In a little over one month from now the Bishops Arms’ latest pub will open its doors for business in Stockholm’s trendy Linnégatan.

The new pub promises to be the most gastro to date in the ever-expanding Bishops Arms pub chain that has increasingly focused on food in combination with its huge range of beers in recent years.

Tops chefs Danyel and Melker will be the creative force in the kitchen at the new Bishops Arms pub in Linnégatan

And it’s no idle promise either, with none other than Danyel Couet and Melker Andersson’s acclaimed catering powerhouse Grupp F12 responsible for designing the menu and running the kitchen.

Exactly what dishes these award-winning chefs will conjure up is being kept top secret for now. However one thing is certain – the name of one BeerSweden follower will be printed on the new menu!

In an exclusive competition sponsored by those nice people at Bishops Arms I want you to describe your perfect burger and beer combo.

(A world-class hamburger is the only dish we know that will be on the menu when the pub opens on June 15th, although the exact ingredients are still very hush-hush).

You’ve got just 60 words to play with and should use them to describe your perfect world-class hamburger and the ideal beer to pair with it. Remember to explain why you believe the two elements work so well together. Your description can be in either English or Swedish.

A sneak preview of how the 9-metre long bar at BA Linnégatan will look.

All suggestions will be judged by the new Bishops Arms Linnégatan crew and representatives from Grupp F12 who will also choose the winner.

The prize will be a dinner for two at the new pub – but that’s not all! The beer and the name of the person who suggested it will be printed on the menu alongside the hamburger description as a recommendation for everyone to see.

And as if that wasn’t enough a branded glass with the winner’s name on it will be given a special place behind the bar for whenever he or she pops in for a drink!

You’ve got until June 1st to submit your entries to me at darren@beersweden.se. To enter you must also get yourself over to the Bishops Arms Linnégatan’s brand spanking new Facebook page and click LIKE to keep up-to-date with all the latest pub news. You’ll also need to LIKE BeerSweden’s Facebook page too (but you’ve already done that ages ago, right?)

The judges’ decision, as always, is final. A picture of the winner’s name engraved on their own special glass will be posted on BeerSweden on June 15th. This competition is open to everyone aged 23 and over (that’s the minimum age limit at all Bishops Arms pubs and they will check if in doubt), although you will probably want to live somewhere near Sweden in order to claim your prize.

Lots of gastro-luck everyone!

The old English proverb ‘the grass is always greener on the other side’ is something that holds true for many of us when it comes to our beers.

It’s often tempting to look to other countries for the latest, hippest, most crazy, most extreme, most oaked, weirdest named beers while forgetting to see what we have right here in front of us – a dynamic, creative Swedish craft brewery scene that over the past few years has collectively stuck two fingers up at stor stark by brewing beers with real character and depth.

If you want to taste proof of just how far the Swedish craft beer scene has come and you happen to be in Stockholm over the next few weeks then you really should drop by The Man in the Moon pub which is hosting its Sverigeyran festival for the sixth year in a row, starting today and running all the way through to April 9th.

The dedicated and beer-savvy team at the pub have scoured the land looking for hard-to-get beers from 24 of this country’s microbreweries and have designed a special menu to show their food-matching qualities off to the full. In addition up to 25 different draught beers will go on sale (with new surprise kegs being tapped every day) plus a selection of rare vintage bottled beers, the oldest dating back to the last century (Ed note: it’s actually 1999 but the last century sounds far more impressive).

This just in…….places going fast!!

Monks Porter House and Pubologi are two new beer places that have just opened within stone throwing distance of each other in Stockholm’s picturesque Gamla Stan.

Monks Porter House is the latest addition to the Monk ‘cloister cluster’ of pubs in the Swedish capital and is housed in an imposing 16th century listed building on (rather fittingly) Munkbron.

Walking up the narrow steps you are greeted by a knight in shining armour who guards the entrance to where it is hoped the pub’s keenly awaited 350L microbrewery will soon start producing a range of exclusive porters and stouts.

It was to be honest a little hard for me to orientate myself at first. I got the odd feeling I had stumbled into the entrance of a museum by mistake. It took a couple of wrong turns to discover that the pub itself is stashed away deep in the vaulted basement of this historic building.

With it’s worn stone steps, uneven whitewashed walls carved out of rock and dark brick vaulted ceilings Monks Porter House cannot fail to make a lasting impression on you. A number of small ‘alcoves’ offer drinkers and diners plenty of privacy should they need it, making this a great place to come with your ‘other half’. The bar itself is rather small, neat and modern, with trendy bronze-coloured tower fonts technically capable of dispensing 56 different types of draft beer.

I say technically as the actual selection is as yet far smaller than that, albeit an eclectic range of tasty Swedish and international beer brands and styles.

The only thing I couldn’t work out was why the designers decided to put up a wall of computer screens behind the bar which beamed out prices and special offers exactly like the ones you see at McDonalds.

I stood there fully expecting the barman to say “would you like a cheeseburger with your Hornbeer Cranberry Bastard sir?”

The food was excellent (I had a deliciously buttery cup of chanterelle soup to start with followed by a Porter Steak washed down with a malty sweet brown ale) and the service utterly professional.

I walked out of the new Monks happy and contended with the feeling it was more like a restaurant that served great beers than a place I would go just for a drink and to socialise. Having said that it’s early days for this Monk and speaking with one of the team working there a little later it’s clear they have plenty of ambitious plans in the pipeline.

If Monks was a ‘work in progress’ however then Pubologi is the finished article.

Just a short stroll down Stora Nygatan I was lucky enough to find myself sitting down in this ‘hybrid bar’ on its opening night.

Now there are plenty of places in Stockholm that try to be cool. The problem is that if you’re trying you very often aren’t. Pubologi is COOL, spelt out in big shiny metal letters like the ones that dangle from the bar’s front window.

It’s hard to describe a place that by its own admission isn’t a bar, isn’t a restaurant and isn’t a traditional pub. It’s one of those places you sit down in and spend most of your time gazing around with a smile on your face just checking things out. It’s a case study in attention to detail, managing to cram tonnes of finesse into a tiny space that seats just 25 people.

And therein lies the secret of its undoubted upcoming success. Pubologi brings everyone together for a unique dining experience in which you sit at something akin to a desk and pull out a drawer containing your spoon, knife, fork, menu and even a cute little wooden butter knife.

Rather than the somewhat private and ‘disconnected’ dining areas at Monks here you rub elbows with the stranger sitting next to you, although in such a laid back atmosphere they probably wont stay strangers for very long.

So what about the beer? Pubologi have done the opposite of Monks and kept the beer offering very lean, with ‘just’ 8 craft beers on draft, dispensed by fonts that spell out the pub’s name (just another of those lovely touches).

All the beers come in small, medium or large servings, poured into elegant oversized wine glass that give you plenty of room to swirl (and we all know how important that is don’t we!)

I went for the Punk IPA and a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. Both were stunningly fresh and aromatic and (despite the fact I had only eaten less than an hour before) did some serious making out with a paper cone of mixed fritters served with two different types of mayonnaise.

Pubologi may have difficulty spelling out what it is but I don’t.

Pubologi is spelt C-O-O-L.

They say in London you are never more than a 5 minute walk from a good pub. In Stockholm you may have to walk a little further but there are plenty of great places to enjoy beer while out and about in the Swedish capital.

Whenever I’m in the city I tend to ‘do the rounds’ of my favourite bars and earlier this week I visited four of my ‘regulars’. I thought it might be fun – and possibly useful – to write a quick ‘pub guide’ to them in case you ever find yourself wandering the streets of the Stockholm looking for somewhere to drink great beer.

Remember these four pubs are part of a growing list of great Stockholm pubs and bars I like to drink at (currently totalling over 20) so in the next few months I’ll attempt to visit as many as I can and review them here at BeerSweden.

Whenever I fancy a big Belgium beer I like to pull up a stool in the classy Duvel Café located on Vasagatan near the central train station. Together with its ‘sister’ watering hole Pressklubben/Bakfickan next door it serves an impressive and prestigious range of Belgium beers, including many vintage and cuvee bottles. The food is also excellent – albeit rather pricey.

From here you can take a very pleasant walk down Drottninsgatan, through the Parliament buildings, along the cobbled streets of Gamla Stan (Stockholm’s ‘old town’), emerging at Slussen and the area of Stockholm known as Södermalm.

Here you find the last three pubs I’m writing about today, all within comfortable walking distance of each other.

The first is Oliver Twist on Repslagargatan 6, a place I have probably spent entirely too much time in over the years. The problem is it’s such an Aladdin’s cave of beer that once you enter it’s almost impossible to leave. The fact the staff are incredibly friendly and knowledgeable and it’s possibly the best pub in Sweden to hunt down rare US micro beers doesn’t help matters either!

From OT head towards Medborgarplatsen, hang a left and you’ll walk right by my next favourite haunt, Krogen Soldaten Svejk. And you may actually walk right by it if you didn’t know better, as to be honest this pub looks a little ‘ramshackle’ from the outside. But step inside and you’re transported to Prague, with faded, flaking walls, tiny tables (that you can never fit more than a couple of pints on) and high bar stools crammed into the pub’s tight corners. If you want to sample the best draft Pilsner Urquell in Sweden you have to come here. Also pours a range of other authentic Czech beers on tap and serves huge, filling portions of traditional Czech food.

A short walk along Folkungagatan brings you to the final stop on this particular pub tour – the Bishops Arms. As part of a chain of pubs located throughout Sweden ‘the Bishops’ has gained a deserved reputation as a place to enjoy great beers, albeit if the décor does sometimes reminds me of drinking in the English pub at the Disneyland resort. Manager Johan is mad about his micros and always has an intriguing selection of bottles from northern Europe, the US and Canada, as well as several Swedish micros to try.

By now most of you know the whole sorry story. The volcanic ash cloud that has shut down Swedish airspace has stopped BrewDog founder James Watt from attending his own party in the Swedish capital and I am left sitting here stranded in Umeå all thirsty and frustrated.

But although BeerSweden couldn’t make it to tonight’s Stockholm BrewDog party that’s not to mean we can’t cover the event! Thanks to the power of the Internet and mobile phones some faithful (and utterly amazing) BeerSweden followers are taking pictures of the event to give us a ‘live-ish’ look from inside the biggest BrewDog party ever seen in Sweden.

I’ll post every photo I get as soon as I get them so if you couldn’t make it there then sit back in your chair wherever you are, pour yourself a cold one and follow the fun online!

The BeerSweden faithful Niklas and Claes. Cheers and Beers guys!!

Late comers missed the only bottle of Bismarck, so it was more a question of 'Lick the Bismarck'" Nice one Christian!

A splash of Bismarck and some Zeitgeist.

Sander missed the Bismarck but he's making up for it with a drop of Penguin.

Annica gets her BrewDog tattoo. They're a bugger to wash off. Trust me I know!

Nice T-shirt!

Dare I write this? Annica goes Hardcore......

Annica again, this time with some Abstrakt 1. At this pace I give Annica another 30 minutes....

Nicklas has sent in the first 'mood' pictures! The banners are out and it's only minutes to go before the BrewDog beer orgy begins!

Apparently the party opened to the sound of, you've guessed it, Who let the Dogs Out!

Let the 'sampling' begin! Annica enjoys a Penguin. Sent in by Christian and Nicklas!

Who let the BIG dogs out? This is the ONLY bottle of Sink the Bismarck available! Christian the snapper again!

My mouth is watering. Literally!!! Is that Sink the Bismarck I see!!!??

Only a few minutes into the party and it's standing room only at the bar.

Abstrakt 1 on tap - I believe for the first time anywhere on the planet?