Friday 6 March 2015

The New Gollem



Things have gone crazy in Amsterdam the last couple of years. New breweries and beer pubs are popping up like mushrooms after rain. I'm struggling to keep up.


Some of the boom is down to existing operations expanding. Like Gollem, who now have four pubs dotted around the city. Saturday I finally got my arse into gear and visited the newest location, on the Amstelstraat between Rembrandtsplein and Waterlooplein. I'm not a huge fan of Rembrandtsplein too much crap music and too many drunks. Amstelstraat used to be a bit rundown, with tourist bars and coffeeshops. It looks like it's on the way up.  It amazes me just how quickly Amsterdam is changing at the moment.

From the outside, it looks a decent size with its double frontage. But inside it seems smaller. And very clean and modern, with some fairly bright colours. Nothing wrong with that. I’m sure that’s what youngsters expect nowadays.

The beer selection is an interesting one and tells us much about the state of beer in the Netherlands. Sure there’s American beer, IPA and beers from new local breweries like Oedipus and Butcher’s Tears. But it isn’t full-on craft, as London Pride and St. Bernardus Abt on draught betray.

On the bottled side, there are some eye-wateringly expensive large format bottles. But most are American so there’s no way I’d buy them over here. One of my rules: I don’t buy American beer in Europe. You’ve no idea what state it’s going to be in. And I get to the US often enough to get my grapefruit fix.

Being honest, I quite like that it hasn’t got both feet in the craft boat. Makes it easier to persuade Dolores to go there. She’s not a huge fan of fruit-bowl Ales, preferring Belgian or British beers.

All in all, a decent addition to Amsterdam’s beer scene.





Café Gollem Amstelstraat
Amstelstraat 34,
1017 DA Amsterdam.

Opening times:
Mon-Thur: 14.00 - 01.00
Fri-Sat: 12.00 - 03.00
Sun 12.00 - 01.00

30 draught, 100 bottled

8 comments:

Grey Ghost said...

I went to Cafe Gollem Raamsteeg last year. I enjoyed it, and its selection. Mainly because I am from the Antipodes. I hope to be back across in May, so might have to get around to other bars. I might also be heading through the US, so I might get some grapefruit fix as well.

Bailey said...

Think you've accidentally (?) participated in the 97th beer blogging session.

Ron Pattinson said...

Bailey,

why's that?

John Clarke said...

I rather liked Gollem 4 when I was there in January. Have you been to Craft & Draft or Hoppy Days yet?

Ron Pattinson said...

John,

I was at Craft and Draft on opening night. I plan checking out Frits this afternoon.

John Clarke said...

Hi Ron - I hadn't heard of Frits. Looks very interesting.

Stonch said...

Ron there are some American beers imported with care in refrigerated containers. Lagunitas IPA for example comes over in a tank and is kegged by Adnams in Southwold.

But yes those large format bottles who will have been handled by specialist distributors / importers will have been all over the place, sat in warehouses (because they're slow sellers to pubs who scoff at the mad prices) and then in a store room in the pub (because they're slow sellers to customers who scoff at the mad prices).

750ml, £25 bottles of craft beer was a Whitbread folly when we used to go to Craft Beer Co together. He always insisted on getting one to share and it was always disappointing and money down the drain.

Ron Pattinson said...

Jeff,

I'd be more inclined to trust kegged beer.

Thankfully I've no need to drink US beer on this side of the Atlantic.