Shouting "LAGER, LAGER, LAGER" - or - Hydroponic Hops

The weather turns warm and sunny. The sap rises. I want something different, something clean and fresh, something other than big chunky beers. Magically, a selection of beers from Camden Brewery, and a mini-cask of Sharp's Spring Cask Pilsner arrive at my desk, as though the beery gods have sensed a change in my mood, and can tell that I need placating a bit sharpish, matey.

The beers from Camden are good. The Hells Lager (apparently a stab at combining the helles and pils styles) works well, being a well-made lagery sort of a lager - clean, crisp and moreish. This is the beer you get if you go into a bar and ask for "a beer" - well-executed, transparently flawless, drinkable, bittersweet. The unfiltered version ups the ante a bit further, and the Unfiltered USA Hells slams down a hand of four aces and scoops the pot into its lap - zesty, slightly yeasty, but carrying that unmistakable hoppity-skippity of an unfiltered lager. It's just more alive, somehow.

Sharp's Spring Cask Pilsner is an essay in elegance. Brewers talk about having nowhere to hide when you brew a lager, but lagers such as Camden's have a distinct robustness when compared to this lager-ale hybrid. The Crafterati will hate it, even though it's a distant relative of Monsieur Rock. It's the opposite of an edgy, boundary-pushing beer, so ethereal as to be pummelled into submission by a full-bodied, unfiltered lager like Camden's. It's there, it's gone. Honey, herbs, lemons, fresh air and dewy grass. Can I have another please?

The Spring Cask Pilsner was such a gentle waft of spring breeze across the palate that that it got me thinking. Last night, I drank a Kernel Brewery Double Citra, so full of mangoes and passion fruit that its 9%+ abv slipped by unnoticed. It was the concentrated fruity essence of a hop that has been bred to be the concentrated fruity essence of hops. Have my doors of lupulin perception been pushed permanently ajar by the repeated ingestion of Double Citra, Double IPA, Imperial Black Ale? And more importantly, if they are, should I even care, or should I just yield to it and accept that the past is a different country, and things are going to be different from now on?

The Beer Academy - How To Judge Beer

We all love beer. You love beer, I love beer, and that's a beautiful thing. Every time we take a mouthful, we evaluate it to some degree, either an idle "mmm, tasty" or an analytic "sulphurous, astringent", to a meaningless "4+2+3+4+3=3.6".

If you blog about beer, and if you read this blog, it's because you're interested in this evaluative process, to a greater or lesser degree. You can now have yourself certified [insert joke here] as Possessor Of Beer Knowledge by The Beer Academy, who are running a series of "How To Be A Beer Judge" courses all over our beer-soaked isle. You can have a look at the schedule here. I'm particularly pleased to see that the Leeds course appears to be nearly full, which means that by the time the European Beer Bloggers Conference hits town in May there will be a sector of the local populace, distinguished no doubt by gowns and mortarboards, who are able to talk about why a beer is either awesome or bogus with reference to appropriate evaluative language. You never know, it might bring you a step closer to that hallowed gig of paid writer.

Open It! Live in Leeds (Part 2)

I don't think there's any doubt that Open It! Live in Leeds was a great success, thanks in the main to the Rick Furzer for organising it, but also to all of the attendees who brought along a mind-boggling assortment of rare beers (and a 75cl of Leffe Brune) to share.

I was going to give a write-up of everything that I ate and drank, but that has proved too Herculean a task even for me. Instead, some things that made me think the most on the night, in chronological order.

Up until last Saturday, I held a certain belief that some beers just don't go with food. Orval is one - it's a great beer, but it's simply too dry to go with anything in a symbiotic way. It's a perfect aperitif, and hell even a great beer for just drinming (imagine that!), but it's not a "food beer". Lambics too sort of rested on that list, although now I realise that what I really think is that Cantillon beers aren't food beers. Indeed, the glass of St Lamvinus (thanks Gav) that I tried merely served to reinforce my opinion that I just don't anything that Cantillon make. It's all too wild, too stinky, and just plain wrong. What threw this into sharp relief was the appearance of a couple of American "wild" ales (although termed wild, they aren't spontaneously fermented, but rather innocculated with certains strains of yeast and bacteria).

Upright Brewing Sole Composition #7 (disclosure: I brought this beer along, and it was sent to me by Jeff Alworth of Beervana), and some post-prandial bottles of various Russian River wild ales clarified this belief. These had all the tartness and complexity that I enjoy in a lambic beer, but without the sensation that they'd been strained through a farm-hand's underpants before being bottled. I thought the same of the aged bottle of Fraoch 20 (mine again) - it was tart and funky, but didn't smell of pigshit and compost.

Food match of the night for me was the crispy belly pork, black pudding, celeriac and mustard salad with Mikkeller Stella 1 porter (thanks again, Gav). The sweetness of the pork and the savouriness of the black pudding played off against a similar set of sensations in the beer, making a match that was truly greater than the sum of its parts. Somehow these combined to take what on paper (or screen) sounds like hard work, and turned them into something that could quite happily have eaten all night in place of the rest of the meal. And the magnum of Stella 1 would have been a worthy accompaniment.

Another highlight was, or course, the generosity of everyone. I was particularly touched by Tyler showing up with a bottle of Pretty Things Jack d'Or, grinning as he handed it to me, knowing that it was one of my favourite beers of last year. Andy and his better half for bringing along a box full of Russian River beers. Another Andy for the brilliant and scurrillous industry gossip. And everyone else who came and shared beer, ate great food and made a fun evening happen.

The fun carried on into the night, rolling on to Mr Foleys and North Bar. I bowed out at about midnight, after (and I don't like this phrase, but there's no other way of putting it) smashing down a couple of devastatingly fresh pints of Ska Brewing Modus Hoperandi and demonstrating why I'm one of the UK's foremost beer communicators.

The food at Create was excellent, and the staff are great too. I'd recommend it without a second thought

I also did a tumblr blog for the evening - if I could figure out how to reverse the order of the photos and edit the title, it might add a bit more to it, but I appear to be showing my age with regards technology these days.

Open It! Live In Leeds

In the spirit of a picture being worth a thousand words, I've set up a Tumblr account for tonight's Open It Live, in Leeds. You should be able to find it here.

It's just an experiment to see if it it adds anything to the overall reporting of the event. Or it might just be me annoying people with my phone.

We'll know on a couple of hours, I guess!

Please find enclosed herein.....

Hi Zak,

Please find enclosed herein a bottle of Bear Republic "Racer 5" IPA.

Many months ago, after I posted on the Wine Pages forum, you helped me find good beer. When my wife and I stopped into Beerritz, You kindly gifted me a bottle of the Brewdog "Avery, Brown, Dredge" Imperial Pilsner. At that time, you wouldn't take my money for that beer -- instead you told me to give you how ever much I though it was worth on my next visit to the store. As it was, I enjoyed the ABD quite a lot, but I feel that giving you money for that beer (which bears your name) would be too impersonal.

And so we arrive at the bottle sitting in this bag. I recently visited friends and family in the States, and was able to bring some beer back to England with me when I returned. This is one of those bottles. This beer is my favourite "regular" IPA, and a six-pack of it is always in my fridge when I'm at home in California. So rather than money, I give you this beer [smiley face]

I hope you enjoy this beer as much as I do, Zak. Please let me know what you think of it. Thank you again for your kindness.

All the best, Brian

------------------------------------------------

Dear Brian,

thank you so much for this. I remember sending you that message on Wine Pages, and I remember you coming to the shop. Although I don't really post as much as I'd like to in the beer section of Wine Pages, I do look at it frequently, and I see that you are a regular poster. I'm happy to see that about half of what you post about comes from the shop (or from somewhere in Harrogate more local to you).

When I gave you the bottle of ABD, I did so thinking that you would probably enjoy it, and I'm pleased that you did. I was delighted that you'd come to see us, not only because you brought a wallet full of money, some of which you were good enough to leave with us, but because you obviously love beer.

Part of the fun of being into great beer is turning people on to things that they've never had before. Hence me making free with the ABD. And I'm so delighted that you've returned the favour.

Oscar Wilde said that a cynic is a man who knows the price of everything, and the value of nothing. With this cynicism-free act, you've demonstrated that a gesture can be worth tenfold the value of any goods that it contains. I'm drinking the Racer 5 now, and am happy to report that it's bringing me a huge amount of pleasure, not just by being a good beer, but also in the spirit in which it was given.

Keep the faith, Zak

Sweet Treats and Beer

A huge thanks to Leigh of The Good Stuff for his sterling baking odyssey that resulted in some stellar baked goods for our beer and food matching evening. Words can't do justice to how great the matches were, but here goes:

Baked Vanilla Cheesecake with Oakham Hawse Buckler or Summer Wine Teleporter

If there is anything that will convert a sceptic to the cause of beer and food matching, it's this pairing. Rich creamy cheesecake against bittersweet roasted flavours. Exceptional.

Banana and Fudge Bread with Maisels Dunkel or Erdinger Dunkel

This was the pairing that I was the most sceptical of, but as it turns out, I don't in fact know everything. The match of spice, malt and banana in both was a winner, and ,ike a high tea for grown ups, the absorbency of the bred against the fluffy texture of the weissebier was revelatory.

Chocolate Brownie with Mort Subite Kriek or Timmermans Framboise

What's not to like? Rich dark chocolate, set off against a sweetly fruity backdrop, with the bitterness of the brownie and the faintly wild notes of the beers keeping everything lively on the palate. Cracking stuff.

If you came along, please let us know what you thought. If you didn't, shame on you! If you're not in Leeds, and you can bake, why not get in touch with your local bottle shop and suggest something similar? It's fun!


Women! Men! Beer! Cake!


Leigh issues careful instructions: "YOU! CAKE! NOW!"


Jeff, hard at work, clearly looks annoyed that someone wants some of 'his' cakes.

What Is A Brewer?

This is a question that's been whirring round in my head for a while. It was sort of kickstarted a year or so ago when I stumbled across the PDTNC blog. Adrian is a brewer, and I was particularly taken with his slant on homebrewing - he built a lot of his own homebrew gear, and has also helped others with various bits of kit.

This made me realise that a good (home)brewer wasn't just someone who had a good idea about what might make a good beer, but that they also had a good understanding of the processes that will get you there. A good beer isn't just a good recipe - it's also about the execution of it, and the ability of the brewer to manipulate all the variables in that process, from set-up, through brewing, to clean-up, from the ingredients arriving, to the beer leaving in small or large pack. It's not just about the recipe - its about every step of the way, all the way back to the set-up and purchase of the brewery.

And what of the brewer's job itself? Should that just be confined to the brewhouse? Is it important that brewers are able to talk eloquently about their wares, not just to their peers in the industry, but also to the end consumer? Should brewers be white-coated scientists, or should they be rock stars? Is it necessary, or even desirable, for a brewer to have a microscopic understanding of everything that is going on in the brewing process, so that every batch of beer is the same as the last, or are we prepared to tolerate a few bad batches of usually very good beer, even if those bad batches are brought about by sloppy practice?

When you drink a beer, the way it tastes is the result of a very deliberate set of decisions and precise actions by a brewer. Each bottle of beer you buy in shop, each pint of beer you buy over a bar is a little essay, a story of flavour, aroma, taste and texture, from a brewer to you. Is that liquid love-note enough, or do you want more from your brewers?

What, to you, is a brewer?