November 2008

Beer box in Worthing is a local real ale specialist. It’s recently had some difficult times but is now refinanced and reopened under (some of) the same management. I popped in yesterday with some draft Merry Andrew and bottles of Merry Andrew and Velocity; it’s already showing signs of success.

Beer box will be open today at 4pm and they will be selling our beers at an excellent price. Given that prices will probably be going up everywhere next week in response to the Badger, now is a good moment to go over an take advantage.

{ 0 comments }

I’m wearily resigned to the fact that our political classes appear to be more or less completely out of control at this point. Both those in power and those that are rather feebly opposing on the opposite side.

When the Badger of Doom announced that alcohol duty would be put up in order to claw back money lost to the government by the reduction in rate he claimed it would be neutral. At this point I asked rang up HMRC who at the time had no idea how much the rise would be. Today it turns out that duty is going up 8% and since it forms a disproportionate part of lower priced products such as a 500ml bottle of beer, it represents a very real cost increase. In fact duty has gone up by around 17% this year alone.

…and of course a significant proportion of this money will be wasted, partly on subsidizing MPs own drinking habits.

I’m afraid we will have to review our prices and I’ve no doubt every other brewery in the country will be doing the same thing.

We need a new political settlement in this country.

{ 0 comments }

Well, it’s up. There will be a number of slightly more subtle changes in the near future and some interesting announcements to come I hope.

…we now return to the standard program of rants….

{ 0 comments }

Earlier this week, I noticed a report in the Telegraph suggesting that sports clubs that are sponsored by drinks companies encourage binge drinking. Luckily, Sir Ian Gilmore is on the case:

Speaking in response to a study that showed a link between alcohol sponsorship and heavy drinking, Professor Ian Gilmore, president of the Royal College of Physicians, called for a debate on whether such deals should be banned.

Apparently:

The study found that sportsmen and women in clubs sponsored by the drinks industry were more likely to binge drink than those without an alcohol company backer.

…and….

Nearly half of such sponsorship deals (46.7 per cent) included free or cut-price alcohol for sporting functions and post-match celebrations, found researchers at Manchester University and the University of Newcastle in Australia.

Players felt obliged to drink the sponsor’s product under such circumstances, the study found.

‘Obliged’ is an interesting choice of word here. Perhaps they were actually just taking advantage of the possibility of a cheap drink. What does Sir Ian suggest ?

…a debate on whether such deals should be banned.

This is a bit disingenuous. Public figures only call for a debate on a subject when they are on one side of the argument. I think it’s fair to conclude that Sir Ian would like to see such sponsorship deals halted.

Oh dear. In all seriousness, we don’t want people (even football players) to feel obliged to drink our beers. Of course quite a lot of small sports clubs rely financially on their sponsors – I guess they’ll just have to go to the wall for their own good.

But, further down the article, a very important fact is revealed:

The researchers questioned 1,279 players of rugby union, rugby league, football, cricket, golf and hockey in clubs of all levels in New Zealand.

Hold on! You mean that archipelago off the south east of Australia – the one that looks like Middle Earth ?

Here are a few interesting facts about New Zealand (largely from Wikipedia)

Population: 4.28 million (e.g. smaller than London)
Demographics: 78% European, 14.6% Maori, 9.2% Asian, 6.9% Pacific peoples, 1% Hobbit, .0001% orgs, ents, nazgul, etc.
National sports: Rugby union, nazgul hunting, wizard spotting.
Principle exports: butter, the One Ring.

In fact, this is quite unlike the UK, and although I’ve never been there I speculate that the culture of New Zealand is quite unlike the culture of the UK as well. Readers who have paid a visit might like to correct me on this, but I note in passing that the haka is not the sort of thing that might of originated in Cheltenham.

Binge drinking is a cultural phenomenon. To suggest otherwise is to propose that it in some sense inherent or biological. The fact that binge drinking is not widespread in places like France and Belgium underlines its cultural origin. The New Zealand Medical Journal published an interesting study on how drinking patterns vary between Maori and European populations. It’s a little obscure and it took nearly 30 seconds for me to find it on Google so I suppose we can forgive Sir Ian for missing it.

The principal finding is that while the total volume of alcohol consumed was similar in the two populations, the drinking patterns differed markedly. Relative to Maori, non-Maori drank more frequently but, on average, 40% less alcohol per drinking occasion.

Which sounds as close a definition of binge drinking as you would care to find.

To summarize, a small study about sponsorship in sports clubs, in a country half a planet away, that spends it’s leisure hours playing rugby, and where 14.6% of the population are Maori, possibly has a problem with sponsorship of sports clubs by drinks companies. From this Sir Ian Gilmore wants such sponsorship to be banned in the UK.

That’s a bit of a stretch isn’t it ?

{ 0 comments }

Just received this from the artist, and posted here with his permission.

The beer itself is priming and samples will be available next week. The stout itself will be going on sale as soon as the labels have been printed and applied. Within days I hope.

{ 0 comments }

A few months ago, a pub called The Black Dog, was told to take down a sign that directed drivers off a main road to their business. I commented on it here.

Now the Publican reports

A couple that had been told to remove a road sign advertising their pub because it could lead to drink-driving have been granted a reprieve.

In September The Publican reported that the Black Dog in Chilmark was asked to take its sign on the A303 down by Wiltshire Council on the advice of the Highways Agency.

But licensees Tom and Trisha Russell are celebrating after their appeal against the decision was unanimously won at a local councillors meeting.

Obviously the local councillors have more sense than the Highways Agency.

{ 0 comments }

We brewed Friday. Velocity again on the grounds that we are a) down to our last four cases, and b) been given a large order for the same. Good news!

Arriving at more or less the appointed hour (8:30 am) with the toddler in tow, we discovered that the water to soak the grain wasn’t quite hot enough and that we were completely out of Hobnobs*. No problem, a little grain measuring and then off with the toddler to nursery. After this a swing by Tescos to pick up Hobnobs and one or two toys in the form of new squeegies. All of us are rapidly developing an intense interest in the quality and design of squeegies.

Tesco’s turned out to be packed. Who’d have thought that at 9am on a Friday morning, most of Shoreham had decided that this was the ideal moment to block the aisles and debate the relative merits of Tesco brand washing up liquid vs Fairy.

After queuing for 10 minutes at checkout I opened my wallet to discover: NO DEBIT CARD!! Where had it gone. Hmm. I was here late last night buying a ready meal from Marks and Spencer….

Abandoning Tesco’s I moved next door to Marks and Spencer – which was packed – who’d have thought that 9:45 am on a Friday morning was the ideal moment to block the aisles and debate the relative merits of St. Michael (TM) brand knickers vs…. well you get the idea. Eventually I reached the service desk where a St. Michael (TM) brand ‘dear old soul’ hunted around various books. Eventually she said ‘It’s not here dear, you probably want to try the service desk’.

‘This isn’t the service desk ?’ I asked.

‘No dear, this is food customer service, the service desk is back through there, and turn right at menswear’.

So I battled my way back through knickers, to find another dear old soul at the Service service desk. She hunted around various books before saying, ‘no dear, no record of it here’. Then she looked again. ‘Did you say your name was Arthur Dwelly ? Only we had one handed in for Andrew Dwelly last night’.

Retrieving my card I battled my way back to Tescos and having queued in a slightly longer checkout queue again, paid for the Hobnobs and squeegies and back to the brewery.

Getting the grain soaking went smoothly and we waited the usual 90 minutes before drawing off the wort through our automatic underback into the copper. This relies on a pump and electronic cistern arrangement and it had occasionally failed during our previous brew – which floods the floor with hot sweet and very sticky wort. This time I was watching it like a hawk and after about 100 litres of wort had gone through, it failed again. I put a call through to Dave Porter (who built our setup) to ask for advice.

‘Disassemble the underback and take the pump out, take off it’s front cover, and remove the washer. You’ll find it works much better’.

We took the pump out to discover that the washer had either welded itself to the pump through heat – or it had been glued on. Off to Bunces (a local hardware store) in Steyning to acquire a Stanley knife to cut it free. Bunces was packed – who’d have thought 2:15 in the afternoon was the ideal moment to stand in the aisles debating the relative merits of natural fibre vs nylon rope.

Back the brewery and after a few slips (but I do have 9 other fingers) we managed to get the washer out of the pump and the pump and underback, back together. As Dave had said, it did work much better.

Boiling the wort and adding the hops went well and in the meanwhile we carefully sterilized the fermentation vessel to collect the wort. Finally the stage where the wort moves from the copper to the fermentation vessel began. At this stage you have to control the flow of boiling wort through the heat exchanger to ensure that it’s coming out at a temperature the yeast can live with. I started the process and took a reading on the wort going into the vessel. 56 degrees – too hot. Tweaking a valve, I tried again, 63 degrees ? What ?

Our thermometer is an electronic one that takes a few seconds to adjust to temperature. I waved it around in the air. Apparently the air temperature in the brewery was 42 degrees centigrade. Odd, I hadn’t noticed I was cooking. I’ve still got my fleece on.

In fact, the thermometer had failed. This represented a bit of a legal problem as we need to measure the starting gravity of the wort accurately in order to work out the alcohol that we eventually end up with. To work out the gravity we need to know the temperature of the wort.

Luckily, our pilot plant back at my place had two good thermometers, so it was back to my place on the other side of Steyning to grab them. My place was packed. Who’d have thought that 7:15 in the evening was the best time to debate the merits of Bob the Builder vs. Thomas the Tank Engine bedtime stories.

…back to the brewery, where the vessel was still filling. We got a good gravity reading.

Then it was just the clean up. Home by 9pm. Not one of our best days, but we still have 800 litres of Velocity fermenting nicely.

*Hobnobs are vital when making beer.

{ 1 comment }

….reports the Daily Mash….

Actually, the ways things are going this could be all too easily true.

{ 0 comments }

(This is slightly off topic – and it’s a strictly personal view to boot)

Dear Tesco:

I don’t know if you noticed, but our home secretary, Jacqui Smith recently gave a speech at the Social Market Foundation where she basically claimed that the UK population were gagging for ID cards and she was going to set up biometric collection points at supermarkets for people who wanted them early.

I shop at you guys regularly for personal items – food for the family mostly. More recently I’ve been buying ingredients for the brewery from you as well. Sugar in 5 kilo bags, which we use for priming bottled beer, and jumbo rolled oats, 12 kilos at once – which we use as an ingredient some of our beers to give them a nice head. I’m afraid that when I told you these were for a very large bowl of very sweet porridge – that was a fib.

I’m on record of being rather against ID cards for all sorts of reasons, but most recently because of this, this, and this, to pick a few examples from the many.

So I’m sorry to tell you that if you do decide to allow the government to collect biometric data on your premises, I shall have to fold my tent and steal away. I will not shop at any supermarket that does this, and I’ll be making it clear to my relatives, friends, colleagues, and employees why I made that choice.

I understand that my annual spend with you is a drop in the ocean, even with the brewery (although that is getting larger). But you never know. Perhaps others will follow my lead. Other supermarkets may be slightly less convenient and slightly more expensive, but if they don’t do this and Tesco does, I shall be using them in the future. In the final analysis – there’s always Lidl after all.

Anyway, it seems only fair to warn you.

All the best.

Andy Dwelly

{ 2 comments }