who is partial to ale, and Lisa, a fellow hack – typically, she’ll drink anything. Daniels arrives at the flat with barrels, bottles galore and the spittoon. ‘I don’t think we’ll need that,’ says Emma, gleefully.

First up is a raspberry cider made by the Weston family in Herefordshire. We hold it up to the light and smell warm, appley

the people who made DTs. I like it,’ says Lucy. We move on to a Batemans Lincolnshire bitter with slow-cooked beef short ribs and mushrooms. ‘Bitter is manly but this one doesn’t have that charred aftertaste,’ opines Emma.

Cheese with a calcium lactate crunch is eaten with a bottle-conditioned IPA brewed by the St Austell brewery in Cornwall

with Marris Otter barley, which I love. Another interesting potation is the ripe and full-bodied Chocolate Porter made at the Unicorn Inn in Stockport. Emma confesses she wouldn’t normally drink it but she’s

converted. She’s not alone.The amount of women trying

cask ale has doubled in the past year. ‘Some 16 per cent of women tried a cask ale last year and it’s risen to 30 per cent this year,’ says Cole. ‘We worry about calories but a 330ml beer has fewer than a G&T or a glass of wine.’

As Plato said all those years ago: ‘He was a wise (hu)man who invented beer.’M&S releases its beer and cider range on September 30. Tel: 0845 302 1234 or visit www.marksandspencer.comFor Melissa Cole’s beer tastings at lovebeer@borough in London, see www.lovebeeratborough.ning.com

Three fine tipples for gals❯

Ben�McFarland,�founder�of��www.dwink.co.uk,�the�new�online��drinks�magazine,�has�a�wealth�of�advice

1Aspall Perronelle’s Blush is cider’s answer to rosé, says our guru. ‘Fusing

fresh-pressed English apple juice and crème de mur blackberry liqueur, the flavour is redolent of traditional English blackberry and apple pie.’ 5.4 per cent, 500ml, Sainsbury’s, £2.49.

2 ‘Meanwhile, chocolate beer is brilliant, really nice,’ continues McFarland. ‘But

instead of pairing it with chocolate, I’d pair it with a fruit compote. Both men and women will like it.’6.5 per cent. Tel: 020 8293 1111. www.meantimebrewing.com/chocolate.html

3Kasteel Cru Rosé, a bière blonde d’Alsace, is ‘brewed with champagne yeast, which

can misbehave in beer, but it works here,’ he says. Expect a pale pink colour from the elderberries and delicate fruit flavours.Five per cent, £1.79 from Morrisons (also available in All Bar One).

Women�are�sensitive��to�stale�flavours�so�they�might�experience�damp��dog,�which�is�offputting�

Good taste: When it comes to beer and cider, the fairer sex has a more sophisticated palate. Chloe SCoTT and friends put the theory to the test

■

flavours from the Aspall apple juice, then the raspberries, before taking hearty gulps. This fruity number proves a hit, probably to the disapproval of any beer geek reading this. ‘It looks like a rosé.

My mum would like it too,’ says Lizzie.

A Belgian wheat beer from the Huyghe Brewery in Melle is next, accompanied by Alaskan smoked salmon. ‘This is from

Pic

ture

: Gre

tel E

nsig

nia