Tiny Rebel make it two in a row!

Newport brewers Tiny Rebel make it two years in a row by taking gold again at the Great Welsh Beer and Cider festival in Cardiff this year.

The results were
Gold - Tiny Rebel 'Fubar'
Silver - Purple Moose - 'Dark side of the Moose'
Bronze - Great Orme - 'Welsh Black'

Fubar is a 4.4% American Pale ale that is bloody gorgeous, a great choice to be honest.
Huge congratulations to Gaz and the team.

The W-Ales Beer Festival 2014

Early June means time for the Great Welsh Beer and Cider Festival, this year its been re branded as the W-Ales Beer festival, in a new location also.
Earlier in the year I noticed that the Motor Point arena in Cardiff had a band listed as playing on the dates the festival is normally held there leading me to wonder if it had either moved dates or venue.
Turns out its the venue as they've upgraded to the Millennium Stadium, and also advertising "an emphasis on international ‘street’ foods" which, lets be honest, can only be an improvement on the dreadful food at the Motor Point. Looking today on the website though I still cannot see any vendors listed so it'll be interesting to see what is there.

Details:
 Beer List here
What looks interesting that they all appear to be Welsh beers, usually there are ones from all over the UK.

Dates are June 5th- 7th, with Thursday being the trade only day, open to public at 5pm. Friday & Saturday 12.00noon – 10.30pm

Price has increased again, day ticket is now £10, other deals available, and you get to keep the commemorative glass if your a CAMRA member.
(I'm fine then but what about my friends, are they to be charged if they want the glass, on top of the tenner to get in?)

Some great beers are listed, several new breweries to me that I'll try to seek out, it looks like a good beer day for me.

Tiny Rebel Beer festival 5th- 8th June

Starting this Thursday until Sunday is the NOT SO Tiny Rebel Beer Festival, at their Cardiff bar The Urban Tap House.
You gotta love a spreadsheet and it looks like they needed one here to list the beers schedule so you know when the beers you want will be on tap!!
I'm studying Fridays list as that's when I'll be going.

To Cornwall and back again

Last week was our annual trip to Cornwall, we join our friends and their families for fun, food, sun (sometimes) and yes drinking.
The boys see it as a great opportunity to get reacquainted with breweries we have discovered over the last five years, local beers and have done a pub crawl around a new town each year, Padstow, Wadbridge and Bodmin being the last ones. This year we thought about doing a brewery tour and plumped for Skinners in Truro, who were very helpful when contacted, more on that later.
Due to the general poor mobile reception in Cornwall, really bad in so many places, and the ultra slow wifi at the farmhouse I didn't check into Untappd as many of the beers as I could have, but as usual I bought a few bottles home to blog about.


The first cask beer of holiday for me however was from a more well known company, namely Sharp's brewery from Rock nr Padstow.
A lot of people are down on them since their acquisition by Molson Coors a few years ago, but I still like their beers, and from what I've read about Stuart Howe, chief overlord or some such similar title, he seems a bloke who hold very high ideals and integrity, certainly someone who knows his own opinions.
Whatever, judge them on the beers.

We stopped for lunch on the way from South Wales to Cornwall just of the A30 past Exeter into a village called Ide for a pub called the Poachers Inn.

Sitting in the sun in the lovely beer garden we enjoyed a well prepared and reasonable lunch, my daughter (and the rest of us) loving the huge whitebait she had ordered. I went for a classic lunch, and got large slices of ham and beautiful fresh eggs with chips.
To drink they had several south west breweries on but I went for the Sharp's Six Hop IPA, which at 3.8% you could put it into this new 'sessionable IPA' category that seems to be mentioned more and more.
Light golden yellow, good carbonation. Minimal head retention. Light citrus aroma, which on taste seems a little light also, nice balance with the malts. Subtle bitterness afterwards. With the six hops I was expecting something a little more upfront and punchy in the mouth, this was gentle but refreshing and certainly sessionable.

Then it was onto Cornwall.

Preseli Brewery 'Powder Monkey'.

Powder monkey is a 4.2% abv bitter brewed by the Preseli brewery based in Tenby, and which they now label as 'Tenby Ales'. As I mentioned in a previous post on Tenby you can buy their beers in some tourist shops in the town at quite a price too, over £3 for the bottles I saw.

I wasn't going pay that price for them, they were quite ordinary all those years ago when I reviewed them in my first month on this blog in 2010. This bottle I found in a garage shop outside of Tenby at a much more reasonable price so thought I'd give them a second go.

Going back to that first review there are two things I will mention.
Firstly I said that their website was basic and untouched. 4 years later there seems to be little change showing how much they value/need their online presence.

The second thing is, and this is sort of backing up the first point also, a while back I looked at ratebeer and noted the commercial description of their beer 'Even Keel'.
This is it:


COMMERCIAL DESCRIPTION
Even Keel is a 3.4% bitter probably what you would term a ’session ale’ and it went down very quickly. With a light malt taste and some hop aroma, pleasant enough but not terribly exciting. The kind of drink you would have again but if there was something else on offer you would try that first.


If you go back to my original review you note this has been lifted straight from it! You have to ask why?!!! It's not even that complimentary, I'm suggesting try other beers instead!
I don't know how ratebeer allow descriptions to be placed beside beers but it's possibly not that a stringent process. And I'm not suggesting that a brewery should monitor every aspect of their online presence but a complete lack has probably meant that this 'description' has been tagged to their beer for a couple of years now, something most people would want to remedy you would think.

Anyway back to the current beer.
Not flat but little carbonation. Light fruity aroma which follows through into the taste. Light to medium body, very slight bitterness afterwards. Umm and thats about it really, not really much more to say about it.

Here's a nice picture of Tenby instead.

Stackpole Inn, Pembrokeshire, and Bluestone brewery 'Pasg Hapus'.

 How's that for a beautiful country pub! The Stackpole Inn at Stackpole was one of the places we visited on a trip this week whilst staying in Tenby.

The decor inside sat comfortably between modern and country style, a lot of stone and wood but well presented, warm and appealing. Welcoming friendly staff too.

We were headed for a day out to the Stackpole estate for a walk, it's a National Trust property in South West Wales with great walks and nature aplenty, birdlife, lillypad lakes, and otters if you're lucky enough. Within easy walking distance is also Barafundle bay which is regularly voted one of the best beaches in the UK by those who know.

And when my wife suggested going to Stackpole something pinged in that clogged up head of mine that a pub nearby appeared in one of those '10 best Welsh country pubs' lists.
An early lunch before our walk was planned, a nice menu with plenty of local produce on it, and a bar with, aside from the usual offerings, had a good few Welsh beers on.
The barman said that they like to keep their beer and cider options Welsh, although their lager wasn't. I suggested they try the Gower brewery for their Lighthouse which is a nice lager, or try Tiny Rebel as all their beers are pretty good.

Food was ordered, children's meals were pretty standard for what you expect, I opted for the Cawl with local lamb and veg (£9) and my wife went for a mushroom cheese red onion puff tartlet thing with salad (£11).

As you know a new brewery opens up every 93 seconds these days, and currently according to made up figures there are now 29,537 in the UK. By the time you reach for a newly created beer tomorrow that will have topped the 30,000 figure*.

One of those new is the Bluestone brewery based in Pembrokeshire a 10 barrel operation whose beer was on that day.
'Pasg Hapus' means Happy Easter in Welsh, the pump clip gives it as a Pale Ale at 4.5% abv.
Fresh and in good condition it had a a medium body, smooth yet enough life in it, reasonable citrus bitterness from the hops, a good beer in a lovely pub.



 *all bullshit as I'm sure you know

The Gravity Station, Cardiff's newest beer shop/bar

If you read Craig's piece last week on the Gravity Station opening in Cardiff, then this is just an additional piece to follow on from it. If you didn't read it and visit/drink in cardiff I would suggest you catch up!
I received an email a month ago from the manager Jim explaining the progress and idea of the shop, selling bottles and having up to 8 beers potentially available on tap.

Anyway it opened on Friday just gone, I learnt this via a little exchange with Jim on arfur' s untappd entry for a Waen beer called 'Snowball'. As I was going into Cardiff the following day that nicely fitted into my plans of wandering aimlessly whilst my wife shopped.

Oopps, blurry!

As you can see from the photos there is a nice selection of beers European and American, Odell, Flying Dog and Anchor to name a few. Wales is obviously well represented, and owners The Waen Brewery showing off their range, and a nice selection of British brewers including Brew by Numbers whose Nelson Sauvin Saison 01/07 I picked up. The aforementioned 'Snowball' by Waen is a seasonal offering, a vanilla coconut chocolate stout, 7% abv and so I got one of these too.

Monday morning they only had 4 beers for sale on gravity, two from Waen themselves their delicious chilli plum porter and 'Gravity one', and one from the Off Beat brewery 'chocolate stout' which I tried, smooth and tasty. Prices if remembered correctly was £1.75 a half, and they do tasting paddles too. They have seating inside and out, and it was really nice to meet Jim, a top bloke happy to talk about their plans, the setting up and general beer chat. To have somewhere in central Cardiff offfering that range of bottles is an excellent addition to the beer scene Cardiff is developing.
(In the initial period of opening they are still awaiting the card machines so its cash only)

 

After I met up with my wife we went for lunch at the Grazing Shed which is a couple doors along from the Gravity Station, it's a 'gourmet burger' establishment , all ingredients are locally sourced, welsh beef, chicken and lamb, drinks too. I had the Uncle Pedro beef burger which was really good, nicely spicy and fresh, and you can do meal deals of a burger and a beer or cider. Celt experience and Artisan brewing co. are available, I had the latter's hefeweizen which was excellent.

The Gravity Station
Facebook – www.facebook.com/thegravitystation
Twitter - @TheGravityStn
Website – www.thegravitystation.com

The Waen Brewery
Facebook – www.facebook.com/groups/waenbrewery
Twitter - @TheWaenBrewery
Website – www.thewaenbrewery.co.uk

it's all gone crafty!

(Adopts booming voice)
Yes it's craft craft craft here at Tesco.
You too can be hip and happening, drink cool beer, and not need hang around in craft beer bars with people that have tattoos and strange facial hair.
Now that Tesco is stocking more more more craft beer from small independent breweries such as Greene King, Marstons, Fullers and Brains. Gasp at the range, bask in the coolness of a beer produced in a shed/nanobrewery round the back of the car park of the megamassive main brewery.


Don't miss out, go craft craft craft beer crazy!!!!!!

Ok so a bit piss takey but it's how my mind worked when I went into the mega super massive Tesco yesterday. 'Oh new bottles' I thought as I looked on the shelf, and quite a number of new ones too. Quite a few were 'craft lager' but a red ale and a hefeweizen also. 

If stocking Brains Craft beers most shop's will only have Barry Island IPA and Boilermaker, so it good to see some new ones, 'Bragging Rights' which is a braggot style ale and quite nice, and ' Ides of Marzen'.

Looking at the other bottles though you soon notice they are all from the larger breweries, mentioned above.  Over the last week a few bloggers have been commenting on the Sixpoint beers appearing in Wetherspoons (and I hope to get some soon) and it possibly being a turning point/milestone for craft beer (and I hope it is) I look at these on the shelves and do wonder. With the power and foot already in the door that these big breweries have, and the almost instant ability to supply the 'latest trends' you see small independent producers could always be struggling against the tide.

Anyway enough thinking it hurts my head. What about the beers, and yes I did buy some of them, like you I like to try new ones when I see them.
The two Marstons 'Revisionist' label beers I got were the red ale and wheat beer. Both being fairly innocuous, the wheat beer being a bit spicy but otherwise bland as a very bland thing. The Brains Craft marzen was nice but I prefer the 'Bragging Rights', nicely spiced and balanced.
I also picked up one from Greene King 'Suffolk Strong' because it says its been blended with their old ale 5x.

Tenby (holiday break) and beer update

After a few days in Tenby during half-term, expecting poor weather and being pleasantly surprised that most days stayed dry enough to get on the beach with the kids for walks and rock pooling, I thought I'd post a sort of beer update on the town. (My previous post on Tenby's beer scene.)

The Lamb pub, owned by Marstons, has been closed.

The Preseli brewery which is based in Tenby has changed its name to 'Tenby Ales'.
I've yet to see any of their beers on cask in the pubs I've visited surprisingly, but I saw their bottles in a Welsh tourist shop on Frog St. and in the Deli. But I'm not buying them at £3.69 a bottle, they were pretty ordinary beers when I tried them a couple of years ago, and unless they've significantly improved i'm not sure they can justify those (tourist) prices.

The Brains pub 'The Crown Inn' now also serves an ale straight from a cask on the bar, that day it was from their Craft Brewery 'Farmer Walloon' a 4.5% saison which was ok although a bit tired and tellingly they took the cask off soon afterwards.

The Giltar Hotel up by the South beach has one cask beer on in the bar that's open to non residents. I had Celtic Pride from the Felinfoel brewery, which was perfectly fine but uninspiring to be honest.

As you can see the eyesore that is the Waters Edge development is progressing at rate of knots. Well, no actually its not. A company now in administration has stalled the building work, leaving it as you can see going nowhere.
 


 The South Beach Grill, owned by SA Brains of Cardiff is part of the development, and been open for a while. I've not been in yet for a drink, I will remedy next visit. Wonder how much they've been affected by the building uncertainty and delay.
A photo on their Facebook page showed a van delivery from Brains and the Craft Brewery so it will be interesting to see what's on sale.
As you can see in the photo they've had to dig themselves into work following the recent storms!



As always the best pints I had were in The Hope and Anchor, guests on were from Otley, Purple Moose and Skinners.

Tiny Rebel Brewing Co. 'The Full Nelson'

From the Tiny Rebel Brewing Co.  is a bottle of 'The Full Nelson', not a new beer but a damn fine one that I always enjoy.
Style wise it is an American pale ale but they described as a Maroi pale ale due to the use of the excellent Nelson Sauvin hops from New Zealand.
330ml bottle, 4.8% abv.

Aroma is a wonderful sweet apple and white grape effort, some peach also, smelling crisp and fresh, and with a fluffy white head.
A light lively body, again the crisp and freshness come across your tongue immediately, light biscuit malt, more peach, and a dry citrus end rather than an overly bitter one.

Wetherpoons 'Mount Stuart', Cardiff Bay

A couple of times in the last month I have had the opportunity to drink in the new Wetherspoons in Cardiff bay. I say new, but it actually opened in July last year but this is this first chance I've had to visit it.

The Mount Stuart is well located in the Bay, in the old Harry Ramsden restaurant I was led to believe, close to the car park and Techniquest, a big tourist attraction if you have kids.

The first visit was with the family, in the Christmas holidays, and we went to have a meal after a day out.
My initial surprise was that this did not look like a Wetherspoons.
You know what I mean, their pubs do have a tendency to look all the same, but this is open, all glass and chrome, open area's. A number of long raised bench's to sit at in large groups, with plenty of table seating also downstairs. The bar staff to me the upper area includes an open outside area that was very popular last summer.

They have the standard menu, the food was good, served and priced well.
They have about 8 hand pumps, a couple of keg lines and then the usual others in lagers and ciders.

That day they had a couple from the Celt Experience on thankfully, including a Xmas offering called Divine Yule Saison. A collaboration with the Waen brewery, this was a beautiful 5.3% saison that had an earthy sweetness from the pumpkin, an aroma and taste of lemon and pine.
Tangy, bitter and dry it was incredibly refreshing.


 The second visit was at lunchtime midweek, it was reasonably busy, maybe three quarters of the tables taken.
I was about to met some work colleagues for a meal elsewhere but took the opportunity for a second visit.

So glad I did as on tap was the Adnams and Six-point Brewery collaboration 'Righteous Ale'.
A rye style at 6.3%, deep red/brown in colour, a real malty sweet aroma. A comforting richness swims by, plums, brown sugar,with a nice bitterness with orange and lemon tones. A hugely enjoyable pint.
 
The Mount Stuart seems a welcome addition to the bars in the Cardiff bay area, competition to the Brains brewery pub Terra Nova,  and for those used to the identikit Wetherspoons a nice alternative viewpoint.

Brains Craft Brewery 'Black Mountain'

One of the things I like most about the Brains Craft Brewery is the labels they use, nice cartoon style brewery set up depicted, and usually little unique characters or items added for each different beer, lovely little details have gone into them.

'Black Mountain' is described as a 'hoppy Black IPA' , 5% and as with all their bottles 330mls. I picked this one up at Wally's Deli in the Royal Arcade in Cardiff, paid £2.35. It was brewed in conjunction with the Craft Beer Youtube channel.

Poured pretty black but with a small head that went soon after the photo.
Nice medium body, little toffee aroma, and a little floral and spicy elements. It does not however give the 'explosion of hops' promised from the Amarillo, Pacifica, Citra, Summit and Apollo hops used. The 'coffee, liquorice and burnt toffee' is there but also quite muted.

Overall its an okay beer,but compared to other well known Black IPA's its a bit of a light weight.
Its been reviewed reasonably well on untappd on cask so I thought that perhaps it has lost some of that freshness in the bottle, but seeing as it was only available in late December in Brains pubs this bottle isn't that old really.

Last year and the next

Happy New Year to beer drinkers everywhere, and everyone else too.
Drink beer, none of this dry month garbage, that's what I say.

Anyway, like several other bloggers that commented over the last couple of months, I am also guilty of slacking on the post front, in fact I think I averaged about 3 posts a month which is rubbish compared to previous years. Ah well, must try harder!

The promise I've made on this blog about this time in the last couple of years has been to feature more Welsh beers in reviews, and whilst not increasing the number it has held at about the 35% mark.

I again didn't do the Golden Pints awards but I suspect Tiny Rebel and The Celt Experience would have come out well, especially Celt. They are going from strength to strength, and looking back on untappd last year I rate them usually as a 4/5 most of the time, and am always impressed.

The new year looks good, and with the news from Craig that Brewdog are locating a puppy factory in Cardiff that's a great start.

Happy New Year.

Threat to trappist beers - become a monk!

Quick link to post whilst on my break at work.
The Independent has a story about the declining number of monks and the threat to beers such as Orval as a result.

Link

Brains Craft Brewery 'A Pils from the Hills'

A 5% abv, 330mls, this Pils uses the hops Saaz and Hallertau with a pilsener malt.
'A Pils..' is crisp, light, the hops especially the Saaz are obvious and beautifully aromatic. A nice pepper spice element, lemon, and the over-riding freshness was great. Typically golden and well carbonated.

And that's the problem with these craft 330ml bottles, its over far too quickl!

Another from the truly exhausting list of beers that the Brains craft brewery have produced.
Which again is a fairly decent offering, as are a lot of the beers on that list, but I've had only few which are really really good. They just feel like they are ticking beers of a list of styles, and producing reasonably well made, well crafted beers, and thats great (to drink).

When they take a beer and re-do it, like Bragging Rights (a 5% Welsh beer style called bragawd)  one of their better beers in my opinion, they seem to be tinkering to improve and really getting it right. More of that tinkering  please.