Gone is the first Bank Holiday weekend of May, along with it, a multitude of Beer (and some food) festivals across the Northwest (covered in a previous blog: [http://electrokemistcuisine.weebly.com/1/post/2014/04/may-bank-holiday-round-up-2014.html]), at least for another year. Whilst the weather held until the Monday evening, the majority of us received some warm, if somewhat grey conditions in which to indulge in some fine ales from up and down the UK. Unfortunately, already making arrangements for the Mad Hatter Brewery Tap opening on Friday evening and for a trip to Bispham Green into West Lancashire, it left little time to head elsewhere such as the Aigburth Cricket Club Beer Festival. There was however, a chance on a Sunday afternoon to wander down to the Old Christchurch in Waterloo to indulge in the embers of the seventh festival held at the remarkable environs. Journeying by train out to Ormskirk from Liverpool and then onward to the Eagle and Child pub in Bispham Green, between Mawdesley and Parbold is now an annual treat for me and a few other regular accomplices. The pub is owned by the Ainscoughs (also of Racquet Club fame) and run as a ‘gastropub’ – the term usually makes me shudder, but it isn’t too ill fitting here as the pub does indeed present some superb, honest and fairly priced meals. The tranquil settings are excellent at the beginning of our session, from 4pm onwards things tend to get noisier, with the live music sound checks and a larger number of locals heading down to the venue. A single large marquee is stationed to the rear of the pub, with the bowling green and other patio areas soon populated with revellers, getting in early with picnic blankets is highly recommended. There are usually around 50-60 ales on offer along a single row of stills, alas keg has yet to catch up here. There are a large number of ciders to compensate, although these have a tendency on warmer occasions to run out by the Saturday afternoon. A £10 door tax returns the festival pint glass, a programme and around £6 worth of festival tokens, with halves being around £1.50 to £1.75 depending on the ABV, meaning this is one of the better value beer festivals around in terms of entry costs. Food is available at a tuck shop and with proper chips and a rather enticingly aromatic hog roast also to the rear of the pub. The Festival at the Eagle and Child is now heading beyond its 19th year and is as popular as ever, but the setting is by far and away the greatest asset; few beer festivals feel as relaxed as this when the weather is dry and warm. The beers were of a usual standard for such beer festivals, alas none of them were listed in the festival programme. Sadly, the first festival where they have left it out, this was a glaring omission from previous festivals, where the presence of the list made planning your beers a much easier and stress-free task. Breweries such as Propsect, Southport, Allgates and Burscough, Frodsham and Phoenix all have a heavy presence at this festival; producing some excellent English pale ales, best bitters, red ales and stouts, although there wasn’t too much of variation beyond this. Coach house Brewery from Cheshire did supply many fruit infused beers such as the very drinkable ‘Pineapple’ and supermarket friendly ‘Blueberry’ – again though, these beers are all pale ale, where the Coconut they brew jarred with the hopped pale ale style when best paired with a darker ale in stout or porter style. An extra two hours was added to the session at Waterloo by the Liverpool Organic Brewery guys, making an 8pm close the order of the day. Luckily the session was not sold out, so being able to pay on the door was a blessing, although many of the first choice beers had gone in the previous sessions. With allegedly some 200 beers on offer (and excellently, some keg for the first time at the Waterloo iteration) alongside the ciders, Liverpool Gin, Peninsula Pies, Liverpool Cake Company and the ever-present Liverpool Cheese Company. As with many other festivals, there is live music alongside the beers, but the main attraction is the well organised and well stocked feel the festival has. As the festival has grown, attracted sponsorship and added a greater variety of beers to the repertoire it has also very gradually increased the cost of the sessions, sadly with overheads spiralling in all industries, this is sadly inevitable, but the festival does remain good value for visitors with the added attractions of great food from the aforementioned contributors. Attendance does feel as though it has slipped ever so slightly in the last two years most likely due to a saturation of the marketplace for Beer Festivals (where demand is thankfully still remarkably high), but the event still sells out on the Friday and Saturday evening sessions in a heartbeat, meaning slightly easier going sessions during Thursday, Friday and Saturday daytime and Sunday can be less crowded to get around. The beers at the Waterloo festival are again, as with the Eagle and Child, all run off stillage, aside from two groups; the Liverpool Organic Beers on cask hand pull and the craft keg beers from the likes of Mad Hatter, Saltaire and Tiny Rebel. Long may these two excellent festivals continue to provide a gateway for new beer enthusiasts, great beers and a convivial atmosphere in which to enjoy them. Pedro. ------------------------------------------------------------ Eagle and Child Malt Kiln Lane, Bispham Green, Mawdesley, Lancashire. L40 3SG Web: http://www.ainscoughs.co.uk/The-Eagle-Child/eagle-and-child-home.html Telephone:01257 462 297 Email: [email protected] Liverpool Cheese Company 29a Woolton Street, Woolton Village, Liverpool. L25 5NH Web: http://www.liverpoolcheesecompany.co.uk/ Telephone: 0151 428 3942 Email: [email protected] Liverpool Cake Company Web: http://liverpoolcakecompany.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/liverpoolcakeco Telephone: 0151 734 0761 Mobile: 07864 069 105 Email: [email protected]
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Let’s dispense with the usual Beer Festival anecdotes about them being frequented by Gandalf-a-likes from Lord of the Rings and those dressed like Steampunk enthusiasts, but also steer clear of references to more contemporary groups that begin with the letter ‘H’. There was more than a healthy spread of the UK’s demographic present at the Camp and Furnace over the third weekend in June, all of whom seemed happy, enthused and remarkably positive about yet another shot in the arm for the City of Liverpool in its own ongoing gastronomic proliferation. The usual pattern was followed by my companion and I, upon entering an event such as this – retrieve glass and programme, wander about like a lost soul for ten minutes, find a shady spot to call our own for the duration of said event and then finally wander off to find our first victim. That is, our beverage of choice (if you thought anything else, you’re weird). The first beer went down a little slower than is usually to be expected, primarily a courtesy of the reveries from the evening before, but thankfully things were able to gather pace after that. Pace, just in time for my pencil to decide to give up on me (a retractable in case you’re wondering), robbing me of an ability to note any of the hazy observations about the beverages on offer and make succinct tasting notes. However, that was never really going to be the raison d’etre for this piece, so there is no real huge loss. The usual system of tokens was in place; a crisp £10 got you a card of 20 tokens with the beer prices coming in at around the 3-6 token mark generally speaking. The beers were served both from keg and cask across a number of bars spread around the periphery of the Furnace. Aside from smaller blackboards, pump clips at the bars and a larger ‘masterboard’ (which was often inaccurate) at the door into the Furnace, there was little way of deciding what your next beverage would be. A minor failing in the whole process for such an event was not to put any tasting notes or comprehensive list of the beers on offer in the actual event programme. This therefore failed to mitigate the trying of a beer which may have initially sounded enticing, but turned out to be a rather dull brown offering or a bog standard mild with a very misleading name (I hasten to add that this wasn’t exactly the case – but on more than one occasion I was stuck with half a pint of something not exactly pleasant to my palate). This failing was in part dealt with by many bartenders offering small tasters of a beer prior to taking away the half pint, which was a very welcome facet to proceedings. There were a number of beers pushing the envelope with regards strength, usually the 6 token beers, which had ABVs in excess of 8-9% and I do think I spotted something at over 11% which is Saison Dupont Rochefort 10 territory – offering very deep and complex beers with figgy and dried fruit characters to rival some wines. The only problem at a beer festival is being rather picky about which of these stronger beers you go for without ending up a bit of a mess by the end of the session! Some of the ales on offer were more standard offerings of citra and cascade hopped beers nestling alongside some excellent IPAs and a number of complex stout ales. There has been mention in national press (the Guardian no less, at least, prior to the event slipped into an article about the ‘rise of craft beer’ [http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2013/jun/13/craft-beer-guide-beginners]) of the endeavours undertaken by the Expo Liverpool Echo posted this piece about the Expo: [http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/whats-on/review-liverpool-craft-beer-festival-4325877]. There is even some footage posted right here: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3kZxuiq6i0] with a nice panoramic shot of the Furnace for all to see. There was even some blogging (shock horror) on the event, although I’ve not had a chance to trawl them all, Allgates Brewery did post this: [http://allgatesbrewery.com/allgates-brewery-blog/2013/06/liverpool-craft-beer-festival/]. Pricewise, it was in keeping with usual goings on at the Camp and Furnace, with the burgers hitting the £6 mark, similar to those installed at the Food Slam events that take place on a Friday in the venue (which, all things considered are pretty steep). The flavoured popcorn is always a good accompaniment as a bar snack, as were the rather large bags of crisps, something to help soak up the beers and thus appreciate the convivial atmosphere always goes down well. The chance to watch some live brewing was also a welcome and interesting touch, with the likes of Beavertown, Camden and the hosts, Liverpool Craft Brewery all displaying their talents.
An education, an experience and most certainly, overall, a pleasure; here’s to the next one! Pedro. x ------ Many thanks to Jon Young for his photography skills on the afternoon. You can follow Liverpool Craft Beer Expo on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/Livcraftbeerexp And Liverpool Craft Beer here: https://twitter.com/Craft_Beers British Bank Holiday weekends are invariably washed out affairs, much more suited to sitting wistfully on a window ledge staring outside at the rain trickling down the pane. Luckily, the last two Bank Holiday weekends in May of 2013 have been gloriously bright affairs. That type of weather definitely lends itself to sitting out with friends in a Beer garden, having a picnic and a few cold drinks in the park with the family or even better, attending a beer festival. There have been a few of late and there are a few more to come in Liverpool over the next few months. I spent the first May bank holiday at the Eagle and Child beer festival in Bispham Green (near Parbold/Mawdelsey). Typically, this festival experiences excellent dry weather and is generally superbly run and friendly affair. The addition of hand pumps to a few of the cask ales on offer this year is a definite improvement and a step upward from the usual high standards in the grounds of the pub owned by the Ainscoughs (of Racquet Club fame). The most recent Bank Holiday weekend was also spent investigating a slightly smaller scale beer festival, this time by the banks of the River Mersey in Otterspool at the Otter’s Café at Active Adventures. Having ventured down on the Saturday and Sunday, the clientele was mixed to say the least, with a market having brought some people out and the remainder either those wandering along the promenade for a walk and an ice cream or those specifically for the beer festival. There was even room for a Hen do oddly enough! Rather than a pub or association running this event, the crowds were treated to some local brews organised by the Mad Hatter Brewing Company. The Mad Hatters Brewing Company is the newest addition to Liverpool’s ever-increasing craft beer and real ale scene with Head Brewer Gaz and partner in crime Sue, initially taking things a little more seriously in 2007. With the burgeoning interest in Liverpool (as with the rest of the UK) in food and more pertinently, drink, driving the demand for fashionable food and beers with character, there is certainly room. The latter of these demanded items is something that the Mad Hatter is able to provide in abundance. This is more than evident, with some 16 different styles of beer lined up at the brewery, perhaps more once confidence has grown – and a range of brewing techniques not generally used in the UK. Some departure from academia up in Lancaster, I am sure most would agree, but a brave and highly welcome decision for a lot of us. At the festival, there were a few ales on offer from some of the usual suspects on the Liverpool Beer scene in the shape of Liverpool Organic Brewery, Liverpool Craft Brewery, Wapping, Brimstage Brewery from Wirral and another newcomer in the shape of the promising Melwood Brewing Company. The undoubted stars of the show at this festival were the beers on offer from the Mad Hatter Brewery. The unusually potent ales conceived by the Mad Hatter himself were present in fridges, which were stocked full as to be curiouser and curiouser; leporine artwork by Emily Warren of Stealthy Rabbit adorning a variety of exciting bottles promising much. Emily's thoughts are given in a bit more detail than I can divulge right now over on: [http://thestealthyrabbit.blogspot.co.uk/]. Over the course of the weekend, I made it my duty to try and characterise as much of the wonderland made real by the brewery as possible. However, with an ABV of usually over 7%, care must be taken – an easy task it was not!! The brewery was keen to provide something as an alternative to the usual session beers on the market, offering viable alternatives for food pairings to the usual fallback of a bottle of wine. Here are a few of the tasting notes I made whilst I was able to stave off falling down the rabbit hole:
2. Imperial IPA: Using Simcoe hops, the pine notes in this beer are deeply embedded and very obvious, at 7.3% it packs quite a punch and has quite a sharp edge with some good acidity. Very, very hoppy!
That’s your lot for what magnificence I tried on offer at the Beer Festival, but your extra reading after this blog is to go and check out the Mad Hatter Brewing Company website (conveniently located here: [http://madhatbrew.co.uk/] and for more up to date information, search facebook for Mad Hatter Brewing Company, or follow them on twitter, @MadHatBrew] with a run down of their beers and details should you need to contact them. Their beers will be available from the following outlets: Beers are available in Liverpool from: Stamps Too, (CAMRA pub of the year, Liverpool) The Dispensary, Renshaw St The Ship and Mitre And also soon from: 23 Club, below the Clove Hitch Pod, Allerton Road Manchester: Pie & Ale, Northern Quarter, The Port St Beer House, Northern Quarter And also soon from: Joshua Brooks, Oxford Road The Magnet, Stockport (CAMRA pub of the year, Greater Manchester) Unfortunately, you can’t buy from the Brewery direct at the moment, so you’ll have to go hunt down these bad boys from one of the outlets above if you’re feeling impatient!! A tip of the (mad) hat should also go to the guys down at the Otters Café for putting on the mini market and beer festival. They have an aerial assault course in the vein of Go Ape! there alongside a maze and the café and lovely riverside views. The coffee and cakes is pretty good there too! Full details of the venue are just a click away: [http://www.activeadventuresliverpool.co.uk/]. Until next time guys, I’ll see you through the looking glass! Pedro x Brewery tours and beer festivals are always a welcome weekend distraction for me. Receiving an email from the Liverpool Organic Brewery in the early Autumn/late Summer was even more of a pleasure, since I had heard that they had planned to do a brewery tour much earlier than 3rd November 2012. However, the business of running a brewery is definitely a painstaking one and concentrating on what they do best (making beer) rather than invite people to the premises for a presentation and few hours of hospitality was on the back burner for the most of this year. Cain’s Brewery is currently the only Liverpool based brewery that conduct regular tours, which is made much easier by their vast premises (compared to the other breweries located in Liverpool). Their tour was not quite as pleasing as the one I attended most recently at the Organic Brewery’s Brasenose Street headquarters; however, it is still rather interesting. The brewery tour for the Organic Brewery comes in at the moment at a superficially steep £20 per head, but once you’ve completed the tour of duty in the midst of their fermentation vessels, you will probably feel as I did that the value of the tour was well worth the cost – not just based on the refreshments provided, but the intimacy of the event. Managing Director, Mark Hensby, gave a very personable account of the set up of the brewery through to the brewing they carry out and into visions for the future of the business. The other members of the brewery staff all excelled when asked various questions during the remainder of the tour in which guests are given a few nibbles and as much beer as they can hold over the course of three hours (along with complimentary glass); they were both friendly and knowledgeable (no mean feat when faced with lots of drunk punters!!). The beers on offer at the event were based on the availability of what had been brewed, luckily that included two of my personal favourites in Honey Blond and Iron Men (along with St. Anthony’s Ale – Cambrinus and the Liverpool Organic Best Bitter). The tour is by no means planned to be an isolated event. During the talk, Mark Hensby intimated that two more could be planned for later in the year both taking place in December, with the possibility of a Beer Festival taking place in the same month in the future. Good tidings! The beers on offer will no doubt rotate based on the hops that the brewery have at their disposal, with summer now over (as if we had one…) the lighter New Zealand and Cascade hops will have been used up in Iron Men and Cascade etc, so expect darker brews during the Winter and early Spring. In terms of the breadth of beers that the brewery produces all year round, there is the possibility in a reduction of the number due to ongoing logistical pressure within the business; which is sad thing, but if it means assuring the quality of the beer produced at any given time then it is a positive longer term for drinkers. In short, the tour is in early stages, but still very enjoyable and great value for money. Stay tuned, join the Facebook group or follow the brewery on Twitter to get information on when the brewery tours will be scheduled. I will no doubt spread the information too on my Twitter and ElectroKemist Facebook feed. Happy Drinking!! Pedro. (Further details on Liverpool Organic Brewery can be found at: http://www.liverpoolorganicbrewery.com/ and they can be contacted on 0151 933 9660) I love beer. To an unhealthy extreme some might say. They’re probably right, but I don’t really care, it really is something to get genuinely excited and passionate about… plus it’s something that the British are exceptionally good at. The ales we produce in these fair isles are pretty much second to none in some categories. There has been a surge in the popularity of microbrewery wares in the last few years, this is probably due to a combination of factors including the skills of the brewers pouring their hearts, souls and bank account contents into their projects and sharing the fruit of the labour with the rest of us. Another big factor believe it or not, has to be attributed to former Labour Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. Mr Brown introduced a tax break for small breweries in the UK in 2002, the number of microbreweries has proliferated to double the number that year (http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2079988/CITY-FOCUS-Raising-glass-micro-breweries.html). Sadly, the number of pubs has been declining due to the harsher financial times we are all experiencing, but the quality certainly has been going in the opposite direction in some towns and cities. This is due to better food on offer, but more importantly a better range of beers with significantly better quality also present at these establishments. A recent visit across to Brasenose Street in Liverpool to pick up some goodies for Christmas (2 crates of very excellent brews) from the Liverpool Organic Brewery (http://www.liverpoolorganicbrewery.com/) warmed the cockles of my heart. The brewery, who are currently preparing for the Waterloo Beer Festival (http://www.waterloobeerfestival.com/) and increasing the range of the beers they have developed over the last 3 and a half years (since September 2008), has gone from strength to strength and also had a major presence at the National Winter Ales Festival over in Manchester. The National Winter Ales festival was held over 4 days just outside the city centre in Manchester, so after a train from Lime Street to Piccadilly and a short walk via meeting some friends, we built up a bit of a thirst whilst wondering what beers would be represented. I was slightly dubious about what would be on offer, as traditionally the beers at this time of year tend to be darker and heavier… more Stouts and Old Ales, accompanied by treacle, toffee, autumn leaves and heavily malted flavours. I was pleased at some of the easier-going drinks that were available at the event, but also managed a fair share of some rather less pleasant offerings. The atmosphere at the event was pretty good, there were a few seasoned veterans (you always get the obligatory ‘Stetson hat with goggles strapped to the top’ type along with several guys who look like they’re there for a Gandalf look a like convention) a few less eccentric people and surprisingly a lot more girls aged 20-30 which is something of a shift in the demographic over the last few years for Real Ale/Bitter drinkers. This speaks at length to how the image has changed for these types of beverages down the years. With regards the drinks that were tried at the Festival, the 1/3rd measure of beer available was immensely helpful for those who wanted to broaden the range of drinks they were able to partake in; especially useful since there were a number of barley wines available (typically higher alcohol contents and much stronger all round). I have a full list of tasting notes and ticks next to all the beers tried at the Festival, but suffice to say the results from the CAMRA judging panel did pick out what I regarded as one the best of what was available by the Saturday session for an award. The full results can be found here: (http://www.camra.org.uk/article.php?group_id=4140). The two favourites on display for our group were both Stouts and significantly more delicious than Guinness (in our opinion). First up, related to the prose above, Liverpool Organic Brewery’s Russian Stout was a big favourite in the absence of Kitty Wilkinson’s Chocolate and Vanilla Stout. The smooth finish on the smoky velvet texture belies the strength and although I was no stranger to the stuff, our mancunian counterparts were suitably impressed with it. The second stout was that produced by the excellent Coniston Brewery from Coniston in Cumbria. Their Special Oatmeal Stout was exceptional, even better than the excellent and very interesting No.9 Barley Wine (which is very strong, but has unusual cognac and marzipan qualities) which won the Gold Award in the Barley Wine category. The tasting notes described the Stout thus “Oats used in the grist give body and smoothness, enhancing the roasted barley, giving it complex flavours reminiscent of dark chocolate and coffee”. The dark chocolate note was spot on, as was the description of its smoothness. There was a very rich and satisfying undertone to the Oatmeal Stout too, meaning it stood out above most of the other beers that were tried in our group. Moorhouse’s Pendle Witches’ Brew was also on, which is simply one of the finest ales I have ever had, on its day of course. But I have to shine the spotlight elsewhere now and again! Unfortunately, I have to caveat that this was not a scientific assessment of the beers available due to many of them simply having been demolished in the previous 3 days of drinking. This is something of a bugbear for me, but running out of a beer at a festival, especially ale that does sound incredible only for you queue for 10 minutes to be told it is all gone. The logistics of a festival are difficult at the best of times and an establishment simply can’t store as much ale to double up on what they provide, as such I know I can’t complain too much but maybe one day something will be done to ensure exciting sounding offerings such as the Lytham Gold will still be on for the final day of a festival! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Threshold Festival and Liverpool Craft Brewery Linking into the beer theme, some of you may have noticed there is a recent addition to the current crop of Merseyside brewers in the Liverpool Craft Brewing Company (http://www.liverpoolcraftbeer.com/). They have recently created two new brews to add to the Liverpool Icon, Icon Dark, Viking and Hop Beast in their range. Most recently, Tane Mahuta has been pushed as a result of tinkering with the Hop Beast recipe. Intriguingly, there has been an ale which the guys have specifically brewed to link into the Threshold Festival which takes place in Liverpool (http://www.thresholdfestival.co.uk/). The Threshold Festival began life as a collaboration between the Contemporary Urban Centre and Under the Influence in order to bring opportunities to push music, live performance, theatre and visual arts in a single setting. It is soon to have unshackled itself and pushed to be held at a multitude of venues to champion the grassroots artists that it prides itself on providing a platform to. The details of the venues and shows on offer are best sought out on the website for the Festival or by contacting the Festival organisers. Following the success on a maiden voyage and going into its second year, the festival has won many friends and some critical (including journalistic) acclaim in many quarters. Kaya Herstad Carney, ------ said of the collaboration with the Craft Brewing Company: “When Paul approached us and asked if we would be interested in having Liverpool Craft Beers making a special Threshold beer, the answer was indeed easy - Of course! Being able to be part of the process, even from the measuring and mixing to separating vanilla pods just made it perfect for us; DIY with a root in knowing your craft and a big measure of passion: Ingredients.” Rachel Dyer, a Festival Coordinator for the Threshold Festival also commented that: “It was great meeting Liverpool Craft Beer, I've never tasted beer let alone been to a brewery! Paul and Terry introduced us to the whole process and got involved with weighing ingredients, mixing and starting the brewing of the Threshold beer. The beer grain was so tasty I carried on nibbling at my sample! It's clear how passionate they are, and being self-taught independent and innovative, they're exactly the kind of people we want to call friends and work together for Threshold Festival 2012. Can't wait to see the final result!” The festival takes place between the 10th and 12th February 2012 and tickets for many of the events are available now. Heading along, spreading the Valentine’s love and having a look and trying a delicious pint of collaborative ale would be the only sensible thing to be doing! Links: Threshold Festival 2012 (10th til 12th February 2012, Baltic Triangle, Liverpool). Bigger Better and Baltic Bound! Facebook for Threshold Festival: https://www.facebook.com/undertheinfluencenight?sk=app_134506053246185#!/undertheinfluencenight?sk=info Follow the festival on Twitter (@thresholdfest), Tumblr (Thresholdfest) and Flickr (Thresholdfest). Buy advanced tickets through Skiddle. Follow Liverpool Craft Brewing on Twitter (@Craft_Beers) Follow Liverpool Organic Brewery on Twitter (@LivOrganicBrew) All the pictures for the Threshold Beer visit were kindly supplied by the organisers, therefore, it's their copyright too. ;o)
Catch you all next time dudes! Pedro x |
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