First Drink for a British Isles Cruise?

[MrCruzdoggie]

Ususally on a Caribeann Cruise I go for a frozen drink when I get on board. Want is a great drink to kick off a British Isles cruise?

[TheOldBear]

Ale 🙂

[MeHeartCruising]

A cup of hot tea.

[turnip eater]

G ‘n’ T

[muchofamuchness]

Depends on the time of year but a Pimm's (No.1 Cup + sparkling lemonade, with *all* the extras) is a suitably "British summer" kind of drink, if the cruise line offers it. 

Edited March 29, 2022 by muchofamuchness

[John Bull]

5 hours ago, muchofamuchness said:

Depends on the time of year but a Pimm's (No.1 Cup + sparkling lemonade, with *all* the extras) is a suitably "British summer" kind of drink, if the cruise line offers it. 

 

Agreed.

Take a bottle aboard, along with lemonade and mint.

And steal fruit-salad stuff from the buffet, then relax with it on your balcony.

 

But if it's NOT summer-time, I wonder how the OP is with hot chocolate or oxtail soup 😉

 

JB 🙂

[MrCruzdoggie]

9 hours ago, turnip eater said:

G ‘n’ T

Love a good one!!!!!!

[Crown Vic]

No matter the time of day, possibly with the exception of breakfast, an Old Speckled Hen is the way to go. A close runner up is Spitfire. Both beers/ales are top notch but do not drink them if taken straight from the fridge. Approximately 8C or 47F is the proper temperature for your pint. Of course, one can never go wrong with a good cuppa char. Cheers!

[Host Bonjour]

Hi everyone!

 

Still here, just looking on because things are always pretty wonderful here, as we see in this fun topic, people are getting back to cruising, albeit with testing and such.

 

Call me crazy (some do 🙃 it's fine) but I feel like this conversation might make for curious and interesting chat. We have something similar on the Italy Port, getting into food, drink, and sometimes shopping and various cultural matters.

 

What sparked my interest were the great responses (always!) about ale temps, tea–didn't see that coming, the tea love fascinates me–Pimms I knew of, but some of the names of Ale, I became very curious and interested.

 

My first thought was of course the gin and tonic, there are the many preferences or correct (?) thoughts on how to do the G&T. 

 

No interest in stirring up contentious debates, only to get into flavor, culture, history, etc. If it's an uninteresting convo, we drop it. But many people like to adapt to and appreciate, the practices of the countries that they are visiting. In this instance, a frozen daiquiri might not be front of mind when one contemplates the U.K, but as always, it's YOUR holiday, you do you. This is a judgment-free zone.

 

Let's see how it goes, shall we? 🙂

 

[John Bull]

Pimms on a warm summer's day for sure.

Pimms is mixed in a jug with lemonade about 1 : 3, with ice, slices of cucumber and such fruits as are in season or can be stolen from ship's buffet but always with leaves of mint (not usually seen in ships' buffets). Pubs usually sell it by the jug with whatever fruits, but any landlord who fails to include mint is normally shot at dawn next-day.

If you want to push the boat out, Pimms Royale (aka "royal cup") uses champagne instead of lemonade.

 

"Real ales"  come from small craft breweries run by devotees in all corners of the UK. They are pretty flat and pumped from the cask at room temperature.  They have strange names like Old Engine Oil, Old Hooky, Roaring Meg and Seriously Bad Elf, and from Southampton's Dancing Man micro-brewery - Bovine Intervention.

But be aware that big breweries have cottoned-on to the value of strange names, so  a strange name is no guarantee that it was brewed in somebody's barn.

 

Scrumpy. A particularly strong & vicious farm-produced cider. Flat, cloudy, good for cleaning your tonsils 😀. Similar to farm-made ciders in Normandy & nothing like commercial supermarket ciders. Popular in the West Country, nearest ports Bristol, Dartmouth, mebbe Portland. 

 

In Scotland, single-malt whisky.

If you port in Invergordon the nearest distilleries of distinction are from Speyside (the River Spey flowing east from the Cairngorms), for Skye and the western isles its the Hebrides & southern islands like Islay & Ailsa Craig,  for Glasgow perhaps Girvan.

"Scotch" is an alternative name - but only for things like scotch whisky, scotch pancakes, scotch broth & such, and never, never,, never for Scottish people. 

 

In Ireland, Irish whiskey 

Note the different spelling, not a typo.

Distilled three times (scotch whiskey is distilled twice), which makes it a smoother drink

Biggest brands are Jameson's and Bushmills.

Or stout (the best-known is Guinness) if you prefer to wait for ages whilst it's properly served, and to eat it with a knife & fork (British humour 😉)

An American visitor patiently waiting to be served in a Dublin pub proudly told the bartender "I was in this pub 35 years ago". The bartender replied "Oi'm sorry, sir, oi'm serving as fast as oi can". (Irish humour 😉) 

 

I had to as Mr Google about Welsh alcoholic drinks.

Other than a very small number of producers of a variety of common drinks, I drew a blank.

 

Cheers, Sante, Salud, Gesondheid, Proost, Saude, ΥΓΕΙΑ, Sláinte, Na zdravi, Cin cin, Kanpai, Na zdrowie, Skal, Lechyd da, Sei gesund, bottoms-up

 

JB 🙂

[gnome12]

5 hours ago, John Bull said:

Cheers, Sante, Salud, Gesondheid, Proost, Saude, ΥΓΕΙΑ, Sláinte, Na zdravi, Cin cin, Kanpai, Na zdrowie, Skal, Lechyd da, Sei gesund, bottoms-up

And let me add לחיים or transliterated le’chaim. 

[Host Bonjour]

On 4/14/2022 at 6:24 AM, John Bull said:

Scrumpy. A particularly strong & vicious farm-produced cider. Flat, cloudy, good for cleaning your tonsils 😀. Similar to farm-made ciders in Normandy & nothing like commercial supermarket ciders. Popular in the West Country, nearest ports Bristol, Dartmouth, mebbe Portland. 

 

This just went on the "must have" list. I'm a fan of the cider, and the tonsil cleaning sold it for me–well, after the name Scrumpy. I have had the ciders in Normandy and was a fan, less a fan of the commercial ciders: always tastes like someone basically dumped some apple extract into light beer or something. 

 

It would hit nice actually, right about now. No Scrumpy around when you need one. 😔

[Slugsta]

JB, I'm afraid that mint is the stuff of the devil; I immediately remove it from my Pimms (if my plea to omit it has fallen on deaf ears)!

[Pitbull1130]

On 4/16/2022 at 9:51 PM, Host Bonjour said:

 

This just went on the "must have" list. I'm a fan of the cider, and the tonsil cleaning sold it for me–well, after the name Scrumpy. I have had the ciders in Normandy and was a fan, less a fan of the commercial ciders: always tastes like someone basically dumped some apple extract into light beer or something. 

 

It would hit nice actually, right about now. No Scrumpy around when you need one. 😔

I've something called Scrumpy Jack, is that the same?

[John Bull]

2 hours ago, Pitbull1130 said:

I've something called Scrumpy Jack, is that the same?

 

A centuries-old brand, but in more-recent years it's produced by Bulmer's  - the UK's premier cider-maker. Not as bland as the stuff produced under the Bulmer's name, but it's become more like a standard mass-market cider.

 

Clear rather than cloudy..

Semi-sweet rather than dry.

Gassy rather than flat.

All the things that most drinkers prefer, but perhaps "scrumpy" in name only.

 

Enjoy - it won't clean your tonsils 😉

 

JB 🙂

 

[lisiamc]

On 4/14/2022 at 11:24 AM, John Bull said:

Scrumpy. A particularly strong & vicious farm-produced cider. Flat, cloudy, good for cleaning your tonsils 😀. Similar to farm-made ciders in Normandy & nothing like commercial supermarket ciders. Popular in the West Country, nearest ports Bristol, Dartmouth, mebbe Portland. 
 

JB 🙂

The landlord of a favourite local haunt once asked me if I wanted the standing up cider or the falling down cider.  A good scrumpy should definitely be the falling down kind!

[markeb]

Preference would be the first drink I always have when I arrive in the UK (with the possible exception of a Bloody Mary since it's an overnight flight!): The best cask ale they have that has to be pumped by hand at a proper ale temperature!

 

Unfortunately, none of cruise ships will have it and I'll grouse about how they can't even bring a decent local ale on board in the UK! 

[Simon-t]

On 4/14/2022 at 11:24 AM, John Bull said:

 

I had to as Mr Google about Welsh alcoholic drinks.

Other than a very small number of producers of a variety of common drinks, I drew a blank.

 

JB 🙂

 

I can recommend Penderyn Welsh Whiskey, which is very nice if you are a whiskey lover.