Three Years Ago Today

I thought I'd look back on my blog on today's day in past years. Well in this instance three years ago. I was writing about a rant by a geezer from Marston's, which was wide ranging, but gave CAMRA a good kicking. There are some good comments from a guy called Woolpack Dave (whatever happened to him?) and a wide boy called Gazza.

Even if I say so myself, it is pretty good and the comments seem equally valid today.  We haven't moved on that much in three years. Or have we? Read it all here.

This day in 2008 I was singing Glasgow's praises, but the rant is far better.

Was He Joking?

Spring was in the air as me and E strolled into Middleton to walk part of the way to the pub, a distant four and a half miles hence. A tall, slim figure was coming the other way. I recognised him immediately as J W Lees Second Brewer, or rather, to give him his proper title, Brewhouse Manager. We stopped for a quick chat. "On the way to the Tavern?" he posed. "Yes" I replied for it is hard to deny that I am a creature of habit on a Sunday. "Tried the "Silver Bullet yet?" he asked, referring to Lees new seasonal beer. I replied that I hadn't yet seen it anywhere, therefore hadn't tried it. "Too hoppy for me" he said, hurrying off to his local Lees pub to watch City.

Now I am known at Lees for my liking of hops. I was having my leg pulled. Wasn't I?

"This auburn beer is brewed with spicy Challenger hops for
a full, fruity flavour and a Bramling Cross / Perle blend at
the end for a slightly mellower finish."

Like the Pub? - Don't Like the Beer?

There are loads of good things in London and loads of bad. Like most places really. We'll all have our own lists I am sure. When it comes to pubs though, London has some crackers. Many of them are just how you'd like a pub to be - or rather - they are just how I like a pub to be. You for all I know, would like a big barn with blasting gangsta music, crack openly on sale, an underlying frisson of impending violence and wall to wall people drinking out of bottles - though of course why would you be reading my blog if you did?

Near our flat there are two, among the many, that I particularly like despite beery considerations. They are worth a mention as they seem to be real pubs. Proper places where actual people go more than once, rather than, as is the case with many parts of London, where they just end up after work, then disappear into every compass point there is. That is the nature of London of course, but people do drink there and some of them even seem to go to pubs to the extent that they are known by name and it isn't "Hello Love."

So what do I like about London pubs so much? Well often it is that they have nice original features. They will have lighting dim enough to make the place feel cosy, but bright enough to see a hand in front of your face. The sort of cosseting snugness that makes you feel once you are in, that the world and all its troubles are far away and can be forgotten for a while. There will likely be nooks and crannies - I like them - and often, there will be big picture windows, bric-a-brac, old brewery mirrors, snob screens, etched windows and an interesting and varied clientèle. There will likely be comfy bench seating and mismatched furniture, because it has been acquired over the years. It will shine like a new pin and a friendly barperson will smile at you and say "What can I get you?", not the moronic Manchester greeting of "You all right there?" OK I exaggerated the smiling greeting bit, but you get the picture.

I am not seeking, grail like, Orwell's Moon Under Water. Real pubs do exist, but the illusion is often shattered when you, the cask beer drinker, peruse the bar. Then your heart sinks. There is nothing you'd like to drink. Or you may even know in advance, because it is a brewery you don't like, that you are unlikely to find yourself more than marginally satisfied ale wise. (This does take some of us back to when someone in the company would say in a horrified tone, in response to a proposal, "I'm not going there. It's a bloody Bass/Greenalls/Tetley/Whitbread, or whatever house, while some other wise monkey would chime in "Oh c'mon. It's a nice pub.")

Ah yes. Nice pubs. One near me which we have gone into off and on over the years, is a Shepherd Neame pub. It is snug and cosy, long and fairly narrow, but it opens out. It has a mixed set of customers and ticks most of my other boxes. The beer just doesn't. Not the quality of dispense, but you just can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear - and Shep's cask beer is at best a sow's ear. But I - we - like this pub and among other things, the installation of a modern juke box which isn't played at deafening level, has found me, a music in pubs disliker,suggesting we go there. It has over a million songs this juke box and the pub barman chats to you, remembers you, discusses football with you. The other pub near us that we, well me really like, does have a reasonable choice of beer, but keeps it so badly you want to offer your services free, as cellarman for a week, just to show the bastards how its done. But I like it, though it has been knocked about a bit, because it is a really good pub in that kind of indefinable way you get sometimes.

Anyway, I suppose I have answered my own question. If you like pubs, the beer can never be your sole reason for going there. "Pint of Spitfire please and anyone playing that jukebox?"

Photo nicked from www.whatpub.com

Here's a Good Idea

Last night at the Baum in Rochdale, I was taking a few trial pictures before starting our presentation to them as CAMRA Pub of the Year. Hence this one of the bar. Note the little sample glasses in front of the pumps. For some time now the Baum has these dinky little glasses to show the customers what the beers on offer look like. I'm forever asking bar staff the colour of an unfamiliar beer (most have no idea of course.) Here's a simple and elegant solution, which provides great and cheap customer service and makes life easier all round.

I am not sure if I've seen it before, but isn't this a good idea?

Maybe that's why the Baum is such a good pub. 

Hydes Numbers Don't Add Up

You may or may not have noticed that one of the four remaining Manchester Family Brewers, Hydes has decided to close its Moss Side brewery and move to a green field site.  The main point of this being the age and location of the venerable brewery itself.   (I have visited it and it is indeed very cramped and yes, very old.)  The family remain firmly committed to brewing and the new site, though smaller, will produce exclusively Real Ales. It is expected that they will produce a core range plus seasonals and special brews.  The family will remain as owners and will take an active role in the running of the new brewery, though all the free trade business has been sold to Thwaites.

That was roughly the picture in January, though I have omitted some of the more mundane details.  Since then it has been revealed  that the new £2 million brewery will be based in the former Greenalls Distribution Centre at Media City in Salford. This is a modern 20,000 sq foot  industrial unit and it is expected that the new brewery will be fully operational by September / October.  The brewery will be a fully automated, brand-new brewing set -up, with an initial capacity of 5,000 barrels per year.  This is a huge fall from current capacity and production and even allowing for the loss of contract brewing (including cask Boddingtons) is quite astonishing.  The brewery is probably knocking out around 40,000 barrels currently, though it was as much as 88,000 barrels when Boddies was still being bought in quantity.

According to their web site Hydes has 66 pubs. A 5000 barrel brewery would be able to supply each pub with  around six nines a week.  The obvious conclusion from that is that most of the requirements of the Hydes estate are going to be bought in from elsewhere.  A two million pound brewery, producing around 100 barrels a week, just doesn't seem economic.

 I understand the Hydes Production Manager, Paul Jeffries will be guest speaker at Stockport and South Manchester CAMRA Branch meeting this week. The answers to the many hard questions that should arise will be very instructive.

This blog piece draws heavily on CAMRA information. I have also heard the cask Boddies is likely to be discontinued.

On the Slide

I have plummeted from number five to number eighteen on whatever Wikio is called now.

WTF?

Apologies to Boak and Bailey

I had planned this post Saturday night. Honest. Not exactly like this, but more or less. I am not copying you or jumping on your rolling bandwagon. Cross my heart.

Did you know I have another blog? Bet you didn't. It isn't open and was started way before this one. This one started on 26/11/2007 and the other one started on 21/2/2007. It inspired Tandleman's Beer Blog, but is really just a personal diary, not about beer. Why am I telling you this? Well here is an extract from a couple of weeks ago:

"The weekend was good, though it did start off with a long lecture from E about how, as we aren't getting any younger, there has arisen an urgent need to visit expensive restaurants. I haven't felt this need, though mortality is always at the back of my mind. So unreceptive was I, that it took quite a lot of time to knock the idea into my head to an extent that allowed me to go to bed - albeit at half past bloody two. I am not saying an excess of wine afflicted E, but in the morning, it somehow seemed less important to her."

Nonetheless the idea wasn't completely abandoned. Thus it was we booked one of London's top Indian restaurants, Cafe Spice Namaste.  It is rather convenient for our flat and falls into E's definition (albeit at the bottom end of her expectations.)  We have been before, but were vaguely disappointed and it was some time ago, so we duly reported, had highs and not so highs and left full up, but feeling perhaps it lacks the precision of cooking, particularly in spicing and sauces, that is so important in Indian food and that you will get in say, Mother India's Cafe in Glasgow. But this isn't about the grub.

 Of course before choosing a tasting menu so we'd get the full gamut of the kitchen, we wondered what to drink. There was quite an extensive wine list, but wine doesn't really go with curry in my view. The beer list was one in number. Cobra - in big or small bottles. I remarked to E at the time, that while Cobra was perfectly decent  (though pretty neutral in taste) that an IPA would have been nice, or maybe a wheat  beer of some sort would have been worth a go, to complement what was a pretty diverse set of flavours. Alas no, it was Cobra or nothing.  This is where we come back to Boak and Bailey. They've said what I wanted to about the subject in generic terms. In this actual example, Cafe Spice Namaste has a menu that is very well put together, diverse and thoughtful and clearly chosen with care. The beer list though was a cliché. A single cliché at that.

This isn't a go at this particular restaurant. They are doing what most do, as B&B point out. But is that really good enough? I don't eat out in "proper" restaurants all that much and when I do, I'd like a decent choice of beer. Please.


Many years ago in Edinburgh I enjoyed a beautiful bottle of Deuchar's IPA in a Leith Curry House. That would be a contender. Or White Shield, or a Schneider Weisse.

Scarily Good

"What's the difference between characterful and rough?" I pondered from the top deck of the 55 bus bound for Oxford Street. Wind back two hours and I was walking tentatively from Walthamstow Central station towards the King William IV, the home of Brodie's Brewery. I say tentatively as I wasn't entirely convinced I was heading in the right direction and I was in what seemed a rather dodgy looking part of London. A quick check at a bus stop map reassured me and crossing the busy junction at Lea Green Road found me outside the pub, unscathed.

The pub itself is great. A proper pub with bench seating, two large rooms and long windows giving it a bright feel. Two very handsome Truman Hanbury and Buxton mirrors caught my approving eye. Fine examples indeed. The bar positively bristled with handpumps, almost all selling Brodies own beers, though I did spot a Magic Rock one. A few locals with proper Lahndan accents conversed and all seemed well with the world. Brodies Citra was superb for such a weak beer, but it was the Shoreditch Sunshine that er.. shone out for me. A super golden beer with plenty of malt to shore up a Galaxy hop driven taste. A cracking beer. I tried the American Brown which was a good example of the style and the locals favourite Bethnall Green Bitter which was a very decent drop. I didn't try the strong beers on as I'd a full afternoon ahead, but what I had was very good, cool and in great condition.  Nor did I ask if they did thirds, but that would be great for trying a few more. Either way, I will be back.

Thanks to Twitter I was advised to get the 55 bus back from opposite the pub. A stroke of luck saw one come immediately and a top deck front seat gave me a birds eye view of things as the bus wended its way back west. I noted quite a few closed and boarded pubs and many ex pubs put to other uses, but plenty still seemed to be open, so a mixed picture. Now back to my question. I am not sure exactly, but visually the areas I passed through on the way back, like Hackney seemed "characterful". Leyton seemed "rougher", but I couldn't really define why. There you have it then. Its just a feeling.


I had intended to nip into the Old Fountain,but missed my stop and carried on to Clerkenwell and the Gunmakers. The irrepressible Jeff Bell was there. The beer was good and sparkled, though Jeff tells me his range of beers are chosen to suit his local customers who prefer less hop forward darker beers. Fine. He still keeps them perfectly and it is stil a great little pub. I enjoyed my drinks, particularly East London Brewery Pale Ale. No visit to Clerkenwell is complete without a visit to Craft. I have never had a bad pint there. A couple of halves of porter and stout would certainly have benefited from a sparkler though. Thornbridge Creamy Vanilla Stout needed the creaminess a sparkler would have brought. I had a nice chat with fellow Scot Tom, the Manager, who doesn't believe in them. Cutting a long story short, we agreed to differ, but thanks to him for talking to me about it. And I must repeat, sparkling a well conditioned beer does not flatten the beer, which was Tom's main concern.

So, a good afternoon. No bad beer at all, a smashing pub that was new to me visited, a chat about sparklers and good timing with buses and trains. London worked well yesterday.

Best beer of the day? Shoreditch Sunshine. What a good beer. They know their stuff at Brodies.

Where to Go?

I have the whole day ahead of me here in London. Where shall I go? Maybe to check out one or two things? Is the Draft House cask beer any good? Is the Southampton Arms still buzzing? What about Mason and Taylor, not far at all and like the Draft House, shall we say challenged in the cask ale department, at least it was previously? That certainly could do with a check, as similar to the Draft House, I like the place immensely, but not so much the warm beer. Maybe Welsh beer at the Rake? I know. Welsh beer, but still.

Maybe out to check out Brodies at the King Bill? I could even go to Camden and have a gander at BrewDog - only kidding - you knew that - or I could just go to Clerkenwell and know I'll get good beer.

London's beer world is at my feet. Better get dressed then. Ideas welcome.  It's still a while until opening time.

Of course I need to go to Waitrose for the shopping first.

They Do Things Differently There

The Bruges Beer Festival is a fantastic event held in a wonderfully historic building, the Zalon van de Halletore, bang in the middle of Bruges. It attracts beer drinkers from near and far and from Greater Manchester. Now as a regular organiser of beer festivals, I of course ran my professional eye over it, just to see what was done well and what wasn't. Firstly, one major difference is that it is free to get in. Yep. Cost of admission is nil. It seems the venue is donated by the city authorities who rather like the event being there and is to the credit of the organisers that they pass this benefit on to the customers. One of the locals told me that it is the city that dictates the date of the festival, by the availability of the premises. Fair enough really. 

The other very big difference is that the beer stands are all run and staffed by the brewers themselves, serving a mix of bottled and draught beer. Yet another difference is that you pay a single price for the beer and use a standard glass, which I think you buy and which is not refundable. I say "I think" because as we were guests of the organisers at our GBBF BSF AGM, we were given our glasses, though not unfortunately the beer, which is bought with little red plastic tokens at €1.25 a pop. There is one other aspect that is very different. The place was scarily rammed. To a dangerous level in my opinion as a Beer Festival Health and Safety Officer. You literally had to push your way through the busiest parts of the venue and any trip to find a beer, was a tiresome trial of endurance. It was easier to go outside and round the building than to attempt to go from one end of the very large rooms to the other. God knows what would have happened if a fire had broken out, though oddly, as the day progressed, that slight nagging concern became less and less prominent.

Now of course the wise and the tickers had got in early and nabbed the seats that were available. This is indeed a tickers festival and well known adherents of the faith were dotted around, marking off "required" beers and then vanishing for ages in pursuit of them, due to the crush. Lesser mortals such as me just randomly grabbed beers from the nearest stall, though of course there was some discernment and advice heeding. I was after lambics and gueuzes and in the main, these were handily gathered together in a downstairs section of the fest. This did involve rather a long journey to get there, but was well worth it to sample some really delightful beers. It was a pleasure to be able to drink Boon, 3 Fonteinen, Hanssens and Cantillon side by side - well one after the other - only one glass remember. Back upstairs I made sure of a visit to De Cam for the spectacularly good beers there. Nor did I forget a couple of Lindemans Cuvee Rene.

Later as some of the early attendees staggered off, we got a seat at a table and enjoyed friendly chats with some locals - local to Bruges that is and some more familiar faces from our neck of the woods. I won't list other beers tried - I can't remember anyway - but I liked most of them, noted that hops were very evident in quite a few and that strong golden ales are far too easy to drink. My other top tips are that older pourers of beer are far more generous than younger ones and that if you want good, solid advice on Belgian beers, sit near John Clarke.

As the title says, they do do things differently there, but apart from there being far too many people in, I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and didn't have a single beer that I thought was poor.  Belgium is great.

Another top tip from JC was to visit Café Rose Red, which given that we'd had a few, we found surprisingly easily - just round the corner.

"Boston Lager" - A Follow Up

The Brewer's Guardian had an article on the story I spoke about yesterday -about Sam Adams Boston Lager being brewed by Shepherd Neame. I was quite struck by this quote from Sam Adams founder Jim Koch. The articles says that Koch also has a message for any doubters: "Taste it. Unless you’ve become wedded to slight oxidation it’ll be better. It will be a better Samuel Adams than you’ve been getting because it’ll be fresher."

Now let's dissect that statement.  Firstly "it will be fresher". Unarguable. Secondly "it will be better"  presumably because fresh beer tastes better. OK.  And lastly, though he says it first,  "Unless you’ve become wedded to slight oxidation it’ll be better"  Right. So all Sam Adams beer is slightly oxidised, which presumably means that much imported beer is slightly oxidised? Presumably many beer geeks forking up top dollar for all these fancy imports are, in some cases at least,  getting slightly oxidised beer?  Of course, many are so strong and strongly flavoured that it will scarcely show and hardly be noticed, but does anyone observe staleness in imported beers?

 Not that this should matter to any great extent (some would argue that cask conditioning is all about serving oxidised beer) as long as people are happy with what they are drinking.  But it is instructive to know it.

Read the Brewer's Guardian article here.

"Boston" Lager

Sam Adam's Boston Lager is one of those beers that a lot of people associate with the term "craft", though it is of course brewed in its millions of barrels in the US. It is very widely available in the US and elsewhere in the world, including the UK. I learn though that Sam Adam's lager, for the first time ever, is to be brewed abroad under licence and the UK will claim that honour. Shepherd Neame will brew and package all UK Sam Adams lager under licence at Faversham, replacing imported stuff and substituting European size 33 and 50cl bottles for the American 35.5cl ones.

The reasons given are interesting: "The primary aim is to improve the freshness of the Sam Adams we’re offering to British beer drinkers," said Boston Beer's founder, Jim Koch. Now I have often wondered about the freshness of imported beers as I watch people hand over infeasibly large amounts of money for them and there you seem to have it - there is in the industry a doubt raised about the freshness of beers such as these, to the extent that brewing under licence is being undertaken. There is another aspect to this too. Graeme Craig, Shepherd Neame’s sales and marketing director, said "We’re seeing growing interest in the US craft beer scene and we both felt this was a better way of doing things rather than an elongated supply chain."

So. The best way to provide drinkers with craft beer from abroad is to brew it here? Really?  Or is Boston Lager a craft beer at all? Was it ever? When did it cease to be? Or when will it cease to be? One thing is for sure. The term "craft beer" is one that the big brewers and marketers see has some legs. But in exploiting it, will they devalue it, rendering an undefined term even more vague than it is already? It also seems to this writer at least, that conflating US and UK definitions may make an already rocky road a touch rockier.

Time will tell, but is this really a good move? Is Samuel Adams no longer craft, but just a brand? Questions, questions.

Clearly this is a move for a "craft" beer that is in effect little more than a commodity beer, but as a believer in the thin end of the wedge.......

A Heads Up

On my return to Manchester after my visit to Scotland, I popped into the Angel for a restorative pint. Luckily for me there was Hawkshead NZPA on the bar. Now this fits the description "dangerously drinkable" like a glove, with its zingy New Zealand hops and its six per cent strength. Being of the twitter persuasion, I tweeted my experience. Matt, the Hawkshead brewer, replied that I should drink it while I can, as it will be rested for a couple of months to be replaced by a similar strength beer with all American hops.

A double edged sword that.  Something to look forward to and something to miss, but I share the information as a public service.

Luckily I have a couple of bottles of NZPA left. I will be sure to eke them out carefully.

Browned Off

I've passed through Glasgow a couple of times in the last couple of weeks on my way to my Mum's in Dumbarton. Dumbarton offers no real ale, well no real anything these days really, so I always stop off in Glasgow for couple of pints on the way. Usually it is one of two Wetherspoons between the station I arrive in and the one I leave from, or the Drum and Monkey, though often this Caledonian Brewery obsessed bar is passed by. I am no fan of Caley beers.

Glasgow denizen, sparkler hater and blogger Robsterowksi recommended I try Browns on George Square as a change, as they sell Harviestoun Blonde. So I did and found both times, in this glitteringly posh bar, that despite silver founts adorned with Doom Bar and Harviestoun Blonde pumpclips, only Doom Bar on offer. The second time (this week) I queried this and was told that they only have one "spike" (I assume they mean spear extractor) so they can only ever offer one real ale at a time. The barman advised me it is usually Doom Bar, as that is most popular.

Now that's up to them, but why imply that two are available? I dislike this misleading way of doing things. It is presumably to ensure that the "look" of the bar is maintained. Better though to take the clip off when the beer isn't available, or better still to buy another extraction spear. They are cheap as chips and this place, believe me cost millions.

Of course, you could always go to the nearby JDWs and choose from a dozen real ales. Which is what I did.

Glasgow of course is a lager city. I doubt if Browns sell much cask anyway and I suspect it will buzz at night with or without it. It was empty both lunchtimes though.

Pub Design

A mate of mine was clearing his late mother's house and came across a book he thought I'd like. Too true I would. It is an unusual "beer book" as it is written by a pub architect and gives a great insight into how breweries designed pubs, their thinking behind designs and a lot of "do's and don'ts.

Written by Ben Davis, the book, The Traditional English Pub is dedicated to "the memory of the Architects Department, Ind Coope Ltd, disbanded on 3oth May 1980" and was published in 1981. The author doesn't confine himself to architecture, as there are chapters on Understanding the Pub, and sub chapters on breweries, licensees and some case studies. His observations on the "Essence of Pubness" are simple and compelling. According to Davis there are five essentials that a customer consciously or sub consciously seeks in a pub. He likes to feel welcome. He likes to feel at home. He likes to give and enjoy friendliness. He likes a good hearted atmosphere and importantly, "he likes a sense of continuity."  He goes on to explain how a good pub architect will try and make these qualities easier to achieve by good design, whether by new build or refurbishment.  At the end of the book, written by Frank Bradbeer, there is a Pub Design Guide which explains the steps from concept to completion.

While some of this is pretty dated, it is a simply fascinating read and takes me back, in my mind to the 1980's, but in a good way.  It is also interesting that the author determines (and I agree with him) that the pub is a English rather than British institution.  As Davis puts it "The pub is English.  The Scots drink in bars, and the Welsh, bless them, will drink anywhere.  The Irish had the good sense to hold on to the pubs the English gave them, but their native manner of drinking is in grocers' shops." Perhaps these observations may not meet with unqualified agreement, but I reckon I can see what he means to a fair extent.

The book does hark back to a lost era and clearly Davis was an Ind Coope man through and through, but in some ways, reading it now, that is its strength and a reminder, that contrary to popular opinion, pubs didn't just happen. They were often designed by very clever men and indeed, as the author makes clear, women.

The author on handpumps: "they have a sculptural strength and elegance which, even regarded as abstract form, gives delight."

The Traditional English Pub.  A way of Drinking is published by the Architectural Press: London. ISBN 085139 055 2

Outrageous Behaviour

I read in the Morning Advertiser that in some areas, groups of licensees are operating "unofficial" minimum pricing schemes, whereby they agree not to sell alcohol at below a certain cost. Let's be clear about this. It is illegal to do so. It is operating a price fixing cartel, which is an unlawful activity in this country.

As if that isn't bad enough, it seems that such schemes are being encouraged, or even suggested by the police, or at least by the local licensing bobbies that attend PubWatch schemes. Now you, like me, might think that if such a thing was suggested, that the licensees would firmly turn down these illegal suggestions and maybe would actually report such goings on. But no - it seems some go along with it, despite the fact that it is they, not the police that would end up in (quite serious) trouble for so doing.

I talk to landlords a fair bit and there is much pressure - pressure that is contrary to the Licensing Act - put on publicans to do this and that from time to time, whether it be close early, or not open at all at the "request" of the police, despite their legal right to do so. When I point out the police can't do such and such a thing under the law, the answer is inevitably the same. "If  I don't, they'll make life difficult for me."

The police have a hard enough time in administering public order, but they do tend to lump the innocent with the guilty. When they moan about late night drunkenness, it is invariably at certain venues that are repeat offenders, The police already have the powers to deal with these under the existing law,  just as they can lock people up for being drunk and disorderly, exhibiting behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace, or in extreme cases, for being drunk and incapable. It is time they enforced existing laws and stopped encouraging the breaking of the law by hard pressed publicans. It is equally time that politicians addressed why existing powers are not being exercised, rather than pointless posturing and tinkering with prices.

The cops know where the problems are, be they completely pissed people, or the pubs that serve them when they are pissed (small minorities in both cases) and they should get on with sorting them out and leave the rest of us alone.

Politicians should make it clear that they have to do so.

A Good Beer Day

Now that my Belgian man flu has subsided to a cough and my nose has dried up, it was time to consider beer. Beer with taste and where better to start than with a bottle of Hawkshead New Zealand Pale Ale, kindly given to me by Matt, the brewer when he visited the National Winter Ales Festival.

I have to declare an interest here. I am a big fan of Hawkshead beers and will sup them wherever I see them. From Windermere Pale through to NZPA, they are tremendously well made beers. Hint to other brewers. Make your beers as clean as Matt's and you are half way there. Now if I was, say, the Beer Nut, I'd wax lyrical about tropical fruits, wonderful hoppy aromas and that sort of thing. But I'm not and he's way better at that kind of thing, so I won't. Instead I'll compare it to the draught (cask) version and instead tell you it is a pretty good approximation, with the carbonation held at a slightly lower level than most bottled beers, allowing the craftsmanship of the beer to zing out. It was good. Very good.

So how do you follow that? You go to the Baum in Rochdale and purchase a pint of Ossett Snow Drop, a pale, well balanced beer with moderate hoppiness, through to a strongly bitter and hoppy finish. Then you toddle down to the Regal Moon and spend the rest of the evening with your chums drinking Ossett JPA, another pale beer, but this time much more hop forward, while avoiding that wateriness that spoils many such beers.

There you have it. I have mentioned both breweries before and no doubt will again. Why? Because they are bloody good!


If you want to put a date in your diary, mark May down. Ossett will be putting Citra out. It is a stunner.

In My Liverpool Home

Even as a former resident of the City of Liverpool, I often find it hard to like Liverpool's  Cain's Brewery, due to a number of factors, not least of which is that their beer is pretty much crap. Nonetheless, I am on their email list and couldn't resist showing you all this pump clip for their newest beer, Blonde Bird Ale, featuring the wonderful city emblem of the Liver Bird. It is  the first new cask beer brewed by their new Head Brewer, Jim Kerr.

Hopefully the beer will be really good - I do hope so - but either way, I love the pumpclip.



For me though, Cain's Brewery will always be Higson's Brewery even though it started out as, err, well, Cain's Brewery.  It's a long story.

Reassuringly Expensive

There are plenty of folks around, though they'll likely deny it, that see expensive beer as a good thing for a number of reasons. There are aspiring brewers that wish to sell the fruits of their labour at top dollar; there are those that begrudge the cost, or feel superior drinking beer that others can't afford, especially if it is rare and has come from afar (rarity and distance makes for much better beer - a little known factoid.) I could go on, but you get the picture.

In Belgium recently I discovered that one of my favourite styles, gueuze and its cousin lambic are pretty well a snob's dream in Belgium. They are bloody expensive and to give you the picture, think around three times the cost of an Orval. Now of course you could argue that being so rare, so delicate and so difficult to produce, that this is the inevitable outcome. But of course, until relatively recently, that rarity wasn't reflected in the price. There are a few ways to look at this. One is that small artisanal brewers are at last getting just reward for their efforts, or, that the goose that laid the golden egg is being slowly killed, or perhaps, more benignly, are being elevated to a very expensive treat.

Speaking to Tim Flynn who runs the redoubtable New Oxford in Salford while at the Bruges Beer Festival, reveals that he can put almost no mark up on these beers, as they so expensive to buy in the first place, but he offers them for additional choice.  Now I didn't get the chance to check out supermarket prices in Belgium and they may well be reasonable, but it seems I won't be drinking very much gueuze/lambic in pubs, as to my mind you need several to fully get you in the zone, so that you can really appreciate the style.  That would be a dear do.

Maybe you don't find this expensive beer thing worrying at all? Is gueuze and lambic a special case?

My sour beer needs were met by Rodenbach at normal cost and I feasted on gueuze at the Bruges Beer Fest.

This Doesn't Add Up

Scotland on Sunday had a long piece yesterday titled "The SNP's Drink Problem". This discussed minimum unit pricing of alcohol as a means of limiting binge drinking and associated social problems. There wasn't that much new in it and of course, it was mainly about the internal politicking that accompanies such things. One thing struck me about it though. The current unit price of alcohol - some kind of average I assume - is stated to be 43p for off sales. For cider it is 20p. The unit price over a bar is currently £1.31. I imagine the figures for England and Wales won't differ that much.

Now I usually leave this kind of thing to Mudgie, as he is much better at it, but it seems to me that any organisation or individual supporting increasing the minimum price in an effort to curtail anything is way off beam. Those for whom alcohol looms too large in their lives will still find ways to get smashed, probably at the expense of their family and own well being, or by illicit hooch or whatever, while those that have little by way of dosh, but drink responsibly at home, will get duffed in the purse to no good effect. I know these are points Mudgie has made before.

Turning to pubs, it would seem pretty damn obvious, that minimum pricing will not save a single pub.  I'm all for saving pubs though and like CAMRA, who support minimum pricing, I believe the pub is the most appropriate place to drink alcohol responsibly, but is this really the way to go about it? Maybe if minimum pricing had been considered long ago, before the gap got out of hand, a case for minimum pricing could be made, but now it just seems the wrong policy at the wrong time.   A case for supporting a ban on below cost selling of alcohol could certainly be made and could probably be supported, but minimum pricing is a dangerous Trojan Horse and support for it  seems to place CAMRA a little too close to the anti alcohol camp, a place where surely an organisation dedicated to beer drinking ought not to be?

The prohibitionists already have a foot in the door and minimum pricing wedges it open further.  It is no means certain that it will be to the advantage of pub drinkers and pubs as Mudgie points out. CAMRA as an organisation needs to think again.

One of the reasons given by CAMRA is to stop below cost selling, but that could be achieved through other means.  Their document to the Scottish Government conflates, wrongly I believe, the issues of minimum pricing and below cost sales.

True Story

You'll have read no doubt about the row that has seen a beer from Slater's Brewery banned from Houses of Parliament bars because of its "controversial name" - Top Totty. If you haven't, you can read the story here.

Each year I go away for a couple of nights boozing with three other mates. I'm the youngest to give you some background and I'm no spring chicken. Now Top Totty has been around for quite a few years now. It was one of the early pale, hoppy, golden ales and Slater's used to brew the beer in their pub in Eccleshall, Staffordshire. It had rather a good reputation in the North West.  Around the mid nineties, we called in the pub, the George,  dead on Sunday opening time, gasping for some TT to revive us after the previous night's supping. . Scanning the bar, we noted that our hoped for drink was conspicuous by its absence. "Where's the Top Totty?" quoth one of us. The two young and bonny barmaids eyed each other before one piped up "You are looking at it." All of us, including the barmaids fell about laughing.

Such innocent days.

It is an ill wind though that blows nobody any good. Slaters can't keep up with demand because of all the publicity.

Real Belgian Pubs

Can you get tired of Brugge, delightful though it is? Well yes you can if you are just as much a pub man as you are a beer man. There is a degree of repetitiveness in Brugge pub crawling and once you realise that you can get little by way of ordinary pub culture in the centre at least, you have to travel a little further. The good thing is that is easy to do. Trains are frequent and punctual, though not that cheap, but you can easily get about.

Thus it was that we found ourselves, following advice from assorted drunks, heading to Ostend and the coastal tram. There's two choices. Head towards France and Dunkirk (though it doesn't quite go there) or to the Dutch border at Knokke. Five euros for a day pass and off you go. Now my accomplice Graham has been to De Panne on the Dunkirk side, so off we went towards Knokke. Our inebriated associates had given limited advice; "Get off anywhere - it's all good" kind of summed it up. You can guess though that it ain't all good. If you like a lot of sand dunes it is, but when after forty odd minutes we had seen nothing obvious, we hopped off at Wenduine into what seemed like a ghost town. We concluded this was a summer resort and like most of ours, was kind of closed up for the winter. We could find nothing open other than two deserted looking hotels. And it was bloody freezing too. We hopped on the next tram. So much for "it's all good".

Blankenberge near Zeebrugge is another ten minutes towards Zeebrugge and a world away from Wenduine. Bustling and busy we had no problems finding good cheer. By the main tram stop and on the square we nipped into a likely looking pub. Brasserie Terminus - Koning Leopold III Plein 1 - is highly recommended for its friendliness and the choice of 80 odd beers didn't put us off either. Rodenbach on draught? That'll do nicely and accompanied by free WiFi and croque monsieurs, we were mightily content. Locals came in to eat and have a beer, the news was on the telly. It was comfortable and a world away from touristy Brugge.  We finished on La Trappe Isid'or on draught. At 8.6% and smooth as the inside of a maiden's thigh, it warmed the cockles a touch. We walked back through the busy town towards Blankenberge Park and the tram stop where we'd spotted a couple of likely suspects. The earlier sunshine had given way to snow flurries and then snow. By the time we reached the tram stop at Blankenberge Park it was blizzard like. It was so snowy by then, note taking (not that I did any) was out of the question, but there are three or four pubs there. We dashed into the one with the most beer signs, as it seemed a likely spot. If you don't like mixing with the locals, this might not have been the pub for you. In  Dutch speaking East Flanders, this was a French outpost. The half dozen customers, at two thirty in the afternoon were, frankly,  completely pissed - but jovial - and we chatted away amiably in our broken French. Great fun and though the beer list was limited,  putting up with Orval is not exactly a hardship. That's one of the delights of Belgian pubs. There is always something decent to be had.

Our next target was just round the corner and a quick dash  took us to a bustling locals bar and back to gutteral, incomprehensible Dutch.  Full of corners, nooks and crannies and a central bar, constant comings and going, a good  bottled beer selection,  plus draught Rodenbach ensured a good couple of hours. As the snow worsened and the light eerily faded, we reluctantly left. This was raw and cheery Belgian pub life and the place was a cosy and friendly haven from the outside world.  What more do you want?  Well more beer of course. Ostend itself (on the way back) has a few decent pubs, though probably a bit more upmarket, but were warm and cosy on a very snowy night.  We did some more Orval in and then hopped back to Brugge, where, to be honest, we had too much beer.

For someone that prefers pubs, it was interesting to note that despite the smoking ban , local pubs were thriving. The prices were good too here in the sticks - think €2.50 Orval and €3.00 Duvel - and though the pubs were rough and ready, welcomes were warm, service was unfailingly polite, cheerful and friendly. Belgium is perhaps not the most picturesque part of the world - at least not the Northern part - but it is genuinely good to be in and, as importantly, if you find the right pubs, they are great to drink in too.

When I wrote my Golden Pint Awards, I said one of my beer drinking aims for 2012 was a Belgian visit. That didn't take me long to sort out did it?

The pub is behind the tram! Next the Bruges Beer Festival

Inconvenient Truths

It is always instructive when a spat occurs in blogs, in which diametrically opposite views are aired. We have seen it over craft, over CAMRA, over sparklers (I must do another post on them soon - I need the ratings) and many other diverse subjects. Most of these sort of stick to the point and there is very little by way of personal insult, though, not always, as there are passionate points of view being aired  - sometimes by thin skinned and intemperate people. But on the whole it is all done in the best possible taste, though you'd have to be a pretty dumb cluck not to realise that under all the bonhomie, there is a lot that divides us in the so called "unifying world of of beer."

So back to the spat. No avoiding of personal insults here. This starts out as a blogged rebuttal by Melissa Cole about something unkind that our old friends BrewDog said about British Brewing being "closed and unfriendly". This seems to have annoyed Melissa more than a bit and she goes on to rebut this point of view in strong terms. Now you might think she'd just sigh and ignore it wouldn't you? But I bet she feels about her friends in the brewing industry, the way I feel about mine in CAMRA. When you see your friends attacked in a way you see as unfair,  you want to jump in on their side . I empathise with her in that respect, though recognising, like in CAMRA, everything in the British Beer Industry is far from perfect.  That does need to be said, though it would be far better perhaps, if it was said by others and not our bumptious friends from the North.

Like every good pub brawl, others start jumping in. It's worth a read, so I won't go too far in spoiling your fun, but it does seem to this writer at least, that far from being the confident know-alls that they portray, BrewDog are, underneath it all just a teeny bit insecure. They secretly want to be part of it all, but having burned their boats, they can't be, so just go around burning other peoples boats too. You see, to get help and to be liked, you have to be nice to other people - at least some of the time. I doubt that the lack of respect that they have shown to most British Beer makers, with the exception of a chosen few, has exactly endeared them, but they can hardly complain that having alienated everyone, that nobody likes them can they?

The British Brewing Industry is a broad church. It covers a lot of ground and the so-called "the liquid cardboard" produced by most, is the drink favoured by the majority of their customers, otherwise they wouldn't buy it surely?  It is also somewhat of an inconvenient truth.  Nonetheless, I too believe that there needs to be change. When talking about how  CAMRA should face the future with one National Executive member, I was struck by the observation that "CAMRA needs to be bolder. It needs to take a few risks."  I agree with that wholeheartedly.  The thing about all this is that there is more than a grain of truth behind the BrewDog assertion about the staidness of British brewing and yes, CAMRA has played a part in this. On the other hand, from my knowledge of brewers, there is little accuracy in comments about their "niceness."  They are unfailingly nice when you meet them. On that subject, BrewDog's own fallibility is pretty well proven too, but on the plus side, they do have a go at the different, even if they are wrong headed at times in not only what they do, but the way they go about it.

BrewDog talk about being "exciting and cool"  - though bumming about Ratebeer is neither.  They also overlook that there is a fine line between being cool and being naff.  Now I'm all for the "excitement "bit and  "cool"  is a part of their image and as mostly generationally inspired,  can be overlooked, but one thing is true.  As well as the "liquid cardboard", boldness and some more risk taking from a lot of British Brewing would not go amiss.

Does brewing fortune favour the bold? Is this another inconvenient truth?


Does anyone not think that as BrewDog gets bigger, they will fall into the same conventional trap as all bigger companies and compromise? Does anyone not think the gruesome twosome will not cash in sometime in the future?

The Quality Thing

So now that beer festivalitis has temporarily left me, I can return to the normal world of beer. Saturday saw a pub crawl of Manchester, though unfortunately I missed out on the start at the Port St Beer House, which I like. It was a change from the usual haunts and I was delighted to note excellent beer quality in the Crown and Kettle, the Castle, the Soup Kitchen, the Piccadilly and the Bank. Not every beer was to my taste, but I certainly couldn't complain about the condition or temperature of any. That's a good thing and I will return to this theme of quality much more in the future. Top beer of the day? Well a half of Old Tom was sublime in the Castle. I'm not a fan of Robinson's beers, as I consider the house yeast far too dominant, but a beer such as Old Tom can push that into the background readily enough. On cask and 8.5%, it was probably the pick of a decent day's supping and certainly debunked the myth that you can't put strong beers on cask.

One issue did come up. Jaipur was on in the Bank and once again it failed to hit the mark. Overly sweet and sticky, it just didn't appeal to me or any of my drinking companions and while it may be hitting the spot still for some, I'll be approaching it with much more scepticism than previously as I just don't seem to get a good pint of it and haven't for well over a year.

Returning to the issue of quality, I have become aware of - or rather, been reacquainted with - a fairly widespread problem of pubs that aren't thriving, buying beer in cash as they go along, with many resulting quality problems, such as green beer, hazy beer and beer that has dropped bright, but has not yet conditioned. This affects many pubs and I was advised at NWAF that Adnams are countering this problem by conditioning their beer for longer in the brewery before releasing it. Other brewers may be doing this too or thinking about it, but it is a widespread problem, often affecting tenanted pubs of small regional brewers and is a hidden but pernicious aspect to the doubtful viability of some pubs.  The brewery knows a pub is in trouble when the dray order is dropped and the beer is being bought for cash. Alarm bells clang loudly. 

Next time you get a duff pint in a brewery owned tenanted pub, consider if you can, that it may not have been presented as the brewer intends for reasons other than cellar incompetence.

Well Wasn't That Fun?

Bar the shouting (mostly internal) National Winter Ales Festival is over. It was stressful, but hopefully successful and dealing with the myriad problems thrown up by the venue, the public and the staff reminded me of work, but not in a good way. The public as we know are strangely fickle, but I have to say were mostly a delight. CAMRA members have many qualities and strengths, not all of them immediately apparent, but boy do they work hard. The ones that work at NWAF are dedicated and selfless, but nonetheless, it is all a bit like herding cats, bless 'em. But we got it all done after a fashion and hopefully everyone got something out of it.

Things don't stop though. Apart from the post mortem of NWAF which I'll chair, as the Organiser is buggering off to New Zealand for over a month, we'll have Oldham Beer Festival for my own CAMRA Branch at the end of April.

We must love it really.

My favourite beer? Hmm. Not sure but I doubt if Liverpool Organic's various efforts were surpassed by many.

National Winter Ales Festival

It starts today and runs until Saturday night. I'm very much involved, hence my radio silence.

Do come along. It will be great!

National Winter Ales Festival 2012
18-21 January 2012
Sheridan Suite, Manchester

Not Tasting Notes Exactly

While in Leeds on Christmas Eve, I took my wallet in my hands and nipped into Zak Avery's shop for a quick peruse. I bought four bottles and had a chat with Ghost Drinker, who seems a very nice chap. All the more so since he recognised me first, though fair enough, I did have an "I am Tandleman" T shirt on.

Two of the bottles remain undrunk and will be saved a for a couple of months, but since they are Schneider Hopfenweisse and are pretty strong, I have no fears for their subsequent drinkability. The other two were from Thornbridge. The first, their Koelsch tastealike, Tzara, described as a Koeln Style Beer and the second, the so very drinkable Kipling. Apart from a bottle of Jaipur when it first came out, I don't believe I've ever had a bottled Thornbridge beer before.  Now Koelsch is a beer style I like to think I know a little about, so how does Tzara measure up?  Pretty well actually. It has the appealing freshness and clarity of taste that singles good koelsch out, though perhaps, perversely,  it is a little bit too good, being what Koelsch ought to be rather than what it usually is. Nonetheless it is a great beer, not over carbonated, smooth and tasty, with just that hint of fruitiness and that noble German hop finish that should mark it out. And does.  Overall I wouldn't mind buying a few of these again if I could get them locally at a decent price.

What about Kipling.  Again it is the clarity of taste that appeals. Full of tropical flavours and each one pin sharp in a beer that translates brilliantly to bottle.  If you want to know more, buy a pint of Kipling, or purchase a bottle with confidence. Well worth the money spent I have to say.  Someone at Thornbridge has got this bottling game cracked. OK I only had two samples, but boy were they good.  They know their stuff there.  They have great brewing skills and technique, bring out some tremendous beers and just quietly get on with doing it, which makes me admire them even more.

Have they sorted out cask Jaipur yet though?

Congratulations too to Beer Ritz, for selling such lovely fresh bottles.

A Couple of Days Off

The latest advice on drinking now includes having a couple of alcohol free days a week. While not keen on much of the nanny stateism that comes from the likes of Ian Gilmour, this is a perfectly sensible suggestion I'd say and something I have been doing all my drinking life. In fact I aim (not always successfully) for three.  The term AFD (Alcohol Free Day) is weel kent in Tandleman Towers.

While nobody in their right mind believes the government's safe drinking limit, it seems an easily achievable and sensible precaution to me. The liver far from being evil, is kind of a necessity I believe.

Holidays and National Winter Ales Festival are excepted from the above of course.

I was also amazed to hear Gilmour say that having a couple of AFDs is a good indicator that you are not alcohol dependent. Well I never.

Tell Me What You Think

We talk a lot in these blogs of ours about this and that. Often though we return to old favourite topics like CAMRA and its role. I am often seen defending CAMRA, but I like to think I take a pragmatic view of the issues, though of course, for me at least, supporting quality real ale is a given.

A couple of days ago, I set a scene as to what I think motivates CAMRA in its dealings with Craft Keg and how I think CAMRA sees the subject contextually against its role in promoting and protecting real ale. I mentioned that for us, the battle to ensure real ale survival will never be won as such. We will just have good times and bad times - ups and downs. I also mentioned in the same blog piece, the new wave of keg beers and beer bars and the resurgence of London as a beery city.  These are important to bear in mind. There is change in the air and everyone in the UK beer industry needs to have a think about how they perceive that change, how it affects them and what opportunities it might bring.

We have talked here too,  and in other blogs,  about how all this fits together and tried, often unsuccessfully, to plot a road ahead. CAMRA, as an important component of the British beer scene is looking at it too and I'm part of a small working party reporting to the National Executive on the subject. We are in the process of formulating ideas and I'd like to hear your views against the background I have set out.  While we haven't fixed our remit in stone yet, it is along the lines of "How should CAMRA react to the growth of craft beer and specifically to the small but growing craft keg sector?"

So here's your chance to input to my contribution to the internal debate.  Constructive comments about where we are, where things might go and how you feel CAMRA should react will be very helpful to me in forming my input to the process. Views of definitions would be useful, (though trying to define "craft" may be a bit tricky.)  If you keep your feet on the ground too, that would be helpful. There is no point in unrealistic demands for change.  This is an examination of where we are and how the future might be shaped and not primarily a vehicle for change.  Please remember too that CAMRA is a member's organisation and that for any policy change to happen, one has to convince the membership.  Sorry, but there won't be much by way of feedback, as our NE will be the first to be informed of what we have come up with, but do let me know how you regard the future and CAMRA's role in it, with particular regard to craft keg beer. (Also,  please let me know if you are a CAMRA member or not when you comment and if you want to talk non publicly or off the record about it to me, particularly if you are trade, be it brewer or publican, do let me know.)

Bloggers have a genuine chance here to contribute to my input on the working party on a subject that has already caused a lot of debate within this blog. I hope that as many of you as possible take it up.

Remember too, it isn't just me you need to convince, so please think your arguments through.

Sam's Again!

For a man that shuns publicity, Humphrey Smith, Managing Director of Sam Smith's Tadcaster Brewery, doesn't half manage to attract it. Some will recall his spat over the use of the Yorkshire Rose with Cropton Brewery and others may remember another ding dong with a licensee who was locked in the accommodation part of his pub following a dispute with the brewery and had to hire scaffolding to exit and enter via his bedroom window. All great knockabout stuff.

I am grateful to one of my CAMRA members for alerting me to yet another exhibition of oddballery. It seems Humphrey himself, to quote the dear old Oldham Chronicle turned up at a local Royton pub on New Year's Eve and closed it down pronto. "Staff and customers were stunned when one of the multi-millionaire owners of Samuel Smith’s Brewery (Humphrey) walked in and shut down Royton’s Junction Inn at 8.30pm on New Year’s Eve." According to the Chron, this was the culmination of a row over full measure pints. That is serving them, not for not doing so.  Sam's, (as I observed last night by reading the brewery signs on the wall in a different Sam's pub,) have a policy of serving 95% liquid and a creamy head and offer requests for a top up only  if spillage over the glass can be avoided. Given that most Sam's pubs offer nitrokeg beer, that might be tricky. In my case I was given a pint of Dark Mild with an inch and a half of head and a half pint glass with a smidgin of beer which I could then use to top up at my leisure. I won't name the pub though, in case Humph takes the hump and knocks on their door too.

It seems though this is the nub of the problem in the Junction, though of course there may be more to it than meets the eye. Things aren't always what they seem. I can't put Sam's side of the story though. The Chron obligingly tells you why: "The Chronicle contacted Mr Smith yesterday who said “we have nothing to say” before hanging up.

The wonderful Oldham Chronicle has the story in full.

 My pint of 3% smooth mild cost me £1.19 last night. Yes. £1.19.  If that is being achieved though by causing ructions with licensees, I'd rather pay a few pence more. Just a thought. 

A Slow but Steady Decline?

is my blog starting to mirror the British Beer Industry's slow march downhill - in volume terms at least?

Here's the stats:

2012 (1)
▼ January (1)
A Popular Misconception

► 2011 (145)

► 2010 (173)

► 2009 (249)

► 2008 (262)

► 2007 (32)

A pattern is emerging and though like a strong keg beer drinker, I could claim quality over quantity, I won't. So loins girded, I better get my arse in gear this year.

Target? 200.