Bits and Pieces

Its been over a week since I’ve written anything, and whilst a few things have happened to me over this time, no one thing was blog worthy. So this is a brief run down of what's happened or what's bothered me in the last while.

Anyone who follows me on the Twitter Machine, will know I was out at a bar in Belfast last week and had two glass related incidents. I had been supping Farmegeddons Golden Pale Ale since we arrived at the bar and each time the bar staff asked me if I wanted a glass, and when I said yes they would reach me a nondescript pint glass. No issue. One time a bar man opened my bottle and went to run off with my money without offering a glass. When I asked for one he looked as if id undervalued his first born daughter! He then handed me a steamed up, minging looking small drinks glass, the sort you would take a Vodka and Coke in, only really dirty. Anyone who has even worked in any bar will have at some point went to empty the glass washer only to discover it hasn't gone through the cycle, this is what this glass looked like. I challenged the barman, and again I must have insulted him in some ancient language but I got a clean Tennents glass for my pint. Regular readers will know how much I value customer service in the overall experience, and this occasion the bar did not score highly at all! Thankfully this was a one off and not the norm or I would have taken my custom elsewhere.

O'Haras Red, wonder how they got the name?

Later that night I switched to O'Haras Irish Red Ale, a different barman this time held hold on to my bottle while he searched high and low for a clean glass. He returned a short while later full of apologies and declared that he only had the “heverlee” glass and would that be OK? I’m not a snob, the glass was clean and a decent temperature so I took the glass and poured my bottle into it. Irish Red is so obviously a ruby red beer so imagine my surprise when I poured a dark brown beer with a frothy brown head, several of my party expressed humour that I had a pint of Guinness in a Heverlee glass. It got me thinking how important is glass selection for drinking beer? Ill be writing about that soon.

First batch bottled. 

I got to bottle my latest home brew, which was exciting for me but largely uneventful, but it lead me to...Sampling my latest home brew! I left the beer to condition for just one week before selecting a bottle for sample. I use the “Grolsch” style bottles, and when I popped it open an enthusiastic expression of gas escaping from the bottle really brought a smile to my face. The beer poured with a standard lager style head, unfortunately this didn’t last for the full pint, and neither did the carbonation. The beer was still very cloudy, but tasted much better than it looked, was definitely getting a smoky taste which lingered. I’m going to leave the next sample until July give the beer some time to condition a bit better. I was worried that I had over primed the batch prior to bottling, now I'm not sure I've primed it enough but time will tell.

Cloudy, but with a decent head.

Finally I got round to sampling a bottle from my care package, the first beer I took was Black Wolf Brewery, “Coulls” Lager. Beer52 say Coulls is a smooth contemporary, premium craft lager. Chill for a while and savour the crisp, fresh and peachy flavours. Citrus Fruit and peaches on the nose, and clean crisp and refreshing fruity taste. My experience, the lager poured straight into the glass with very little head, but with plenty of activity in the glass. Very pale golden colour, as pale as something like Budweiser or Corona. I got typical fresh lager aromas with little complexity. Taste wise I got a nice bitter taste that reminded me of Farmageddon GPA, despite not looking nor smelling anything like it. This is a very pleasant experience, definitely a summer beer, could easily buy a case of this for a house party after a BBQ this summer.

Well that’s you up to date, I'm off to colder climates this week, Majorca for a friends wedding, seems like a bit of a waste of money heading to the “Med” for a holiday at the moment. So until next time enjoy the summer sun and drink responsibly(ish)  

A Beer Care Package!

Really didn't expect to be writing again so soon after the Christmas Special yesterday, but as fate would have it I woke up this morning to find this on my door step:

Its the first of my “care packages” from Scottish craft beer company, Beer 52. The premise is simple, you pay them and they send you a care pack of beer every month, there are different payment options and obviously the more you pay up front the cheaper it is. Or you could do what I done, and get someone else to pay for it on your behalf. Well it was my birthday.

Anyway first impressions are good, the bottles are all in tact and very well packaged, I also got a glossy pamphlet describing each of the beers, a smaller glossy book which doubled as a welcome to the club, which also included a featured brewer profile and a selection of notes on another 4 beers the company recommend. I also received a 10% discount voucher from one of the brewery's I got a sample from this month. All very professional stuff.

The notes I got in relation to the 6 beers sent this month, include a description of the beer and brewer, tasking notes, food pairing suggestions and even glass style suggestions, it very detailed, but yet very accessible.

I have been speaking to people at BlackWolf late last month about possibly doing a variety case of their beers instead of having to buy a case of a single type, blindly, they told me it is something they are looking into and hopefully there will be developments on that soon, in the mean time I received a lager named Coulls from them, a good starting point. Also included was “Centurion,” an American Style IPA from newcomers HillsideBrewery.

I look forward to sampling both these beers and the other 6 I received today, and reporting back to you all in due course. If nothing else, this post will put the Christmas special down the list.

Beer 52:                         Website, Twitter

Hillside Brewery:           Website, Twitter

Black Wolf Brewery:     Website, Twitter

Snow is Falling!

Okay not quite, its not even July yet but I've already started thinking about the festive season. My 1^st, (really 3^rd) brew has just been primed and ready for bottling, and now I'm preparing to clean out my fermentation vessel. The thing is, I don’t like seeing it sit there empty so this is where I am at.

A couple of years ago I hosted a “orphans” Christmas dinner for a small party at my gaff, I cooked everything from scratch and people brought their own booze, the ladies brought brightly coloured pre mixed cocktails, and the boys all brought whatever big brand lager was on offer. Everyone at that dinner complimented me on a dinner party well planned, before it descended into beer pong and a bar crawl round my local town.

 This year my work schedule has allowed me to plan something similar, but, I want to go a step further and brew a beer for the occasion. I reckon if I get it started by the middle of June, it will have aged sufficiently by the middle of December.

Which beer? That's the question that has been haunting my every waking moment since I made the decision. In my time working with the Wine Company, I was often asked to help pair wines with food, and I had two simple rules; 1) Compliment. The flavour of the wine should be of a similar style to the meal you are cooking, the wine shouldn’t over power the meal, and vice versa. 2) Contrast. An alternative method was to take the flavours in the meal, and contrast them with a wine, which in certain circumstances can enhance the experience of both the wine and the meal. For Christmas dinner, I recommend a young New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. The dry flavour compliments the dry Turkey meat, yet the acidity means the fruit flavours are not over powered by the strong flavour of the traditional Christmas Vegetables.

The Christmas dinner is mostly oven cooked, and a lot of the characteristic flavours associated with Christmas come from the caramelisation of the sugars and fats in the oven. Your roast potatoes come out a lovely golden brown colour, if you oven bake your stuffing it comes out with a nice dark, but not burnt, crust

at the top (at least that’s what I told my guests) or any other vegetable which is roasted in the oven will have the very extremities a golden or darker brown colour. And the main event? The turkey goes in a cold pink and pale bird with goosebumps all over it, not very appetising, yet it comes out a perfect golden, with a crisp skin and succulent flesh, my mouth is literally watering as I imagine this.

And yet I could be describing any number of Ales that come from the darker malts used to create amber or dark coloured beer. Over the next week I hope to sample some darker ales as I try to decide which style will be served with my Christmas dinner this year. Keep an eye on my twitter machine as the, I'm sure heavily anticipated, announcement of the winner will be made there!

Until next time, stop thinking about Christmas, get out, fire up the Barbecue and eat some red meat, and drink some chilled craft beers with your feet up!

Hilden Brewery

On Friday, 30th May 2014 I attended the Hilden Brewery in Lisburn. As part of my birthday celebrations it was arranged for me to take the tour of the Brewery and have dinner in the Tap Room Restaurant. So we will take these as two separate entities

We arrived at Hilden with a few minutes to spare having taken a left when we should have taken a right, and we were greeted by a very friendly bar tender in the Tap House who explained there would be another couple coming with us through the tour, I'm sorry but I didn't get the staff members names, but again like in the Vineyard in Belfast the staff at the Tap Room are a fantastic asset to the overall experience. A short time later we were taken to the Brewery itself, I wasn't sure exactly what to expect, I've read how beer is made, and I've had a few home brews, so I know the stages in beer production but I wasn't sure what the scale would be. The tour guide was very knowledgeable, and he explained how the malt is made, how it is prepared into Wort and the different stages between Wort and a pint of beer in the bar. The only thing we didn't get to see was a bottling plant. The whole brewery fits within one out building, about the size of a small barn or brewery. I found this staggering, I wasn't expecting a brewery on the scale of Anheuser-Busch, but for me Hilden brands are amongst the most exposed in the Craft Beer scene in Northern Ireland. All good bars stock Hilden products, all the Off Licences that cover craft beer stock it as well and yet all their production comes from the 5 small Fermentation Vessels. I say small, but do not start thinking about your own home brew FV's as they are massive in comparison to that.

this is the only photo of inside the brewery I can find on Google Images.

 The guide did conceded that they are operating at their maximum capacity and struggling to keep up with demand, hoping to extend production later this year. Lets hope this level of demand is maintained.

The Brewery is contained within this building.

What surprised me was a question asked of the tour group near the start of the tour and has had me thinking ever since. Think about all the Macro Brewery's you know, the big international brands, the adverts you see for these beers not one of them mentions the most important aspect of a product meant for human consumption, the taste. The spend all that money on advertising a way of life, usually glamorous and the consumer makes the connection in their head if i drink this beer then I too will be glamorous and successful. Not once is the taste of these products mentioned. The cynic in me can offer a suggestion as to why but ill leave that to your own imagination. Everything the tour guide said regarding Hilden, involved flavour and taste, right up to his closing gambit. To me this is why more and more people are drawn away from the big brands to the Craft Beer scene, appealing flavours and variety and brewers who are passionate about their products and what they offer to the market place. 

We were then sat at our table when the waitress brought down a selection of the Hilden Beers, 4 "small" sampling glasses each ranging from their Blonde Beer through to their Irish Stout. I say small, but thank goodness I wasn't driving, my partner was so I drank hers too (result). We had pre-ordered our food so it arrived very promptly. I ordered Belly of Pork and I'm not a food critic but I've never had Pork Belly cooked properly, the fat is either under cooked and slimey texture or over coked and a hammer required to help cut it. This was perfection, a normal table knife was all I required to cut through it. I had a side of Belfast Blonde onion rings. All lovely stuff. 

I will certainly be back in August for the Hilden Festival which runs on the weekend of 23rd-25th August in the courtyard of the property. The train station is a short walk from the brewery which is handy as my local train station is an even shorter walk from my front door. See you all there hopefully!

Until next time.

The Tap Room Hilden

Festival website