Leeds Beer Festival

Leeds Beer, Cider and Perry Festival. Image copyright of Leeds CAMRA

It nearly sneaked past us again this year, but Leeds Beer, Cider & Perry Festival starts today and is well worth a visit. It doesn’t seem to get much in the way of promotion and it’s not located in the city centre, but the festival is showcasing a whopping range of beer this year.

Beer lovers can fight their way through 150 real ales ‘from Yorkshire and beyond’ and the ‘best range in the North’ for cider and perry. There’s also a beer cum ice cream parlour to get us in a summery mood despite the bitter wind still encircling Bridgewater Place and a Global Beer Bar stocked to the rafters with fancy bottles from all four corners of the globe.

There’s  a whole host of Yorkshire brewers selling their wares at the four day long festival. West Yorkshire is very well represented with Sowerby Bridges’s Brass Monkey, Hebden Bridge’s Little Valley and Elland Brewery from the hilly Calderdale. Joining them from the West are Bob’s Brewing, Five Towns, Fernandes and Ossett of Wakefield; Salamander and Saltaire of Bradford and Shipley; Goose Eye and Old Bear of Keighley; Mallisons of Huddersfield and of course Leeds Brewery, Tetley’s and Fox from the host city.

From the gateway to the Dales there’s Ilkley, Moorview, Copper Dragon and Rodham plus Nook from deep in Last of the Summer Wine country. Otley brewery don’t count cos they’re from Wales but given they’re name they get an honourable mention (please save us some 08!)

From South Yorkshire you can sample beers from Kelham Island and Abbeydale both representing the Steel City plus Oakwell from nearby Barnsley (no Crown Brewery, boo!). Both Masham breweries – Black Sheep and Theakston’s –  have with a handful of beers from North Yorkshire on plus Great Heck and Brown Cow from Selby, the much revered Roosters, award winners Rudgate and York Brewery. From Humberside Wold Top of Driffield are providing the only East Yorkshire brews available.

We'd recommend steering (pardon the pun) clear of Armley Gyratory if you've been to the festival. In fact anytime really...

If you fancy something further afield you can find beers from Somerset to Southport, Wales to Wearside (even some brewery from freezxing cold Fraserburgh!). And if that isn’t enough miles for you the North Bar sponsored Global Beer Bar has an array of continental delights, namely Westmalle Tripel, Erdinger Oktoberfest and Anchor Bock in bottles.

Other highlights that we’ll be seeking out are Wem’s Cherry Bomb, Liverpool Organic Shipwreck IPA, Hopback’s Summer Lightning (if the weather deserves it!) and the Leeds specials, but other than that between a few of us we’ll try as much as possible no doubt! Oh and there’s a little (well, huge) favourite of mine that fingers crossed I get to try on cask, but I won’t name for fear of my not seeing any by Saturday!!!

For more details see http://www.leedsbeerfestival.co.uk/. If anyone wants to meet up for a pint or three email me at mark (at) real-ale-reviews.com or drop us a line via twitter @realalereviews