The attack dogs have been put on a leash temporarily in the dog fight that was the craft / keg / cask / real ale war. The troops are playing football in no mans land and managing not to put in two footed tackles. This means we can get down to the important element in [...]
Posts Tagged ‘real ale’
Pubpaper 644 – CAMRA needs a backbone and more misguided Alcohol policies
Posted: 11th February 2012 by admin in Pub Paper, WritingTags: beer duty, CAMRA, craft beer, government policy, real ale, SIBA
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Pubpaper 641 – Good Pub, Bad Pub, Unexciting Beer
Posted: 22nd January 2012 by admin in Pub Paper, WritingTags: Black Sheep, fullers, guinness, hambletons, john smiths, real ale, sowerby bridge, stout, tasting, the works
Last week I mentioned the two questions posed by one of my fellow bloggers boakandbailey, which, to recap were 1) In a strange pub with well kept mainstream cask ales, but a distinctive range of keg beers, which would you choose and 2) In the same circumstances, if there were mainstream keg beers, but an [...]
Pubpaper 640 – CAMRA consults over Keg Beer and reaching a balance
Posted: 16th January 2012 by admin in Pub Paper, Uncategorized, WritingTags: Brewdog, camden, CAMRA, craft beer, hardknott, keg beer, kernel, magic rock, marble, real ale, stout, summer wine, thornbridge, todmorden
There has been much written both in the blogosphere among beer writers and in this paper by myself and the editor regarding CAMRA’s attitude to keg beer. Their view on the subject is generally considered to be both unhealthy to the beer trade generally and being too inclusive given the craft keg beer revolution which [...]
Pubpaper 639 – A local case study into the pub scene – Hebden Bridge
Posted: 10th January 2012 by admin in Pub Paper, WritingTags: calderdale, hebden bridge, hole in the wall, pub trade, real ale, shoulder of mutton, white lion
Last week I looked briefly back at 2011, and concluded that it had not been a bad year locally regarding the pub scene in Calderdale considering the economic climate, especially in the real ale sector of the local industry, but also for local pubs, of which I observed a number of re-openings this year, especially [...]
Caldercask – Winter 2011 – State of Play at CAMRA
Posted: 20th December 2011 by admin in Caldercask, WritingTags: Abbeydale, Acorn, Black Sheep, Brass Monkey, CAMRA, Cask Marque, copper dragon, Craft Ale, elland, greene king, Halifax Steam, Molson Coors, real ale, Salamander, sharps, SIBA, thwaites
This article is a re-edit of two previous articles I wrote for Pubpaper, but targeted at CAMRA members. You can find the original articles here and here. The PDF of the published magazine can be found here The world of real ale is reaching the crossroads. We have travelled far enough up the road that [...]
Pubpaper 635 – A repost to last week and the fine line before becoming a beer bore.
Posted: 7th December 2011 by admin in Pub Paper, WritingTags: beer, beer blogger, CAMRA, carling, carlsberg, cidre, fosters, real ale, stella, summer wine brewery, thornbridge
Last weeks column drew a mixed reception when published online, with disagreement from one of the bigger online beer writers, who won “beer blogger of the year” recently as well as having several published books to his name, telling me to “stop worrying about what other people drink”. I also received a text message from [...]
Pubpaper 634 – Bland Mainstream Beers
Posted: 1st December 2011 by admin in Pub Paper, WritingTags: beer, Brewdog, carling, Craft Ale, distillery, marketing, real ale
After a having guests over for dinner this weekend, I was left with a couple of cans of Carling in the fridge the following day. Not a beer I’d normally spending money, yours or mine on, I wondered if the product had actually developed a flavour of any description. The answer is a still a [...]
Pubpaper 632 – Real ale going forward and an alternative future for CAMRA?
Posted: 17th November 2011 by admin in Pub Paper, WritingTags: Abbeydale, Acorn, Black Sheep, Brass Monkey, Brewdog, CAMRA, Cask Ale, Castle Rock, copper dragon, Craft Ale, elland, future, Halifax Steam, real ale, Salamander, SIBA, thwaites
Following on from last weeks discussion of CAMRA, with all the benefits it confers to the industry as a whole, and it recent shortcomings. We now need to discuss how we take real and craft ales into the next 40 years. What is for certain is that we will need our big “brand name” real [...]