Just off to get some milk, I won't be long...

I'm in the pub. Right now. We ran out of milk so I had to go out, didn't I. The Co-op's the nearest shop that's open now, two or three minutes away. But Wetherspoons is a few doors closer to home. Convenient, right. And the beer festival is on, isn't it. This means I literally can't walk past without seeing what's on, just in case that one beer I'm waiting for is now on. That one beer. This year it's Ballast Point's Calico Ale. Ballast Point in a pub a few hundred yards from my flat? I'd never have thought the sweet day would ever come. Never. But there was hope. I knew it was coming. One day it'd be here. One day soon. I checked the taps earlier, about 7pm, and it wasn't on. It's just past 9pm now. It not being on didn't stop me returning as there were a couple of others I wanted to try that are currently on the bar - that smoky Twaites beer, the jamaican stout, something with plums, why not. But I'm back here and guess what... It's on. Ballast Point Calico Ale. A bloody Ballast Point beer served in a pub on the road that I live on. Brilliant. I just don't want it to disappoint. Some of the other brewed-under-license beers end up being dire shadows of what they should be. At Shepherd Neame they usually do a decent job (with other people's recipes, anyway). But this one? I've got one mouthful left in my pint. One glorious gulp. And then? Then I'm going straight back for another.

(Bursting aroma of pithy citrus, slightly burnt; smooth, caramel body, hints of chocolate; a bitterness that clings like silk to a soft thigh. I like this beer a lot)

Avery Brown Dredge: The Launch

Avery Brown Dredge is here! The Imperious Pilsner that Zak, Pete and I designed and brewed at BrewDog is now ready and will be launched on Thursday 31st March.

At 7.5%, brewed with a back-breaking amount of malt and a tastebud-trembling 50kg of Saaz hops (in a 20HL brew), it’s been lagering since the end of January and has just finished a final burst of dry-hopping with more Saaz.

The beer will be launched in three locations simultaneously:

Zak will be at North Bar, Leeds.

Pete will be at The Jolly Butchers, Stoke Newington.

I will be at The Rake, London Bridge.

All locations will kick off from 7.00-7.30pm and we’ll have kegs and bottles of the beer plus there’ll be Punk IPA and some Bitch Please, the collaboration between BrewDog and 3 Floyds.

Anyone can attend and it’s not ticketed so just turn up and drink the beer! Grab a bottle too and see the label that the three of us found so hard to try and write in our very, very hungover state.

Hopefully see some of you there. If you can’t make one of the launches then it’ll be available online and in some beer stores soon.

Pale Malt Cookies

Cookies made with pale malt.

This recipe gave me 10 fat cookies, crisp on the outside and chewy in the middle:

150g unsalted butter

85g caster sugar

85g soft brown sugar

1 egg

One drop of vanilla extract

200g plain flour

Big pinch of salt

½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

80g pale malt (with a little reserved)

20g oats

Cream the butter and sugar in a mixer. Add the egg and mix. Add the vanilla extract and then mix all the remaining ingredients (if you want to crush the malt in a pestle and mortar then you can - I didn’t and liked the texture). If the mix gets too sticky then add a few drops of water (or beer!). Butter some baking trays, spread them out, sprinkle some more malt on top and bake for about 15 minutes at 170C.

These are delicious! The malt has a nutty and light sweetness to it which works so well with the buttery cookie, adding great extra flavour and texture. If any brewers or homebrewers have any spare malt (of course you have!) then I recommend baking these. They also work really well with beer on the side.

I’ve now got a few other recipes I want to try with malt as an ingredient, so I’d better find a nearby brewery who can spare a few scoops... I’d also love to try this recipe with dark malt and add chocolate chips.

This idea was inspired by a box of maris otter malt biscuits which I received in the post from Little Rose Bakery. There were two different kinds, one semi-sweet and one savoury, and they were so good I wanted to make my own.

European Beer Bloggers Conference 2011: The Agenda

The agenda for the European Beer Bloggers Conference, which is taking place in London on 20-22 May 2011, is now set and I think it looks fantastic! We’ve tried to pull together people and sessions which will be interesting to a wide range of people while also being relevant, interesting and fun.

This is what we’ll be enjoying and everything is at The Brewery unless otherwise stated...

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Optional pub crawl in London for anyone who wants to start a day early. Details to be announced.

Friday, May 20, 2011

12:00PM         Registration & Meet the Sponsors (and drink some beer!)

2:00 PM          Welcome from Scott Wilson, Director of Public Affairs, MolsonCoors

2:15 PM           History of Brewing in London with Peter Haydon from Meantime Brewing

3:00 PM            British and Worldwide Beer Markets – Past, Present, and Future with David Sheen from British Beer & Pub Association

4:00 PM            Do’s and Don’ts of Beer Blogging with Pete Brown, Mark Fletcher, & Melissa Cole

5:00 PM            Identifying Flavours and Off Flavours in Beer with FlavorActiV

6:30 PM            Dinner at The Brewery courtesy of MolsonCoors

8:30 PM            Evening Party at The Brewery – details coming soon

Saturday, May 21, 2011

9:45 AM             Breweries and Social Media panel

10:45 AM           International Beer Blogging panel

11:45 PM            Shaking up the Brewing Scene with Martin Dickie from BrewDog

12:30 PM            Lunch on your own at local restaurants and pubs (although I’m working on something which would be very cool…!)

2:00 PM             Session with the British Guild of Beer Writers – details coming

3:00 PM             Beer and Food Pairing with The Beer Academy

4:30 PM             Live Beer Blogging

6:00 PM             Dinner at Dirty Dick’s Pub with Wells & Young’s

8:00 PM             Night of Many Beers at Camden Town Brewery

Sunday, May 22, 2011

11:00 AM           The Effect of Ingredients on Beer Flavour at Fuller’s Brewery

12:00 noon        Brewery tour at Fuller’s

1:00 PM              Lunch at Fuller’s

2:00 PM             Conference finish

4:00 PM             Optional: Arsenal at Fulham football match, last game of the season (tickets extra) or visit a few pubs or go home and recover

The Friday night sponsor has been confirmed and we’ll announce it as soon as they finalise their plans, but if we get what has been proposed then it truly will be something unmissable (seriously!). The Dos and Don’ts blogging session will look at lots of different issues to do with blogging, such as free samples, using video, advertising, length of posts, and so on (if there’s any particular issue you think needs addressing then say!). The Breweries and Social Media panel will be interesting to see things from the other side of the mash tun and we’ve got some great people lined up for that. I love the idea of the Off Flavour session and we’ll be getting spiked samples of beers to learn more about off flavours and their causes. The Guild of Beer Writers will probably be doing a session on the Future of Beer Writing with a couple of speakers and then the chance for the floor to have their own input.

For the Live Blogging and Night of Many Bottles we’ve got some cool breweries signed up already, which is very exciting, including the promise of a few breweries that I know will get the beer geek pulse rate jumping up. We’ll be able to announce all these details better in the next few weeks, including all the breweries taking part. We’ll be at Camden Town Brewery so we can have a brewery tour and there’ll be beer served from every dispense.

If any brewers want to sponsor then there are still a few slots available – contact me to find out more. The Conference is also aimed at bloggers from around the world (and to those who blog about wine and food as well as beer) and we’ve got a few travelling from around Europe to attend. If you are from a brewery and want to attend to find out more about blogging and meet writers and industry professionals then you are very welcome to sign up!

There’s less than two months to go so get your tickets and hotels sorted if you are planning on attending! 

Brewery History: Issue 139. Michael Jackson

The latest issue of Brewery History is dedicated to Michael Jackson. It’s a compilation put together by 10 contributors: Pete Brown, Jeff Evans, Martyn Cornell, Tim Webb, Roger Protz, Zak Avery, Carolyn Smagalski, JR Richards, John Keeling and me. It tracks Michael’s career, his writing, his influence around the world and it ends with my piece about his ongoing influence in the new media.

The issue will be launched at The Rake on Sunday 27 March at 6pm. It’s a fitting day as it would’ve been Michael Jackson’s 69th birthday. A few of us will be there on Sunday, along with Tim Holt, the editor, where issues will be available to buy (or you can buy them here).

Steve Williams and Pete Brown have both covered the event here.

I never met Michael Jackson – I started writing about beer after he’d died – but his influence is incredible and impossible to underestimate and his writing lines my bookshelves. It was an honour to be asked to contribute and I can’t wait to read the issue.

CAMRA: The impact of beer duty rises on pubs

Yesterday CAMRA released a photofilm about the effects of rising beer duty on pubs. In their own words:

The photofilm highlights the devastating impact on pubs of successive increases in beer tax - which has gone up 26% since 2008 and is set to increase by another 7% - which could put another 10p on the price of a pint in the pub. CAMRA is calling for the Chancellor to freeze beer duty in Wednesday's Budget.

Britain already has the second highest rate of excise duty on beer in Europe, and further increases threaten the jobs, tax revenue and social benefits of beer. CAMRA is arguing that with 29 pubs closing every week, what our community pubs and pub goers need from the Government is a lifeline, not a death knell.

I like this and it gets across the message simply with some nice infographics. The images of boarded up pubs are a sad reminder of the death of the pub caused by industry complications, some of which could be treated or alleviated. It’s also a pub-focussed extension to the Proud of Beer film produced by SIBA which is another attempt to raise the profile of an industry which needs some assistance from the government, not more taxes. 

And is that Mark Fletcher from Real Ale Reviews on the right in the yellow and black shirt?!

Beer Jelly and Ice Cream

I used to eat a lot of jelly; a huge bowl made with half a bottle of vodka and as little water as we could get away with to make it set. That was as good as dessert got when I was at university and we’d sit around tucking into it between cans of lager and shots of Tesco Value gin (we lived like kings in those days).

I’ve wanted to make beer jelly for too-long. I’ve wanted to make it with beer ice cream to be a boozy twist on the kids classic. I wanted to serve it in a beer glass so it looked like a pint. I also wanted it to be a play on a black and tan, with IPA jelly and stout ice cream. 

It’s a simple recipe. The ice cream is a pot of good vanilla custard and about 100ml of Guinness FES (any stout will do) – you can make your own custard if you want but I cheated. The jelly starts by softening gelatine sheets in about 100ml of the beer – I used a can of Punk IPA. Then make a sugar syrup – you want it to be very sweet (four tablespoons of sugar in about 100ml of water) so that it balances the bitterness (if you used a different beer then you could use less sugar). When the syrup is ready, take it off the heat for a few seconds and then stir in the gelatine with the beer it’s been soaking in. Let the gelatine dissolve and then pour this into a jug along with the rest of the beer. Put it into glasses or serving dishes and leave to set in the fridge.

And the taste? It’s really interesting... It’s jelly and ice cream but not like we know it, far from the bright red wobble of Rowntree’s with white rectangles of ice cream cut from a box. It’s fruity, a little fizzy and there’s some bitterness at the end. Put it with the ice cream and it dulls that bitterness, giving the flavour of beer in both, which is great, really interesting and unusual – it’s not over-sweet and there’s a savoury depth to it.

I used Punk IPA to see if the tropical fruit aroma and flavour stayed with it and it does, just. The trouble is that the bitterness is harsh on its own and that’s not something you want in a dessert. Some pieces of fruit, mango or mandarin (tinned, of course), would balance this and most other beer jelly recipes I’ve seen come with fruit in them (they are also made with fruit beer).

I now want to try it with kriek (a proper sour one) or a sweetened fruit beer. I’d also be interested in a Budweiser jelly or one made with wheat beer. Or maybe black tea jelly with milk ice cream and a biscuit on the side... I’d like to try ice cream and jelly made from the same beer as well – I think it’d make a playful dinner party pre-dessert, especially if served in shot glasses so it looks like beer. Or taken to the next logical stage it’s a full-on beer trifle (beer cake used as sponge, beer jelly, beer-soaked fruit, beer custard, BEER!).

My kitchen experiments continue and I’ve got lots more things I still want to try! Anyone got any cool ideas for using beer in food that I can steal and try out?

The joy of subtlety; the complexity of explaining it

I talked some people through a beer tasting recently. The group were there to learn more about beer in general and get an overall idea about the flavours and varieties you can get with an eye on food matching. We chose a long list of beers, maybe 30, from around the world – England, Scotland, US and Australia. Nothing too crazy, only things which are easily available, but still picking the best that we felt we could, with a heavy bias towards American hops plus a few darker beers for balance.

The people we were drinking with wanted a beer menu, so we were talking them through all the beers. Because of their menu there was the C-hop bias as this is what we felt would work best. This one tastes like this because... it’s this style which means... this works great with food because... this has an interesting story... Simple stuff, nothing too beer-geeky. It was really interesting from my point of view to see how ‘normal’ people reacted to these beers, seeing which they loved and which they didn’t. Some we expected them to love, they hated, and vice versa. But the difficult bit came when we had to explain subtlety.

Some of the best beers were subtle. They are perfectly made and delicious but inherently subtle and not flavour bombs to blow your tastebuds away (but they were the beers we thought would sell best on the menu...). When faced with an American IPA and then trying to extol the virtues of a pilsner, it’s difficult, especially as I’d been exclaiming the importance of flavour intensity to match foods. How did this delicate lager now fit in?

The trouble was that we were drinking them in gulps then moving onto the next (not from IPA to pilsner but our thoughts were always wandering and comparing with half-finished glasses spread around the table). This is fine for big flavour but it doesn’t work with subtle one which require time, consideration and a few pints. You can’t easily fall in love with a lager or best bitter on one sip, but sit there with a pint of it and your heart is grabbed.

So how do you describe the joys of subtlety in a pint? You can’t say it’s got less flavour because the flavour just works differently, it’s deeper and wider rather than hard and fast down the middle. Yet these beers are the ones that more people will enjoy, they are simple, yet if you want to find more in the glass then with the best beers you can and will; you’ll pull out the hops, the yeast, the body, the finish and then, more importantly, there’s the sociability of drinking and chatting over pints (not over tiny pours of extreme beers).

I think the best beers in the world are subtle and simple – a great lager, a session ale. They are the beers I most enjoy drinking – DarkStar Hophead, Marble Pint, the irresistible Bernard Unfiltered, Taras Boulba, Brooklyn Lager and so many more; beers with great flavour which are enjoyable and unchallenging to drink, superb in their subtlety. However, look at the latest lists of the highest rated beers in the world and the majority are as subtle as a slap around the face from Louis Spence. As much as I love my tooth enamel being stripped by alpha acid erosion, simpler beers are just more fun to drink (which is something Fuggled discussed recently). The only difficulty comes when trying to describe it to others...

The Rebuyability of Expensive Bottled Beers

I’ve spent a lot of money on beer in the last few years As I want to try lots of different beers I’m happy to pay a premium for something that I know has got some story to it, is rare or unusual. Because of this I regularly spend up to or beyond £10 on a bottle (though £10 is my flinch point where I think again if I actually want to spend that much on one beer). Ultimately, if it’s a beer that I want to try then I’ll buy it, but what I’m interested in is how re-buyable these expensive bottles are?

I want to try new beers and I like trying new beers but I also have favourites which are always in the cupboard or fridge ready to go. Most of these favourites are every day beers but there are a few special ones which I can’t resist – some Mikkeller beers, Struise, some big American stouts. If the beer costs me less than £2 a bottle then I don’t think twice and I buy it but if that favourite beer costs a lot more then I feel should justify the expense...

The price variable with bottles is large. Each different beer has its own value (it has to be a pretty special 5% beer for me to pay £4 for it, unless it’s in a big bottle) but of the expensive ones, which will I return to? If an online shop gets a pallet of interesting beers in then I’ll likely buy some of the ones I want to try, regardless of cost, but if the same shipment comes in a few months later then do I buy the same ones again even – the ones I really enjoyed – at £12 a bottle? Or do I buy eight bottles at £4 each? Or do I just buy a completely different selection?

It needs to be pretty damn good for me to buy a second bottle of beer which costs over £10 – the first time is ok, the second I think again, whatever it is. For many beers I’ll flinch at £5-6 if I’ve had it before, so I guess that means I’m a fairly fickle first time buyer of beer bottles. That also means I buy lots of beers once, tick them off as done, and move on. I will buy them again but usually only for a dedicated occasion, maybe a food pairing or to share with friends who I know will like it.

So how rebuyable are expensive bottled beers? What’s your flinch point on the price tag? Buying them once is okay for the curious drinker like me who wants to try new beers from favourite or different breweries, but how much is too much when you go back for more? 

7 Things

I got sucked into an internet chain mail by Jay Brooks and, because it’s just a bit of fun, I can’t resist it. The idea is to post 7 Things that you might not know about me and then ask 15 more people to do it themselves and then they pass it on... I won’t ask 15, I’ll just invite anyone who blogs and reads this to carry it on in their blogs.

Piercings. I’ve had almost everything pierced (except for my nose and belly button)... I went through a phase for a few years. I had 14 piercings altogether. I’ve now taken them all out. My earlobes once featured 8mm holes and I had a dodgy one in my ear cartilage which put me on an intravenous drip for a few days. The last piercing I took out was called a smiley. I’ve also got some tattoos, including a white heart on my wrist. I want more tattoos but I keep spending money on beer instead of saving it.

Red hair. I dyed my hair bright red once. To get it as red as possible I bleached it first. It was really red. I spent a whole Christmas like that once. What was I thinking?! I had to dye it to get rid of the colour when I had to go back to school but I chose to bleach it which left me with pink hair and white roots. I had to then dye it brown to cover it all up. I’ve had many crazy hairstyles and spent about four years of my late teens using hair dye in creative ways...

Cricket. I played cricket throughout school and university, being captain of the 2^nd XI in my final year of university cricket. I bowled leg spin, batted in the top order and hid myself somewhere quiet in the field. I was never really any good at cricket. In front of a mirror I had a near-perfect technique. In the nets I wasn’t bad either. Put me out on the square and I couldn’t score runs, which isn’t ideal for a batsman. I once got out for a duck in the 9th or 10th over – I opened the batting. I’ve played one game since uni but I do still miss attempting to hit the ball though the covers or ripping down a vicious leg spinner.

Sports Calendar. I once posed topless in a calendar at my university. It was for the Student Union sports teams and raised money for charity. Wearing some of my cricket whites you can see the strength of my back foot defensive shot.

Laser eyes. I’ve had laser eye surgery. I had bad eyes and so decided to spend lots of money which I didn’t have to get them fixed. I’m very glad I did it!

Fat. I used to be really fat. Until I realised girls existed (which, because I went to a boy’s grammar school, was when I was about 15) I would wobble around. Fat Dredge they called me. I soon discovered that if I swapped fizzy drinks for water and chocolate bars for fruit that I could lose weight. I also used to wear big, round glasses and have braces. I may have realised that girls existed but it took a little longer until they noticed me!

I’ve written a novel. I did it in a few months just after I started this blog. Since then it’s been printed out and sitting in a shoe box waiting for me to do something with it. Last summer I took it on holiday with me and did a thorough paper edit which made me realise how much work is needed to pull it into shape. This year I’ve promised myself that I will at least try and do that edit to see how it comes together. I also wrote another 35,000 words of a different story but it wasn’t working as I’d hoped. That story is about a brewer so I might go back to it sometime.

That’s my 7 things, now over to you!

I'm assuming that having mentioned the calendar shot that you'd all want to see my back foot defensive!