Get the Basics Right!

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Well that's another Oldham Beer Festival over and it's time to reflect on a few things beerwise.  Firstly it was a tremendously successful and we expect that the Mayor of Oldham's Charity Appeal, on whose behalf CAMRA run it, will benefit greatly from it.  It was in effect a sellout.

As always in these things I was mainly involved with the beer side, though I didn't manage the bar. I was however intimately involved in set up and given the severe soaking I got from one brewery's cask of beer, secondary fermentation is alive and well.  There are those that reckon most cask beer is inert these days. I'm not so convinced at the micro end that this is true. So many were vigorous - but we don't buy in national brands anyway, as they simply wouldn't sell.  The jury is out on those usual suspects of course, but like many, I "hae ma doots" every time I drink one.

It was also noticeable that the beers that sold out first were mainly local. That may not surprise you that much when we have breweries of the quality of  Pictish and Brewsmith to name but two and as always there are local favourites which fly out. It wouldn't be Oldham Beer Festival without Serious Brewing's Moonlight Stout and true to form, it soon went. If your beer is good, local definitely works, so there is plenty to play for there.

We always aim to have a leavening of beers that we don't see that often in our area and this time, the Beer Orderer went for an East Midlands theme. Now some were good and some, frankly weren't that brilliant, though that could be applied to lots of beers that you stumble across in the pub. Having had a lot of experience of these things, my advice to the small brewer is simple. Get the beers, clean with distinct appropriate flavours and no odd or "challenging tastes" - at least until you have managed the basics and repeatedly reproduced them. If you have the wish to start off with juniper, lime, exotic spices etc, my advice is just don't. The drinking public aren't daft and you will get slow sales and little repeat business. And brew for your customer, not yourself. Just because your muddy mess of odd ingredients appeals to you,think on. It is unlikely to achieve broad appeal.

The beer of the festival, Tryst Chocolate and Coconut Porte might seem to contradict my musings. Not so. Tryst know what they are doing in the first place. Luscious and moreish, it was a worthy winner. 

All the 62 beers were clear and bright or as near as dammit. 

My focus now shifts to Bournemouth and the CAMRA AGM and Members Weekend. This will include three nights in my London gaff, so fingers crossed all round.

Belated Thoughts on IndyMan

I've been away, so haven't got round to writing this up. I went along to IndymanBeerCon on the trade day and had rather a good time. I spent a tenner.  A tenner you say? How could this be at the most expensive festival around?  Arriving around two thirty I was unsure who I'd know, so just bought a tenner's worth to keep me going until I decided how long to stay. First of all I spent a bit of time wandering around trying to get to grips with the place, or rather, get to grips with what beers were on sale. It was harder than you might think as the eclectic collection of bars were rather small and hard to get to, most being surrounded by festival goers, but that was part of the fun.  Of course I was delayed too by chatting to various people I knew and that was definitely part of the fun.

The first guidance was given to me by an eager beaver who had clearly been there since opening and who had also, clearly followed his own advice with some determination. "Buy the rarest and strongest" slurred my beaming sage, pointing me to a particular American beer, which I was assured was as scarce as hen's teeth.  It seems his advice had been taken up with abandon, as there was none left.  I suppose that kind of figures.

Of course though, with only a tenner's worth - four thirds in this gaff - I did follow the proffered advice, in part at least. The beers were all rare to me, so I just decided to have the darkest and strongest. This wasn't a bad decision at all, as I'm partial to an imperial stout or two. I was also offered and accepted a few tasters, both by servers and friends and this did help make my mind up.  Frankly I didn't have a bad beer - well the odd bad taster - though some were better than others. On my smallish samples, I enjoyed the clearer ones more than the muddy ones and as always at these events, I enjoyed the crack.  It is fair to say that the one price fits all way of doing things divided opinion more than somewhat, with quite a few going for the strongest purely on a VFM basis, while others weren't that bothered. Many seem to regard this event as one to be saved up for, like a concert or the like. I don't recall prices being a point of discussion last few times though, so clearly it had struck a chord with some. Beer for the people? Maybe not.

The crowd was the usual collection of trade types, hipsters, CAMRA types and Joe Public. I got the feeling that this session was likely to contain the oldest average age crowd of the event.  It was jolly enough for me though and being bought a couple of thirds by brewers (tokens used) helped me have a good time.  Has IndyManBeerCon gone wrong? I don't think so, but I'm not counting up all the kegs of weak beers left at the end.   I left after a couple of hours, slightly buzzed as our American friends might say, but that wore off on the bus. I'd had enough strong beer really and if I'm honest, wasn't keen to pay £7.50 a pint equivalent for the weaker stuff.

Of course I went for a drink when I got off the bus. Supping beer or sipping beer? You pays your money and you takes your choice, but if they are the same price, go sipping.




Others have written how the do was a good as ever. That's good news, but I seemed to know a lot less people than I usually do and some didn't stay long, but it was fine for a couple of hours. A few bemoaned the lack of cask (none on sale as far as I know at the session I attended.)  The servers were all pretty pleasant which is great. I didn't bother about food.

I had free entry as trade. That's quite a saving.  I took no notes and one photo (above).

Dispensary Beer Festival

A few weeks ago I was in London having a few pints with @erlangernick. I wrote about some of it here. For our last beers, I took him to one of my local East End pubs, the Dispensary near Aldgate East Tube Station.  I usually go there when I am down at our London flat, as it sells decent beer and is handy for me.   During this visit, Annie the landlady came to chat and ask if I was coming to their beer festival. As it happened I was going to be in London that weekend. She asked if I wouldn't mind checking over the state of the beers on her external stillage and for a bit of advice -  which I duly gave.  She was worried (among other things) that the beer on the stillage, served by gravity, wouldn't be up to snuff.

Fast forward to the night before the festival when I went in to see what was going on. The stillage was erected, twelve beers on board and all vented using a porous hard spile as I had suggested. All were untapped.  Cold water cooling was supplied by Adnams and the beer seemed cool to the touch, so all looked good.  I tapped all the beers and samples were spot on.  So far so good.  I called in the next morning all was well. No big leaks - a miracle in itself - and even better - no cask had spat its tap out overnight. That's always a fear.  The beer was cellar cool, well conditioned and mostly pin bright apart from those that weren't meant to be. Well we thought they weren't meant to be, but it is hard to know these days.  All tasted fine however and we disregarded the odd haze. None were soupy.

The festival was opened by Roger Protz who was, to say the least, surprised to see me, but we had a great time and the pub was busy. Roger drank some Londom Porter which he loved and gave a very amusing and interesting speech about beers in the East End and spoke fondly about his old favourite, Charrington IPA. Roger is a true East Ender and was happy to be back. We had a good two or three hours. Later, much refreshed after our gated community's annual residents party, we called in again. The pub was still busy and beer still good. On Saturday night after meeting friends we nipped in once more on the way home and again the beer on stillage was still in great form and the pub, not usually open on a Saturday attracted quite a crowd.  It was clearly going well.

As I keep saying, looking after cask beer is actually fairly easy.  Why do so many get it wrong?

The photo shows Annie and me after the beers were tapped. I didn't take any pictures of Roger. Or much else. Don't know why really.

Disclosure: Annie is a pal. I just helped her for a few beers. And to prove a point I suppose. Oh and David, her husband gave me an excellent sausage butty!  Assuming the event wiped its face at least, Annie and David will be doing this again. I might help.

Quality versus Quantity

Readers of this blog and others will know that there is, knocking about and turning up like a bad smell, an irksome commentator called "py".  He spouts lots of anonymous inane comments to the extent that he has got himself barred from commenting here and there - but not here as it happens. I generally prefer to just give him it on the chin as required, rather than ban him, but I can see the point of those that do. However every dog has its day and occasionally, inadvertently really, a vexatious litigant can make a point that if you dissect it a little, may contain a grain of truth.  He says in a thread about the poor quality of cask beer/real ale in London:

py said...
Its by no means just a London thing. Wherever CAMRA is, then warm beer follows. Go to any CAMRA summer beer festival, the beer is always served as warm as day old piss. You wonder why its the foreign beer bar that always runs out first?

Deny it all you like, reply with some pointless childish insult if that is really the best you can think of, but CAMRA have done more than anyone over the years to damage the quality of cask ale.

21 August 2016 at 22:01

Now clearly much of that is nonsense, but while the writer doesn't expand his "thoughts", is there just a smidgen of what might pass for a reasonable comment there? Well, let's take his point about summer beer festivals. My branch simply wouldn't run one for the very reasons stated. That is, the danger of beer being as described.  Fortunately in Greater Manchester we have always had a heightened view of cask conditioning and beer presentation. We have strengthened that further, with our own cellar experts, who have developed cooling suited to the needs of smaller festivals. It may not be a complete answer, but I must agree that uncooled beer, in the height of summer is a very unwise business, could bring CAMRA into disrepute and my advice to CAMRA Festivals is "Unless you can guarantee the quality of the beer - don't do it."  The reputational risk is just not worth it. This advice should be followed not just by CAMRA beer festivals, but by all that sell real ale. If you can't provide top quality cask beer, just don't do it.

On a second point, Why do so many pubs insist in having a large number of below par beers on sale rather than two or three in top condition? Has CAMRA unwittingly made them think it is the only way to get in the Good Beer Guide? There is some evidence to suggest that might be the case, with the number of single or two beer pubs in the GBG diminishing severely. The current Good Beer Guide, somewhat astonishingly, shows only two such pubs out of 21 pages in Greater Manchester's entries. And even though we know in this area how to look after beer, can this really be wise?  Of course I know that sensible pubs will cut their ranges down at quiet periods, but are we in CAMRA encouraging, or at least not discouraging enough, this quantity over quality concern? On a brief look at this area, it kind of looks like it.  (The number of 3 beer pubs isn't that high either with "Beer range varies" being very common).

In the continual search for quality at the point of dispense, things such as cellar skills, venting practice, temperature and more are all at the top of the list, but when CAMRA looks to implement my motion bringing the quality of beer at the point of dispense into its Key Camapaigns, I reckon we need to include strong advice to pubs that too many beers on at the wrong time is just as bad for beer quality as some other more obvious faults.

Although he is unable to express it without giving offence, it may be that py has a case to argue. 

 I know from my own experience that persuading landlords of this isn't easy though and yes, I think sometimes the triumph of choice over quality can  be partially at least, placed at the door of CAMRA members voting for Good Beer Guide entries.

There needs to be sufficient process safeguards to challenge this at meetings, though of course, a lot of this stems from the pubs presenting too many beers in the first place.

The Countdown Begins in Earnest

Today I'm off to Atherton ( no I'm not sure where it is either) for the CAMRA Regional Meeting, but more importantly in my eyes, for the final organising meeting for the Manchester Beer and Cider Festival (MBCF).

This is going to be massive Folks.  It will be held in Manchester Central - formerly G-Mex - a huge former railway terminus and now an exhibition centre with the latest facilities.  There will be hundreds of real ales, many dozens of traditional ciders and of course, our now famous Foreign Beer Bar, which will feature rare delights both in bottle and on tap and for the first time, we think, at a major CAMRA festival, a dedicated Keykeg Bar where we will feature beers from cutting edge brewers, but all conditioned by natural CO2 and not force carbonated.  They meet the CAMRA definition of real ale, so what's not to like? Come and see what you think.

We'll have tutored beer tastings from Roger Protz, Christine Cryne and our very own John Clarke (tickets still available, link below), impromptu "Meet the Brewer" sessions, a free debate on the future of beer in our vibrant city of Manchester with some leading local and national personalities and much, much more.  Transport there is a piece of cake, there will be thousands of seats, it is all on one level and it is as cheap as chips.  No craft bar prices here.

This won't be boring, so be there. I'll be telling you more about it in detail next week.

Tickets for the festival can be ordered here and tickets for the beer tastings here. You can pay on the door too of course.

What's Going On?

One or two of my most dedicated readers may have noticed that there has been nothing from me to read for a bit. I'm not ill, just busy. CAMRA stuff has been a full time job recently and makes me wonder if, far from being held back by us old duffers the organisation is actually gaining a huge amount from experienced types like me ensuring, where possible, that local CAMRA operations are run as professionally as possible.

I have also been away a bit, but nowhere exciting. I've had crap cask ale in the only real ale joint in Dumbarton, JDW's Captain James Lang, where knackered beer was sold or rather not being sold to an uncaring Tennents Lager drinking brigade, leaving me to very much give up and switch to bottled Morretti which is a rather nicer lager than Tennents.  To be fair to JDW,  I also spent an afternoon with an old friend in neighbouring Helensburgh, where the local Spoons there, the Henry Bell supplied me with excellent cask and added a smile or two when serving, which also helps.  Another thing that helps there is the large number of Royal Navy types from the Clyde Submarine Base, mostly English, who keep the beer turning over nicely.  Both points illustrate that old quality thing again. What are you going to drink? Tired out cask beer or fresh Morretti?  I know the answer.

I also had excellent beer in the JDW Counting House in Glasgow, a vast barn of a pub which was chokka at 11.30 in the morning and one on which I'd almost given up on quality wise. Bet they have a new cask loving manager - that's usually what perks a JDW up.  On Rob Pickering's advice I also nipped into The Vale, where a perfect pint of Fyne Ales Avalanche was much more enjoyable than a typical Glasgow pub, atypically festooned with TVs all tuned to a different sports channel, while inside not a word was being spoken, as everyone gawped at these silent conversation killers. I'm guessing as it is directly opposite the Dundas St entrance to Queen St station, that it gets customers whatever. On this point I'll add, not getting engaged in conversation in a Glasgow pub is pretty near impossible.

In between times we sold out of beer at Rochdale Beer Festival and good it was too, despite the unseasonably warm weather that had vented beers going off like rockets, with fountains of beer everywhere. The answer to this though is not a soft spile and the beer turned out very well in the end. Manchester Beer and Cider Festival is also taking up a fair amount of time, but trust me, that will be worth it.

Lastly I attended the excellent British Guild of Beer Writers do in London last week.  I'd never heard of half the winners which means I need to read more about beer obviously, though I wouldn't have previously thought so. Things clearly move on quickly beer writing wise as in everything else.

And no, I didn't win anything.

This was my entry for the Beer and Travel section.  I thought you'd like to read it as we near the festive season.

Real Lager Back in the Day

Boak and Bailey have an interesting article on the issue of the CAMRA view of lager many years ago. They are right to point out at the start of it that it is more than one of simply regarding lager as "fizzy piss."

Last night I received the attached scan from our Regional Treasurer who was involved with Bury Beer Festival back in 1980.  The list of beers is interesting and it is is gratifying to see that of the 12 breweries (an amazingly modest number by today's standards) no less than 5 remain in production.  That however is not the main point of me reproducing the original programme.  If you look down to Lees there is a lager offered for sale. With an explanation.

Mudgie is always banging on about the poor quality of the lagers produced by regional breweries and he is, in the main right. These were really ales - Kolsch like - in that they were warm fermented by top fermenting (ale) yeast and then cold conditioned before pasteurisation and kegging.  Some were truly awful.  Lees had Tulip Lager and while now, in a modern lager brewery, they produce excellent lagers, it wasn't always the case.

My contact does not say if the thirsty hordes, no doubt including CAMRA members, in a fit of nihilistic doctrinal purity, refused to drink it, though somehow I doubt it. Beer Festivals were still a bit rare in those days.

Click on the image to enlarge. I was also sent an amusing tale which I'll publish soon.

Winner

Like my good friend Jeff, I've been busy lately, hence the silence.  I'm off to London in a few minutes, but I just thought I'd let you know that Oldham Beer Festival was a success and the Mayor will make lots of money for his charities.  I met him too and a nice fella he is.  I also got my photo in the Oldham Chronicle (not for the first time) and was complimented several times on my beer quality.  That's all good.

The winner of the popular vote for beer of the festival was Flaori Maori from Ramsbottom Craft - well deserved too as it was good.  I also enjoyed from the same brewery, my own Chocolate Chilli Stout which did well in the voting.  I believe the runner up was Roosters Baby Faced Assassin.

The beers went down well and most were pretty good. I enjoyed the majority of them but will mention a few that I thought really good. Both Hardknott beers, Infra Red and Lux Borealis were excellent.  I think Lux may have been third in the voting, but don't quote me on that.  Portobello Northern Line Stout was good and Redemption Pale Ale was quite enjoyable, as was Track Mazuma.  I drank a fair bit of Lees MPA too and that stood up well.

Sorry this is a bit rushed, but tomorrow I'm off to Brussels and will no doubt report back.

I drank a fair bit of left over perry on Sunday at a family party. Good stuff and no hangover.  And we cleared the hall in two hours on Sunday. Many hands do make light work!

Photo shows my sample of Chocolate Chilli Stout from Ramsbottom Craft Brewery

Live From the Velodrome

Well it is all getting there. Setting up a big beer festival like Manchester Beer and Cider Festival - see links  in previous post - is a marathon rather than a sprint. When you expect over 12,000 people, there is a huge logistical operation.  In fact serving the customers is the relatively straightforward bit. Getting a few thousand pieces of kit to click together really isn't straightforward at all.

There is always something new too, just to throw you a bit. This year we have to contend with, for example, the new laws on allergen advice.  Given that no-one is an actual expert on the 14 different categories, we have to do our best to get it right. And we will, but it is just one more thing sent to try us.  Today is (nearly) final set up and then we have to tidy away all the boxes, spares and other gubbins we don't need or need later. Bar Managers will make final adjustments, stalls will stock up, coolers will be checked and a million other things. I'll be doing the Health and Safety check later today and again tomorrow to finally ensure we are safe to go.

The good fun starts tomorrow with the trade session which to me is the best of all simply because it is a chance to meet up with old friends from the trade and have a natter and a pint.

I'll hopefully keep you all informed.

I really do recommend it and it will be great fun.

What's Up with IndyManBeerCon?

There's a great post about IndyManBeerCon by Phil from Oh Good Ale.  It tells in a humorous way his reasons for not attending this much praised and sought after event.  While I don't agree with them all, I can see where he is coming from. It is a particularly different type of beer festival to most and to some not at all their cup of tea. For many others though, it is a "must", which in itself must surely make it worthwhile?  Give the people what they want and all that.

One of Phil's main gripes - and it would have been one of mine too had I paid - was the £13  entrance fee which got you a glass, a programme and nothing else.  As I was there as trade, I didn't pay and glad I am too that I didn't, but I do know that many felt it a bit steep and that many more either didn't, or didn't care that much.  You see, for many, IMBC has become a place to be seen at. That's worth a lot to them as social cachet apparently, but then again, in the non beer world, there are plenty such events and while we may shake our heads about Glyndebourne, Henley Regatta and Last Night of the Proms, if it gives pleasure to attendees and a good time is had, I for one say "Good Luck to Them".

It was the first time I'd been to Victoria Baths in the daylight and while always thoroughly convinced that this event would be a lot less attractive if held elsewhere, I moved the dial over even more. The venue is tremendous. Magnificent in fact and the perfect backdrop to the event itself.  The usual mix of keg and cask seemed to veer more to keg this year and that's what I mainly drank.  Prices varied from a pound a third to £4 a third, with most somewhere in between and exhibited the usual bizarre differences. A 3% and a 6.7% beer on the same bar at the same price is odd to say the least, but then again, I have no idea how things are priced up there and who decides.  And someone has to pay for the set up, brewers etc.

So how was it for me?  Well, as always I find this kind of do a place to meet people I already know or know of.  It is the social interaction that I enjoy, the putting of faces to names and the meeting up with fellow beery friends that I only see now and again.  It may well be heresy, but the beer is rather incidental to me and I don't therefore sit scribbling notes about this or that beer.  I'm there for the crack and all the effort in the world to put on this or that saison, sour, or (yawn) collaboration, is merely backdrop to that particular aim. The venue wasn't without its problems though. The room with the food was too smoky from much grilling and the room with the ceiling under renovation was pretty gloomy, but both were easily dealt with by nipping in, buying your beer and retreating elsewhere to drink it.  The beers were interesting enough to provide talking points and were all well presented.I didn't find much wrong with the beer once you'd swirled some of the excess CO2 out of it. I'm guessing too that Manchester has a lot less hipsters, so the crowd was pretty mixed, with plenty of CAMRA types there also and many of then serving as volunteers. We laughed at one customer who thought a photo of three CAMRA chairmen all drinking keg might have been newsworthy (it isn't) and generally had a good time with beery people.

IMBC is a great event. It is all done on a very human level and for most of its customers it's a pleasure. Can't see much wrong with that really.  Nothing suits everyone and you don't have to go.

 One or two beers disappointed, but what festival does that not happen at.  Mostly though, these are beers for sipping, not supping.  That changes the dynamic  of the event too and one well known brewer told me his cask products were suffering from that aspect.

The photo shows the sort of shenanigans that goes on there.  I think they may still have had their trousers on at the point I took the photo.

I guess too there would be many more hipsters and trendies there in the evenings.

Live from the Velodrome

It is nearly ready and boy has it taken a lot of effort, but the Manchester Beer and Cider Festival will open to trade members tomorrow at one, with the public to follow. The venue is most impressive and the photo which accompanies this blog entry hardly does it justice, though hopefully it captures at least some of the scale.

I'm off home for an early night.  I won't be home before midnight for the next four days and in here by around nine thirty.  Is it worth it? We'll see, but my favourite session is tomorrow's trade session as I'll know lots of beery people. I'll have the odd beer too amongst the paperwork and other tasks.

That'll be rather nice.

It isn't too late to decide to come along you know. We've loads of beer and loads of room and you really would be most welcome.

Manchester Beer and Cider Festival

It is just over a week away Folks.  Brought to you by the same team that organised the amazingly successful National Winter Ales Festival for the last five years and from a smashing new venue, the inaugural Manchester Beer and Cider Festival takes place next week.  The venue is the amazing Velodrome at the National Cycling Centre (they insist in calling it that though everyone knows it as just "The Velodrome") but it is amazing nonetheless. Every time we go in to check something we just go "Wow!"

The Velodrome has its own tram station (Velopark),  loads of buses and for the healthy or wannabe healthy, it is only a leisurely half hour walk along the Ashton Canal from town.  Everyone is guaranteed a seat facing the action and there is the prospect of watching our Commonwealth and Olympic Games champions training as you sup your delicious pint. Training will continue throughout.  All the usual festival stuff will be there, with t shirt and book stalls, lovely grub and much more, as well as a number of brewery bars, foreign beer, a massive cider bar and real ale in a bottle. You can even do your shopping on the way home at the nearby Asda,

I won't bore you with the massive amount of work that goes into this - you can take that as read - but let's instead pick out a few highlights beer-wise that you might want to think about in advance. Let's start with Fullers, with 1845 and Vintage Ale making rare outings in cask form. Or how about Brass Castle Port Cask Christmas Kitty, aged in a port oak cask with added rum? Hand Drawn Monkey offer Red Wit, a red ale take on Belgian White.  Hardknott offer Azimuth and Dark Energy and that old favourite, the dangerously drinkable NZPA from Hawkshead will be there too. Old Ales? We got 'em.  Hydes 4X, a bit of a rarity is there, or maybe Brentwood Chockwork Orange - an old ale with orange? Chilli Plum Porter? Double IPA? Imperial Russian Stout? Milds, stouts, bitters?  We have them in abundance.  Beers from Weird Beard, Wapping, Fyne Ales, Brains, Thwaites and Hydes Craft breweries are there too, Okell's wonderful Manx Pale Ale, eight beers from Marble, collaboration brews from Mallinsons and others.  Some really cracking golden ales too. We have the lot.

Highlights from our Bière Sans Frontières bar include all the Oktoberfest beers, five from De Molen, gueuze from 3 Fontainen, Oud Beersel and Boon and Taras Boulba also makes an appearance. Ciders and perrys abound too, so there really is something for everyone and all at sensible Northern prices.  No rip off here.  A pint of Fullers Vintage Ale? Around £4.50 you'll find.

Right.  I think you get the picture.  It's the only show in town and I do hope to see lots of you there.

The Festival is from Wednesday 22nd to Saturday 25th.  Full details and the beer list from this link. Expect more from me on this and yes, I'm involved in the organisation of the event.  

Things Go Swimmingly at the Baths

Take a wonderful venue like Victoria Baths, with its tiled splendour offset by decay that has not yet been reversed by renovation and you have a star that possibly outshines any hirer and indeed, makes you wonder  in the conext of IndyManBeerCon, if the venue  is the event and whether it would be able to survive unscathed a change to somewhere less impressive.  There is something about wandering the three old swimming pools, the tiled corridors and the ornate splendour augmented by subdued lighting that makes you feel well disposed to the place and therefore well disposed to whatever is being hosted within.

There is little doubt too that the second IndyManBeerCon has captured many a youthful imagination and already there have been glowing reviews and a positive flurry of congratulatory tweets.  But what about an old cynic like me?  Was it all it was cracked up to be?

There was a change around this year with all three pools being pressed into use and a mixed bag of cask and keg together on the same bar, rather than separate bars for each.  That worked as well as could be expected and is in keeping with the way that the best craft bars operate, so no complaints there.  There seemed too to be less choice than last year, with the offerings being different depending on which night or day you went and a separate beer list for each night.  You had to like strong beers or somewhat experimental beer of just over 3%,  much of which was of a taste that you'd struggle to acquire.  Something just to drink at a modest yet suppable strength was like hen's teeth, rather hard to find.  An exception was Quantum NZ Light which while excellent is still no Windermere Pale, which is the benchmark for this sort of thing.  In my case I had to wait until the alcohol kicked in to be really able to loosen up a bit.  I'm used to pints of a lot weaker beer.  Funnily though on Thursday as I scanned the crowd, I felt quite at home.  Hipsters were few and far between and it was a rather mixed CAMRA fest like crowd that attended.  There were of course one or two worrying hipster proclivities in evidence, though mostly behind the bar.  E thinks she's spotted a new and unwelcome trend of twirly moustaches to accompany ironic beards.  I kid you not. Just when you thought things couldn't get worse.

There were plenty of people I knew which always makes a festival nicer and plenty of gossip too, none of which I can repeat here.  There were surprising omissions too. Hardknott Dave was there but his beer wasn't, edged out perhaps by even more trendy newcomers. A fickle business this craft keg.  BrewDog were hidden away on a main bar this time and the better for it.  Brewers aplenty served beer and talked about it.  It is one of the abiding upsides of this festival that it attracts brewers to work behind the bar in such numbers.  I wonder though what's in it for them?  You can understand a session, but to work at them all suggests it is either extremely enjoyable or that's just the cheapest (or most lucrative) way to do it.  Either way it's a strange one. 

Food was excellent according to a slightly tottery E, who needed to recover from strong beer and the place was pleasantly busy but not packed which made navigation easy.  Perhaps that's the fire regs, but hey, it worked. Prices (by token) were erratic to say the least.  A 4.8% beer? Two tokens.  A 10.5% one - two tokens?  Strange, but then I have no idea what the structure is, who pays for what, or who sets the prices. I'm equally aware that your average crafteratti is pretty well price blind, a fact that doesn't escape brewers attention. With a minimum price equivalent to three quid a pint, rising to north of £7, that has to be a given.  Certainly one or two more traditional festival attenders told me they found the cost a bit ouchy.

So what were the beery stars?  Thornbridge had a very solid set of offerings from Otter's Tears, a tribute to the late Simon Johnson, a soda water like Berliner Weisse and my beer of the festival, a10.5% Imperial Raspberry Stout.  I liked BrewDog's dark beers too, particularly Hello My Name is Mette Marit and the new Dead Metaphor was rather good too.  I reckon that they brew dark beers much better than they brew paler ones.  Magic Rock were solid but E lamented that their keg offerings lacked the taste of their cask ones and beers from First Chop and Cromarty didn't disappoint.  Dipping in randomly. you did feel though that in many cases you were paying for brewer's experiments.  It isn't that there were many duds, but so many oddities and at times, a curious sameness.

Some of the hyperbole is just that, but IndyManBeerCon was a lot of fun and is a "must go to" fixture, though it is quite possibly a little bit more of a curiosity to the likes of me than a line drawn beyond the rest of beer festivals - unless he means the new wave ones - as one giddy blogger alleged on Twitter..

And after third pints of strong keg beer you might just need a proper pint of cask to remind you that beer is something to sup as well as sip.

I'll be back next year though.  I had a great time with some really nice people and that's what really counts.

Great British Beer Festival 2013

While it may not be an exclusive, it is hot off the press. I can reveal that next year's Great British Beer Festival will be at Olympia between Tuesday 13th and Saturday 17th August 2013. I'm glad. As a worker, it would have been hard to return to the dungeon that is Earl's Court.  In fact I doubt that it would have been as attractive to customers that had experienced the light and space of Olympia. I  regard that as very good news indeed and am sure it will be better (and brighter) than ever. Get the date in your diaries now.

Only one niggle. Can we have a tube service please?

Of course Earl's Court may have been knocked down by then anyway. Or not. 

Same Again. And Again

I have mentioned from time to time the moribund state of German brewing. I think probably the first time was in 2008 in this article, where the author I quote scathingly remarked that most German brewers can't even identify their own pils in a blind tasting, so alike have they become.

So what would it be like with dozens to hundreds of German brewers all in a row?  The Berlin Bier Festival gave me a chance to find out. Would they rise to the occasion or would we sink in sea of samey beer?  I think you can guess the result. What we used to get is the unholy trinity of pils or (helles), dunkel beer and a wheat beer.  Now we have added to that miserable mix, a special. This special will nearly always be called "zwickel" and will often be the pils, but unfiltered, while purporting to be a keller bier.  Well it might be, but it will likely be even less hoppy than the pils, whatever it is and you will never find out for sure, but they'll tell you anything.  Sometimes the dunkel will be replaced by a blacker beer - schwarzbier - and these can be quite good.  There might even be a stronger beer too, but you will have to ask for it. Franconian breweries will likely offer a kellerbier, but these will be a shadow of the wonderful country beers that you may be thinking of.

Of course, this being an international festival, you could avoid the native beer altogether.  There was beer from Williams Bros served by handpump, but re-racked. There was Belgian, though mostly mainstream, but you could get La Trappe and Chimay. You could also get Leffe and Hoegaarden.  Guinness too and Smithwicks, Fullers, Greene King, beers from Poland, the Czech Republic, the Caribbean, South East Asia, Africa and more.  There was in fact something for everyone, though some of the foreign stuff was a lot more pricey.  All in all though you would be pretty fussy not to find something.  Unless you are a fan of the hop of course. Then you'd be in deep shit. Humulus Lupulus was hiding its light well under a bushel.  In fact it had pulled another bushel onto the one that it was hiding its light under and burrowed deeply underneath.

We stuck to German stuff mostly as we wanted to do some direct comparing.  First of all there is glassware and we tried to find decent glasses to drink out of.  Pils just doesn't taste as good in a thick walled glass, so we chose some stands on the quality of their glassware.  It does help. Now you can roughly chop it up as follows: Pils and Helles will be often be sweet, under hopped and underwhelming, though there will be exceptions of enjoyable poise and balance. Dunkel will be sweet, under hopped and underwhelmimg. You may just get one that has something about it, but it will be a long search.  Schwarzbier at its best will be like a really good dark mild. Or it will be like the dunkel.  Weizenbier will be competent, tick most of the relevant wheat beer boxes and will be cool and refreshing. If you like that sort of thing, you rarely get a bad one. Frankly, choosing a stand by its seating, people watching potential and standard of glassware is as good a plan as any. Unless you are some kind of demented ticker of course. Then you have hit the mother lode.

But we weren't here for the beer as such. It was the atmosphere, the people watching and the sense of gemutlichkeit and that was there in abundance. The sun shone like a shiny thing and we divided our time between stalls with a decent view and a stage with Deutsche Blasmusik - that folksy and innocent stuff you hear in the background a lot in Germany - for which we are both suckers and just wandering around doing more of the same.  We joined in the singing later on, watched the dancing, scoffed bratties, talked to Dutch people, fought our way into the Baltika Stand where there was a huge throng intent on cheap and strong beer, fought our way out and back in again for the deposit - no mean feat I assure you - drank loads of pils, wheat, schwarz and dunkel beer, seeking out some old favourites from our many German holidays. We also drank Muhlen and Reissedorf Koelsch and  some awful Czech beer - but the guy from the brewery was really nice so we didn't tell him. We queued for toilets, hopping from one leg to the other and I got misunderstood at the Schneider stall, not once, but twice, by the same guy.  Both times ending up with an extra beer.  Avoiding him,  I did manage to finish unwisely with a Schneider Hopfen Weisse, which wasn't visibly on display, but  a bottle of which was produced with a flourish by the dirndled barmaid and drank far too quickly by me.  Thus hoppily satisfied, we staggered off to a taxi.  Neither of us fancied walking.  We'd stayed far longer than intended, drank far more than intended and sat in the sun longer than advisable too. We'd had a great time, great beer or not.

I felt a bit rough next day, but we did go back.  Much more modestly.  Well it started out that way. It's the atmosphere you know - it gets to you.  Don't worry about the beer - just have a good time.

The next night was less of the same, punctuated by a leisurely Greek meal.  The place was jumping and again the sun beat down.  Some events may have taken place that night. It's hard to recall exactly which was which.

Berlin Bleibt Doch Berlin

Berlin is big. You notice that on the way from the airport and when walking around. It is ever changing and still, 22 years after the wall fell, a city of contrasts and still 67 years after the last shell and bomb landed, undergoing repairs and renovations. In short, in the centre at least, it is a large building site, with former buildings reappearing phoenix like from the sandy soil, or large U Bahn extensions causing diversions as you pick your way through it. It is a marvellous place, though frustratingly difficult to remember precisely, even though I've been there quite a few times.

Mitte is the centre of the old East and that's where we stayed in the excellent Novotel. Great for breakfasts - and handy for more or less everything - trust me on that one. Our short first night was spent trying to find the quaint Nicolaiveirtel, a small part of the former East German capital, renovated by the DDR in its dog days - mostly in concrete - but you can hardly tell. The building works didn't help either, nor did a sign that pointed to its direction the wrong way. They are wags these Berliners. The huge former Palace of the DDR, riddled with asbestos, is now a giant hole in the ground which seemed to block our every way, but eventually we stumbled on a neat little pub with excellent food and a very snooty attitude. We'd been there before with others a few years ago and it was the same then, but the Radeburger- the drink of the DDR politburo - didn't touch the sides and the portions were mighty, even if the craic wasn't. The next day, when the pouring rain eased, we found our goal a mere five minutes walk away. It's easy when you know how.

Determined to do better we headed for Brauhaus Mitte. Now I knew where that was and felt confident. It is more or less opposite the Fernsehturm, the huge former DDR TV tower which dominates Berlin. Well we found the tower OK - you could hardly miss it - and after only a little swearing and cursing, found Brauhaus Mitte. We sat outside, just as it started to rain again and enjoyed a flight of samplers. Nothing that special, but competent enough. A recurring theme.  We took our bearings and planned our day. It was a simple plan, therefore one I felt capable of executing. We were going to the Berlin Beer Festival. That's simple.  And so it proved. A quick shimmy round the Fernsehturm, along Alexanderstrasse and we were there. Karl-Marx Allee.  Now just a touch more history here for you.  Karl-Marx Allee started out as Stalin Allee, though of course in an even earlier incarnation, it was Grosse Frankfurter Strasse.  It arose from the rubble of the Second World War bombing and was perhaps the DDR's most ambitious building project. It is grandly stupendous in an insane sort of way.  Actually it is rather handsome. And why go there? It is where they hold Berlin Beer Festival.

Most of the 2km stretch of Karl-Marx Allee is used for the festival. Not in the middle of the road, but on one side. There is plenty of room, as the whole thing is nearly 90 metres wide.  Stand after stand for the whole stretch is filled with individual breweries beer offerings.  Any brewery who is noteworthy seems to be there and you simply start at the beginning - either end will do - and work your way along. Almost all the beer is German as you'd expect, though there was a bit of British, Czech and Belgian.  There  was even some Russian stuff and other oddities.  I'll tell you later about that in part 2.

To finish part one though, I'll tell you how it all works.  You can buy a festival glass for a few euros and wander around and have that filled, or just get a brewery glass from whatever stand you fancy and pay a deposit on that glass.  You have to take the glass back to the stand you got it from to get your money back - or you can keep it.  And despite the thousands of people, it is real glass. No plastic here. Most stands have a few benches where you can watch the world go by as you oil your neck.  Of course this being Germany, you won't go short of vittals.  Every few metres there is a bratwurst stall, a pizza stall, various chunky meat stalls, roast chickens, hamburgers, fried potatoes and more. You will be entertained by Bavarian Oompah bands, singers, heavy metal and rock, Beatles song singers (lots of that) and cheery German equivalents of Val Doonican, while all the while, elderly couples and old ladies dance away to Deutsche Blasmusik.

Another slight oddity is pricing.  This is set by the stallholders and varies a lot.  Many sold 0.4l, that odd, slightly cheaty, North German favourite, at a very reasonable €3, while some sold 0.25l for the same price or more. It was notable that those with the biggest prices were emptiest, including Zum Uerige who sold their beer "vom holzfass" that is straight from the barrel by gravity.  At the height of the festivities, the AB InBev stand was pretty empty. Who wants to pay top dollar for their stuff? Hardly anyone it seemed. By contrast, Baltika of Russia was bashing out their wares, including some pretty strong stuff, for €3 a half litre.  It was bursting with thirsty bargain hunters.

Customers ranged from young to very old.  Most were German, but there was, astonishingly quite a few British stag parties, looking completely incongruous and out of place, dressed in Joe 90 costumes, chicken costumes, silly wigs and the like.  Not the place for that really, but the atmosphere is one that encourages conformance and there was little by way of bad behaviour, though there was by the end a lot of completely pissed people, again almost all German, but rather well behaved pissed, though a tad noisy. Drinking makes you a bit deaf it seems.  There was one Scotsman in a kilt that was delighting the young frauleins, by showing what he didn't wear under his kilt.  I didn't see this myself thankfully, though I did see him, but E confirmed it was the case. Seems they all found it funny, though I'd have had him locked up.  Funnily enough the GBBF habit of wearing silly hats was noticeable too.  Why does a beer festival make some people want to wear daft headgear? A mystery to me.  Everyone who could had looked out a brewery T shirt too.

Lastly, a word about toilets and policing.  Portaloos were plentiful and free, though some were a grim experience. E opted for the paying version, where for 50 cents, you got toilet paper, guaranteed running water and hand washing facilities.  As the night wore on and things got more hectic, the signs for male and female were simply ignored and people dashed into the first loo available, often after a bladder stretching wait.  By closing time, the abundant bushes were freely and all too openly pressed into service.

All the while the place was patrolled by quite casual looking special police and various security guards.  I didn't see either of them doing anything at all in particular. Apart from public pissing, which was studiously ignored, there seemed no need.

The photo at the top show Leipziger Strasse and was the view from our hotel room.  East German practicality and function. 

Local Appeal

The Oldham Beer Festival was a success. We effectively sold out, so though I won't bore you with the details, a big thanks to all that attended. The standard CAMRA three pints a head formula seemed to apply, so for those that didn't know how these things are worked out, you know now.

One observation. This year, with one long bar divided by the stairs to the stage, we split it between local beers and those from further afield. In our case local means twenty miles from the CAMRA Branch centre. No. Not my house, but still enough to give us quite a large number of beers to go at. This proved very successful (though some disagreed) with beers from local breweries standing up well to those such as Dark Star, Purple Moose, Red Willow, Stringers et al from further away. The first beer to sell out was Tandle Hill from my home town's Wilson Potter Brewery. Beers from other local breweries such as Green Mill, Greenfield, Lees and others sold very well and very quickly too.

It seems to me, people are very keen on local beers;  if the quality is right, they sell. Publicans, please note that provided you can buy them directly, they are often much cheaper too, despite discounting from bigger outfits and they do make a point of difference.

Buy (at least some beers) locally - make money - keep it in the community? Why not?  Seems potentially at least, a winning formula.

And no, the name Tandle Hill had nothing to do with me.

The Art of Boozing

I was invited (along with all of our CAMRA Branch members) to the launch of JDW's Spring Beer Festival at the Art Picture House, one of two in Bury. JDWs that is, not Art Picture Houses.   Now this proved to be a good day out, though involving as it did that drinking leg end Tyson, it lasted a lot longer and was more intense than I intended. 

In addition to the beers on the bar, we had the bonus of "Meet the Brewer" thrice. Hawkshead, Naylors and Titanic all showed up and to the delight of the assembled throng, dished out copious free third pint samples.  This greatly pleased Archimedes and Pythagoras, but the Whitefield Holts Bandit disdainfully eschewed the freebies, while Pineapple Pete, as usual,  concentrated on the free grub. Tyson and I, veterans of such largesse and aware of the Bury public's propensity for free ale, had no such scruples and just elbowed the coffin dodgers aside to park ourselves in front of the nine of Windermere Pale (Tyson) and Titanic Plum Porter (me).  I did have a constructive chat with the Titanic operative, who advised that the plum essence was made by a local sweet manufacturer after using real plums failed to deliver any plum flavour at all. Nature isn't always best it seems.

Now free beer to such men of the world as Tyson and me has limited appeal. There is a great big world of beer out there - even in Bury - and thus it was that I found myself drinking a half of keg Outstanding White, which could best be described as a curious crossover between a German Weisse Bier and a Belgian White. Odd, but pleasant.  The Robert Peel, JDW's other Bury outfit failed to deliver on choice and Hydes Owd Oak mild made you think a new brewery can't come soon enough. Tyson suggested the long trek next door to the Two Tubs. He was gutted to find no Triple C in this Thwaites house, but we settled for the hugely chocolatey Egg Roller, an Easter beer  - and what a great beer it was too. More chocolate than a Belgian airport duty free shop, a luscious body and while at first it seemed one would be enough, it wasn't.  (As an aside can you imagine how miserable this beer would seem without a sparkler?)

So back to the Art where handpumped Titanic Plum Porter finished us off.  Literally. We did have the bonus of seeing Joe Stalin and of course, Don Ricardo who had joined the mayhem earlier.  I dashed for the 163 and the long toilet-less trek home, while Tyson remained to observe the ever keen Don in pursuit (unwisely in this case I can assure you) of the carnal.

Our thanks to JDW's Lisa for the butties and the sausages and to the brewers for their free beer.

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.

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.