Real Ale Reviews

Hop growing for Loiners

6

Wakefield’s finest are coming to Leeds in the guise of The Hop, the live music and real ale venue of Ossett Brewery’s pub armada. Situated in the Granary Wharf area of Leeds overlooking the reinvigorated quayside, The Hop will sit under two of the previously disused railway arches that are tucked away between the confluence of the Leeds-Liverpool canal and the River Aire. Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: brewery, leeds, live music, music, ossett, ossett brewery, pubs, the hop

Brass in pocket – a fresh start for Copper Dragon

3

Shrouded in uncertainly it’s been a a funny ol’ festive period for Copper Dragon. Since mid December rumours of administration and liquidation have been quietly circulating and the future for Skipton’s growing brewery wasn’t looking bright.

But fresh from the Christmas holidays with their finances restructured Copper Dragon seem to be back on their feet and fighting fit for whatever 2010 can throw at them.

Online business news website The Business Desk and Bradford’s Telegraph and Argus newspaper report that Copper Dragon’s pub business was liquidised in November 2008 throwing the brewery into a turbulent period, during which the administrators were called in on the Friday before Christmas by a high street bank, which is pretty annoying by anyone’s standards. Steve Taylor, the brewery’s founder and MD subsequently took his stake in the company from 75% to 100% after refusing to give up further equity or intellectual property rights.

It’s rarely a good time for a company to go into administration but teetering on the edge of oblivion at Christmas time is particularly unpleasant, with customers looking for mini-pins for parties, pubs filling up for the festivities and staff looking forward to well earned family time. Just getting home in the snow in Yorkshire was bad enough!

So we’re really pleased that it looks like it’s all sorted and that the jobs, brewery, bistro and six of the pubs have been secured, and we look forward to sampling some of the new beers that come out of Skipton’s finest this year.

Man walks into a pub…

0

A nice piece about beer in a tabloid sized newspaper? Surely not.

Ok to be fair it’s this months ‘What’s Brewing’, but I love the story on page 10 about Martin Brunnschweiler.

More than a decade ago Martin went to visit his sister at her pub on the Isle of Man and ended up staying there to set up a brewery called Bushy’s. The paper is a bit hazy on the details (I’m intrigued as to whether he drank the pub dry and then set up because he was thirsty and what he left behind) but I like to think the Martin fell in love with the island, the pub, the atmosphere and the opportunity. His brewery has ties to the nuclear industry (and sounds like it could double up as a bunker should a Dr Strangelove armageddon arise) and the equipment is based on a headache inducing tower arrangement that requires a certain amount of agility from head brewer Curly (yes, Curly!).

The best I can do is that I have on two or more separate occasions walked into a pub and ended up 1) working behind the bar and 2) doing the dishes, but never quite made the leap to brewing.

Tags: brewery, bushys, CAMRA, isle of man, pubs, whats brewing

A Grand Day Out…in Nottingham

4

On the lead up to Christmas me and a few or my more intellectually challenged University mates decided to go for a day out in Nottingham to see if we still had the stamina to managed an ‘all-dayer’.  Obviously I knew that the ales were going to merge at some point after lunch and that the details would be difficult to get down. I therefore armed myself with a Cancer Research pen and 2010 Diary and met at the 10am rendezvous, The Bank pub, for beer and breakfast.

The Bank is what I would dub a Weatherspoons rip-off. The breakfast menu was almost identical to Weatherspoons and the range of beers available was similar. I was therefore able to order a pint of Bass to go with my Americano and Large Breakfast. I couldn’t  remember whether I’d ever actually  had Bass before but I knew that it used to be very popular with my Dad’s friends out of  a can. The lightness suited accompanying a large meal and my initial impression was of an relatively sweet toffee flavour but this was tempered by the development of a more peppery body. The existence of these flavours was I think testament to how well the ale was kept and I have since been disappointed when having the same pint at The Wobbly Wheel near Banbury where none of these subtly complex flavours appeared from ‘the same’ pint.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: adnams, Ale trail, Bass, bitter, Broadside, Burton Bitter, Castle Rock Brewery, Greene King, Magpie Brewery, mild, nottingham, Nottingham Brewery, Old Hooky, pale, The Bell, The Dragon, The Roebuck

World’s Bitterest Beer?

3

Are you a huge hop head? Do you crave Humulus Lupulus in your sleep? Maybe you even struggle to wake up after a few “double IPAs” and a night asleep on a hop pillow?!

Well one Oxfordshire brewer has taken on the challenge to create the world’s bitterest beer, and his strategy: yeah you guessed it, he’s thrown a silly amount of hops into his brew.

Pete Fowler of the Pitstop Brewery near Wantage rose to the occasion after a friend reckoned he couldn’t match the bitterness of US craft beers, and in Mr Fowler’s words ‘that was like red rag to a bull’. The beer (or barley wine) has over £100s worth of hops plus additional hop additives for one 9 barrel keg of the beer compared to a usual £5 worth.

Bearing in mind the brewer himself hasn’t tried it yet and is expecting it to be in the region of 500 IBUs* (a theoretical number which scares the pants of my tastebuds) it raises interesting questions on innovation (or should I say ‘innovation’).

Is this an ‘extreme beer’? Or is it simply a boisterous take on the traditional British bitter, tongue in cheek and one finger up to the extremists? Or just a bit of fun?!

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: bitter, bitterness, BrewDog, IBUs, pitstop brewery

Beer Swap beer reviews Pt 1

5

You might have heard of the guy who I managed to draw for the beer swap: Pencil & Spoon’s own New Media Writer of the Year 2009 Mark Dredge. This was a selection of ales to look forward to; a brief glance at his excellent blog shows his good taste and awareness of beers and I had no doubt he would have developed an encyclopaedic knowledge of the local market over the year or so of working on his blog.

Kent is his part of the country, and is somewhere I have never been, so it was almost guaranteed that most of these beers I would never have come across.

So here is what I received:

- Westerham Brewery’s Little Scotney IPA (4%)
- Harvey’s Star of Eastbourne East India Pale (6.5%)
- Hopdaemon Brewery’s Skrimshander IPA (4.5%)
- Whitstable Brewery’s Raspberry Wheat (5.2%) Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: Beer Swap, east india pale ale, harveys, hopdaemon, IPA, kent, scotney, skrimshander, whitstable

The case of the colour changing Hooky Gold

1

Andy over at Beerreviews.co.uk just posted the first review of the test #beerswap parcel that we exchanged a little while back. In it I packed four fine Oxfordshire (ish) ales including the fantastic Hooky Gold from Hook Norton Brewery.

I didn’t think anything of the Hooky Gold at the time, even admiring it’s shiny green label.

Until last night, when Alan popped over and we were chatting about the blog. We looked over at the original Hooky bottles that used to make up this our blog header, and noticed something odd – there was no Hooky Gold.

But of course there is! Hooky Gold was always in a red label with gold writing. Now the label is green!

When did this occur? How did we not notice?! We don’t mind Hooky, we like the green label, but when and why was it changed?!?!

Does anybody know?

Tags: Beer Reviews, Beer Swap, Hook Norton, Hook Norton Brewery, Hooky, hooky gold

Purity Brewing Company – Pure Ubu

2

I have a soft spot for beers that have a) an attractive, modern, cartoony label and b) an interesting back-story. A sucker for marketing, I know, but there was no way I could leave Pure Ubu on the shelf for both of these reasons.

Ubu, according to the label, is the brewery’s dog, who is “a maverick, brim full of character and the unofficial keeper of [Purity's] secrets”. There’s even a cute little drawing of him crowning the front label.

However, I must become a hard-nosed beer reviewer once again, decant the dark amber liquid into a glass, and cast the bottle away from view as to not influence my judgement on the key element of this package.

The nose is malty and warm, with an extra-sweet sensation of caramel and toffee coming through strongly. Once in the mouth, the light carbonisation barely disguises the rather thin, slightly watery mouthfeel. A little warm flavour does manage to make its way through, however, and the slightly nutty taste soon gives way warm, dry aftertaste; an unexpected sensation considering the lightness of the body.

Further down the glass, the beer becomes rather refreshing and fairly enjoyable. Initial disappointment at the lack of impact in the mouth soon gives way to a rather satisfying ending. This, surprisingly considering the darkness of tone, would make a great summer session ale, with the 4.5% abv being relatively none threatening if enjoyed over a period of time.

In the same way that image of little Ubu frolicking happily across the label, this beer wins its way into your heart. Like owning a dog, at first it can seem hard work, but perseverance will bring its rewards with this ale.

Tags: amber, bottle design, pure ubu, purity, refreshing

‘Tadcaster Brown’ doesn’t have the same ring…

2

This week saw the end of Newcastle Brown Ale production in the North-East, as Scottish & Newcastle Brewery, one of the largest brewing conglomerates in the UK, announced they are shifting production of ‘Newcy Broon’ to one of their other plants in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire.

This marks the end of over 90 years of a brewing tradition in the North East and ends an association that has become mutually synonymous for both the locality and the brand.

This couples with the current threat hanging over the Tetley’s brand, with a reported shift of the famous Leeds beer to Northampton when Carlsberg closes the Tetley’s brewery next year.

Here at Real Ale Reviews, we champion innovation and development in beers, and could possibly be expected to be pleased to witness the downfall of the larger brands as their multinational owners struggle to balance vast production and decreased sales (resulting from, I am sure,  the growth in desire for a quality pint of cask ale as opposed to a bland ‘Smooth’ brand). However, there is a strong argument in the defense of traditionalism in brewing culture.

Myself and Mark met at University and one of our close friends is a Geordie. One of the first drinking memories I have of our friend is his pride as he introduced us all to the joy of Newcastle Brown. He made sure we were drinking it at the correct temperature; in the correct half-pint glasses and told us of drunken adventures he had enjoyed growing up in the North-East.

The Geordie was by no means an ale drinker, preferring the cost of cheap lagers that dominated the Uni years. But this was one of the things that he could show off to his new companions – Newcastle had a recognisable brand to be proud of. (Predictably, his other pride was Newcastle United Football Club, but that’s another story!).

As certain household brands came under corporate ownership, they immediately lost that sense of belonging and connection to the local community. No matter what promises a large company might make about retaining an interest in the region, money talks and it soon becomes apparent that large companies such as N&S (themselves owned by the Carlsberg Group) didn’t get themselves into positions of international importance by remaining in one place.

Discussing this move on internet forums, one thought that came across was the idea that some of the large brands that are seriously struggling would benefit from a move away from the larger owners and start afresh in a smaller, dedicated operation that produces the ale for the sheer love of it, putting some pride and care back into the brewing procedure.

Of course, this is a pipedream and there is certainly no shortage of excellent breweries across the country doing this with their own brands. But there is a reason that certain ales have survived as long as they have, outliving their contemporaries and continuing throughout a world that has changed dramatically around it.

This is far from the end of Newcastle Brown in terms of a production beer, but taking it away from its hometown makes it just another beer.

Tags: Breweries, brewing, brown, newcastle, tadcaster

Marston’s Pedigree Victorious Bitter

0

Victorious Bitter from the Marston’s Pedigree range is the latest in a series of Ashes-related ales that have been appearing over the summer. This version, typically, is released to celebrate the success of the England team (and indeed Marton’s own triumphant sponsorship of the side, if reports are to be believed).

I very much enjoyed a couple of bottles of the Ashes Ale that was on sale throughout off licenses throughout the summer and indeed hoped that the beer would contain a sweet smell of success.

The warm golden colour hints at the approach of autumn; indeed the end of the victorious summer. The ale is lively in the glass, bubbling away like the celebratory champagne. The nose is equally warm, hinting at toffee, a malty aroma and for some reason reminds me of the cooler, dewy, bright mornings that have approached with the changing of the season.

The carbonisation is immediately felt on the tongue; as is the rather astringent taste. The body is virtually none existent as the bitterness washes away any hope of my tongue being used effectively.

The immediate aftertaste reminds me of Double Drop – a Marton’s beer I tried once and vowed never to touch again, such was the unpleasant, weak, acidic taste it left in my mouth. Victorious Bitter isn’t quite at those depths, and the glass is drinkable, but its not a bottle I will pick up in any hurry again.

Considering some of the genuinely victorious, prize-winning beers Marston has created over the years, it is a little disappointing that this particular bottle has been used to celebrate a terrific sporting achievement. Indeed, it would have been preferable for them to re-brand the very enjoyable Ashes ale, and allow us to enjoy it for that little bit longer – along with the afterglow of England’s success!

Tags: marstons, pedigree, victorious