Paris - Frog pubs

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On December 29th, we set off to Paris to ring in the new year. We met up with our friends, VelkyAl (Fuggled) and his wife for the first two nights. Unfortunately they flew home on the 31st so we would not be celebrating new years eve together.

So after meeting up at our hotel we headed off to The Frog & British Library as it was in the area we had to go to first anyway. Al had been there before a few years back and I had read reviews that the beer was not the best. We Al was happy to discover that things have changed. The beer is now excellent, at least on par with the rest of the frog pubs. We also had fish and chips which was nice enough but let down by using French fries instead of proper chunky chips. By all accounts the wine was also pretty good.

We also (the second night I think) ventured forth to the original frog pub called The Frog and Rosbif. It's a sort of derogatory name for both cultures. The French being Frogs and and English are Rosbifs or Roast Beef. I imagine it's something to do with the stereotype of a French person eating frogs legs and the same idea for rosbif. Anyway it's all in good fun and the beer is tasty too.

InSeine is on cask here and it was absolutely lovely. Sure it's a typical English bitter but it is packed full of flavour and the Styrian Goldings really shine. Oranges, grass, biscuit and caramel are the driving forces here. I was also rather partial to Dark de Triomphe (we even had a pitcher) and Parislytic. Both were good and solidly brewed beers. In fact they were all good beers but it was In-Seine that really stood out and we downed many pints of this. Al has already mentioned that we tried it both sparkled and un-sparkled.

The sharing platters are worth eating and are pretty good value. I certainly enjoyed the food and I'm sure the others did too.

Blonde (left) - Parislytic (right) - I think

Myself and my wife also spent a lovely New Years Eve at The Frog & Rosbif. The place was actually dead, there was only 20 people at most. They had even made 200 quesadillas in anticipation. I'm not sure where people went, perhaps to the Eiffel tower for the fireworks. The staff did their best to make the best of things and liven the place up. I did not mind, I would have hated it had the place been packed to bursting. 

Random pub patron reading his kindle*

So; if you find yourself in Paris and crave some decent beer, you can do a lot worse than checking out one of the frog pubs.

More to come soon from Paris.

*Al took this picture, I just modified it a little.