NUMMER ÉÉN

Some very exciting news about Doom Bar was confirmed today. I can't reveal what this news is but I'm sure it will be in the public domain soon.

To all those who applied for the job detailed in the post below thank you very much. I am getting around to around to replying to each applicant in turn but there are lot of you and life as always is busy as can be.

I wish you all a beautiful weekend and don't forget that most important thing you do today will be to drink a beer.

Situation Vacant

I need some more Brewing Team Members for my brewery.

 Need Apply

• Are you a brewer or do you want to be?
• Do you want a job at a successful, fast-growing brewery which wins lots of awards?
• Do you get a sense of achievement from learning and developing in a brewery making commercially excellent beers?
• Do you like working in a team to brew lots of consistent beer?
• Do you like hard work on shifts?
• Do you have a good understanding of science and are you interested in applying it to brewing?
• Do you or do you want to live in Cornwall?
• Are you happy to commit to a few years of personal development before you start calling yourself a brewer?
• Do you favour the balanced and consistent over the extreme and outrageous?

 Need not Apply

• Are you a failed chef, artist, musician...?
• Do you like talking about beer more than brewing it?
• Do you want to make up exciting recipes using crazy ingredients?
• Do you think 10,000 pints is a lot of beer?
• Do you want to spend your life in a 2 barrel brewery inflicting olfactory armageddon on people while telling them they only don’t like your beers because they have been brainwashed by the multinational corporations’ media machines?
• Do you think Mikkeller and Struise are highly-skilled brewers?
• Do you think you can learn all you need to know about brewing by reading books published by US craft brewers?
• Do you think the palate of the future drinker will be based on hop-forward, barrel-aged, sour and extra dark beers? 

If you are interested please e-mail the brewery. 

The Pilgrimage

I make no to attempt to hide my deference to Duvel. It is in my opinion a beer without peers. No other beer reconciles big and strong with clean and precise anywhere near as well. I’ve known Duvel (in the biblical sense) for around 20 years and that statement is as true today as any before. 

I’ve held off going to Moortgat for years because I feared it could be an anti-climax. When Jean-Marie said he could get me in and introduce me to Hedwig Neven I realised, this had to be my time.  

 

My cab driver from Mechelen was a chirpy Fleming who delighted in my ‘allo ‘allo policeman Flemish accent and sentence construction. There weren’t many sentences constructed but sufficient to keep him smiling for the next 10 miles. I’d seen the picture of the Duvel “ripening” warehouse many times since I first saw it in MJ’s great beers of Belgium but still driving past felt like gazing on the face of god.

I was quite conscious of how much I was shaking when I arrived in the suavely minimalist reception area. Still a bit deflated from the cabbie’s hysteria at my Flemish I walked up to the reception desk feigning confidence to ask “dyspeakenglish?"  “A little” replied the receptionist. Thinking quickly and keen to impress I said “Meer dan mijn Vlaamse!”. The receptionist gave me the ‘allo ‘allo police officer look so I announced myself in slow English and asked if Hedwig was coming out to play.   

Unfortunately Hedwig had been summoned to La Chouffe to help sort a problem with their bottling line so I had the pleasure of meeting Sven Dekleermaeker. Sven has been brewing in Belgium for about the same time as I have been brewing in England. He has done a tour of the big boys (Inbev and Alken Maes) before joining Duvel Moortgat in 2008. When I asked him, jealously “do you love it?” He replied unequivocally “yes”.

I have to admit to having found the prospect of meeting Hedwig and the tour at the same time a little intimidating so it was good to be able to relax into the tour to a degree, relaxation in the context of high excitement that is. I won’t bore the reader with the forensic technical detail of the brewery. Suffice it to say it is big (more than 1 million hectolitres) very well engineered (Steinecker, Krones etc) and just generally inspiring.

Sven did seem a little thrown by my enthusiasm and thirst for knowledge and at one point asked me if I was in fact there for a job interview. He must have liked me because I got to see the part of the operation not usually enjoyed by visitors, the warm conditioning warehouse where the Duvel sits ripening at 22^oC. It was cavernous space with millions of immaculate cases of Duvel stretching as far as the eye could see. Bewildering, breath-taking, beautiful.    

The magic words I was waiting to hear since the bottling hall left Sven’s lips at about 4PM “And now I propose we drink some beer”.  Away from the tour I had the chance to get to know Sven better. In his spare time he organised trips for brewers to visit other breweries and asked me if I would like to join them the next day. Unfortunately my travel plans were fixed. This was the only disappointment of the day! We talked about oxidation, detection limits of iron ions and the Belgian brewing scene. He was kind enough to call me a freak in reference to my knowledge of beer and Belgian brewing! I don’t think he was expecting me to take it as a compliment.

There was a 30 minute spell in the sunny courtyard behind the tasting bar, as Duvel followed Duvel and brewing conversation flowed where I reached the pinnacle of happiness in my life so far. I usually decide how to feel on the basis of practicality but this was emotion in its purest form. A sparkling Jacuzzi filled with Duvel. Sven is right I am a freak.   

I have invited Sven back to Rock to collaborate on a brew and he is checking on the commercial aspects. I’ll let you know when he gets back to me.         

With Glowing Hearts we See Thee Rise

British Columbia is a charming place. Canadians are a charming and welcoming race. So welcoming in fact they even named a street and a brewery after me. 

 

 My trip took in 7 breweries, 68 different beers (not all pints!) in 3 days and was pretty much wall to wall pleasure albeit experienced through the jaded lens of jetlag.

 

My most Canadian moment was in a Canadian brewpub, surrounded by ice hockey fans listening to Bryan Adams, drinking a beer made with maple syrup. I only needed to get arrested by a Mounty for assaulting a moose with Celine Dion to complete the set.

Turning Point in all its glory

Beer-wise the highlight was a Flemish Oud Bruin (tasted more like Rodenbach Grand Cru than Rodenbach Grand Cru) from Yaletown Brewery and a staggeringly accomplished Pilsner and Amber from Turning Point. My namesake brewery Howe Sound made some crazy, crazy brews such as the Megadestroyer Imperial Stout brewed with star anise which helped me forget how tired I was. Franco and Dave there were so impressed with my reaction to it they gave me a T shirt! My Molson Coors Craft comrade Vern Lambourne at Granville Island made an excellently balanced Imperial IPA and was very generous with his time.

Vern Lambourne and an ugly English bloke

There were some beer low points. All the smaller breweries seemed to me most comfortable brewing hop forward beers. I didn’t taste a poor example of an US IPA or Imperial IPA at any of the brewpubs. UK brewers could learn a thing or two about this style from these guys. This was not always the case with the other styles. Obviously in keeping with national politeness I will not name names but a couple of the brewpubs’ attempts at lager were so heavily polluted with diacetyl that you could smell them from 10 yards away. I can only assume that the entire brewing team, serving staff and managers are anosmic to it. Aside from the Yaletown Oud Bruin the Belgian strong style beers seemed to be the biggest challenge, two tripels and a saison were horrific.

Back to the UK and Monday saw the last in the 2012 Connoisseur’s Choice beers return from bottling. Dubbel Coffee Stout is better than it was when it left and it was pretty bloody good then if I do say so myself. I have to admit to not being the world’s biggest fan of stouts. Monolithic, uber-hopped, black-as-pitch imperial stouts which are so thick they resemble a non-Newtonian fluid are probably my least favourite beers. They seem to me like a teenagers half-pissed cookery experiement where they put as many ingredients in as they can in the hope the positive aspects of each ingredient combine to make the perfect combination. 

My stout therefore had to embody the elements of a strong dark ale which I enjoy most yet retain my beer’s trademark subtlety, balance and finesse. I wanted the beer to be fruity, rich, sweet and warming but to finish cleanly with a moreish linger. The selection of one the world’s fruitiest yeast strains was intended to boost ester levels to compete with the malty and burnt notes from the special malts. I also used a vigorous 2-hour boil to flash off the most fervent burnt aromas. The coffee was used to work with the esters and alcohol to give the beer an Irish coffee feel.

So far those in the brewery and the flavour panel who have tried the beer have enjoyed it. Some have loved it. A lot of people have started off feedback with “I don’t usually like dark beers but…” This could be a good thing or a bad thing. It’s not likely to prosper in competitions where styles must be adhered to but should hopefully convert some people to the dark side.

With the tropical weather we are currently enjoying, spontaneous Panzerfaust has awoken. There is a good 10cm head on the beer and it is smelling like a very musty brewery fermentation. As long as it doesn’t start to head down the rotting meat/faecal route Adrian and I could be onto a winner.

Next week, not only do I get to receive Sharp’s IBA medals at London’s Guild Hall but I also get to visit the palace of ultimate brewing excellence that is Duvel-Moortgat and meet St. Hedwig Neven and thence head down to Leuven for the Zythos Bierfestivaal. Can’t type…. any.....more….. too……… excited!   

Respire-t-elle? Oui, mais tout bas

It doesn’t seem like a fortnight since my last post. Time flies exponentially these days, and we will soon all be dead! A couple of exciting bits of news to share. Firstly I am off to Canada next week to see some beer friends and plan to sample my way around Vancouver. From what I can make of it the Canadian beer scene is just about to blossom so it’s a great time to go. Any recommendations from you beautiful people for places to go and things to do would be very welcome.

Secondly I am in the midst of universe-demolishing excitement about and invitation from THE Hedwig Neven for a tour and a beer at Moortgat. I make no secret of my undying love for Duvel. To be able to learn about it and walk in the glorious palace of brewing excellence that produces this liquid miracle with Mr Duvel himself is as close to heaven on earth as it gets. In fact I’m not sure that celestial heaven would measure up particularly well to this. There was also talk of a Californian craft beer road trip with Jean-Marie Rock and Hedwig later in the year. It is best that I do not contemplate such a thing as spontaneous combustion through overexcitement would be on the cards. 

 

My blog title is now out of date. WIGIG  has now been rechristened craft discovery brand. Marketing are aiming the range exclusively at Range Rover drivers in order to control demand.

My latest discovery brand is being brewed with Lucy Britner, winner of the Drinks Writing Industry Award for most relevant hairstyle 2013. I’ve known Lucy for nearly a decade. We share a sense of humour and a love for Morrissey and Linton Travel Taverns. She introduced me to my favourite film and I introduced her to Paddy Considine. Lucy is not a beer writer and focuses more on spirits. It is fitting then that our beer has a link to the distilled. Lucy has managed to get her hands on some of the juniper berries used at Plymouth Gin to flavour their spirit. I’ve got a few kilos next to my lap top at the moment and the smell is bloody wonderful. I am hoping that with Lucy’s connections and my charm (just her connections then) I may be able to get into Plymouth Gin and do a short run of hopped gin. I’ll let you know how I get on.  

Our beer like Ms Juniper’s hair will be flaxen due to using only pale malt along with some low colour cara malt for sweetness. To this I am adding 2012 crop (just in!) Cascade and Citra and fermenting it very warm to encourage an ester fruitiness. The beer will then be spiced in conditioning with the Juniper (about 2 berries per litre). I want to achieve a really sweet and fruity beer balanced with the natural dry acidity of the spice and the citrus of the US hops.