I've been to the Red, White, Rose on Ditchling road, or at least I've stood outside of it, and have always thought the place was a bit cheap and not particularly amazing, and it was with this in mind that I stepped inside the other shop on Queens Road.
All at once, within the blink of an eye and with the beat of a drum, and the flowing lyrics of a rapper, my preconceptions were exploded. I stepped in to be greeted with an array of specialist beer, all with handwritten little tags on with descriptions of the individual beers taste. This optical scene was staged to some flowing, lyrical hip hop music reminding me of the Cunninlynguists, which I thought was cool for an off license to be playing.
The Beer selection is impressive, with bottles from independent or obscure breweries from around the world, and all sectioned under their country of origin. The store assistant told me that there was a particularly interesting selection from Australia, which I was interested in, as I had done my own beer tour of sorts their, however i'd not even heard of some of the beers they had. Little Creatures at £1.69 was a highly recommended Ozzy beer, that I personally had never heard of, but was more than willing to try, and was not disappointed. They also have unheard of here beers, such as Liberty Ale from San Francisco as well as Asian, and European delights.
Of course, being in Harvey's territory, that was well represented, with a vast selection of bottles from the Lewes Brewery too.
Wine, like the beer is split into nationality, and has the helpful tags to allow the customer to educate themselves. However i must admit I am not well versed enough on wine's to wax lyrical about their selection, but I can say it looked well stocked, and fancy enough to hold a wine buffs attention. Well recommended. read more