Campaign for Real Ale

Subject: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Kosmo
Date: 18 Aug 09 - 10:29 PM

Who's with me?

After many friends of mine calling me a man for drinking lovely guinness and real ale I have decided I need to make a post!

I think it should be promoted as a sexier drink, not some fuddy duddy boring brown drink that only old men in pubs with pipes drink**. It's a drink that I seem to see less of - my main problem is that only a few superpmarkets have a really decent ale section in the alcohol bit, you get a hobgoblin here, maybe another wychwood ale, possibly a fraoch, speckled hen, bomber, deuchars ... and pretty much thast's if you're lucky.

(**the hugest of apologies go to anyone who fitted that description exactly - it was just a bad example)

And why is it only Wetherspoons that have cottoned on to selling cheap ale in cities??? I know a lot of people who look down on Wetherspoons pubs, but they do massive cheap meals, and real ale sometimes from local microbreweries and have an ale festival every year across Britain. So (as a penniless student) I will not complain.

Anyway, join the revolution! CAMRA

Lots of love

Kosmo

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Peace
Date: 18 Aug 09 - 10:49 PM

"(**the hugest of apologies go to anyone who fitted that description exactly - it was just a bad example)"

Your apology is accepted; it's usually me referred to as the bad example.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: KathyW
Date: 18 Aug 09 - 10:59 PM

Believe it or not, there is an ale event in Chicago, Illinois every March: Day and Night of the Living Ales, put on by the Chicago Beer Society. It sells out in advance every year.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Peace
Date: 18 Aug 09 - 11:05 PM

GROZET (Gaelic for gooseberry): Lager malt is brewed with malt, bog myrtle, hops and meadowsweet. Then gooseberries are added for a second fermentation.

ALBA (a name for Scotland at the time of the Viking raids): Sprigs of pine are boiled for several hours with malted barley during the early Spring. Then fresh shoots of spruce needles are briefly infused before the fermentation process.

FRAOCH (Gaelic for heather): A boiling brew of malted barley, sweet gale and flowering heather produces a spicy aroma. It is cooled slightly, but poured while still hot into a vat containing fresh heather flowers . . . where it infuses for an hour before fermentation.

EBULUM (derived from a term for elderberries and introduced by 9th century Druids): A 16th century recipe included roasted oats, barley, wheat and herbs, which were fermented with ripe elderberries.

KELPIE (seaweed): The malted barley grown on seaweed beds produced interesting flavours in the ale and whisky made by coastal farmers at least 400 years ago. Bladderwrack seaweed was included with the barley in the mash, thus producing this dark ale.

From this site.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 02:55 AM

I personaly would not put Guinness in with real ales but I endorse the sentiment:-)

DeG

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Will Fly
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 03:03 AM

DeG, Guinness and bitter is actually a very refreshing drink. What I miss is pubs that sell mild. A mild and bitter is also an excellent bevvy.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 03:44 AM

The last time I went to The Beech in Chorlton they had an excellent selection of cask beer and who knows, they may have some tonight when we gather to sing songs mostly but not exclusively traditional. All welcome - even Bulgarian bagpipes

L in C

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 03:55 AM

I infer that Kosmo is in the UK (and maybe a Les Barker fan).

The Good Intent, and also the Man of Kent, both in John Street Rochester Kent merit a visit - always good beers on, and quite a range of people drinking them.

Maybe one should bring back the old Boddingtons ads?

Kosmo, you can point out to your friends that if you choose your beers wisely you can either drink all day without getting battered (but still enjoy the flavour) or be getting between two and three times the amount of alcohol for the money as spirits drinkers.

Or, if it be the case, you could point out that you like men? And that lots of men find a woman with a pint very sexy.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: theleveller
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 04:24 AM

"only a few superpmarkets have a really decent ale section"

You obvioulsy don't have a Morrisons near you - they have a great selection of real ales that are usually on special offer, and ciders as well. Rhythm and Booze also have a fair selection.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,MC Fat (at work)
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 04:28 AM

or why not visit my local the multi award winning CAMRA National Pub of the Year THE KELHAM ISLAND TAVERN in Sheffield. Always at least 11 ales on handpumps (including at least 1 mild and 1 stout0. Good value home cooked food at lunchtimes plus a session on Sunday nights.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 04:28 AM

Guinness as much as I love it aint real ale, it's nitro keg.

Dave H

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Leadfingers
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 04:48 AM

Bear in mind that Kosmo IS in Glasgow (Good Luck with the Uni Folk Club) and as I recall , Real Ale is not so common North of the border
which is also the case in Northern Ireland .
And with reference to Guiness , I would certainly go for Guiness in a Pub that DIDNT have any hand pumped beers .

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Acorn4
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 05:11 AM

CAMRA became very popular during the seventies, so much so that even the "chaps" in the saloon bar cottoned onto real ale. A worthy cause with which I fully agree.

Down with trendy red wine and cider!

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,Joe P
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 05:43 AM

I have mixed feelings about CAMRA, on the one hand they have done a great deal to promote and 'save' real ale, but it's members and some of it's campaigns don't always give off the best image, those groups of complete bores who have made beer tasting such an obsession at the cost of not actually enjoying the experience really put me off. I even went to Hull Beer Festival once, never again.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Acorn4
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 05:59 AM

I know what you mean - beer anoraks, but as you say, it is a good cause!

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 06:08 AM

Real Ale in America - for a long, long time
was only available through home-brewing...and
many consider still that way today.

You may have a bottle capper but...Without a mashing tun
you are still just a piker.

I have used homegrown grain - but always considered the
the ultimate arrival to be ... homegrown hops.(Cascade for me)

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 06:39 AM

we found a micro with restaurant in Moab

Now their is a line for a song.

Excellent beers and they did a great tray of 5 or 6 different glasses for a very reasonable price.

We were also excited to note Rosanne Barr's sister in law from the same programme in the restaurant.

cheers

L in C

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,AlanG at work
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 06:52 AM

I've not got a clue what you're on about Les. Are you sure you've not been testing out the Timothy Taylor's Landlord at the Beech ready for tonight?

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: folk1e
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 04:36 PM

And why is it only Wetherspoons that have cottoned on to selling cheap ale in cities???

Weatherspons have cottened on to the novel idea of buying "late" beers! Late bers are those that are about to go past their sell by date, this makes them very cheap to buy ..... hence the good pump price!of course you need to have a good volume of sales for this.

If you are looking for good real ales (other than at folk festivals .....Obviously) Tesco, Co-op, Asda et all do a good selection of bottles at a good price. If all else fails you can always nip down to your local brewery, be it micro or mainline who will almost certainly help relieve your problems. Ifyou look closely you may just see a pub with a small magazine for sale called the good beer guide ......... and then there is CAMRA!

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: stallion
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 04:48 PM

Unwittingly I was at the first ever meeting of CAMRA. In 1970 I was on a training course at the Post Office Training College, Stone, Staffs, it was a two week course and the trains back to Scarborough were a nightmare so I stayed in Stone for the weekend. On the Saturday I went into the town to be met by hoards of people and public speakers all trying to stop the closure of Joules Brewery, the town brewery, I curiously tasted the brew, I thought it was vile and perhaps didn't need saving, however I did become a member for several years in the teeth of the war on the kegs, the war seems, for the most part, won.
Keep drinking the real stuff!

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: The Barden of England
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 04:51 PM

I'm a member of CAMRA, and have been a TRAIN SPOTTER in the past. What with that and Morris Dancing, and a beard, and a beer gut, there's no hope for me.
Bugger it, I'm off down the pub for a nice pint or nine of 'Incubus' (a brew from the badlands of Kent)
John Barden

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Peace
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 04:54 PM

I am Canadian and very happy to be so. WE have beer in bottles and most have a picture of a horse on the label, thus identifying the factory from which it originated. FYI.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Folkiedave
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 06:15 PM

There is a real ale pub in Kingston Ontario - though I forget its name.
Sheffield of course is the real ale centre of the UK along with being the folk centre of the UK.

In fact if you are a folkie it really is the only place to live. What Jim (MC FAT) fails to mention is that within 150 yards of the Kelham Island Tavern http://www.kelhamislandtavern.co.uk/ is the Fat Cat. Another wonderful real ale pub. And a few hundred yards further a real ale gastro-pub. And a few hundred yards further........all the way along the Don Valley. To the New Barrack Tavern. All linked (more or less) by tram. How civilised is that?

Of course you could deviate to the Kashmir Curry Centrre

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: joan at cons
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 06:21 PM

try the real ale in the conservative club in saltburn
its good x

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 06:52 PM

those groups of complete bores who have made beer tasting such an obsession at the cost of not actually enjoying the experience really put me off. I even went to Hull Beer Festival once, never again.

Shame to miss out on all that good ale, don't you think? The fact is that any* enthusiasm or hobby has its quota of grey-whiskered box-ticking bores wearing quaint slogan T-shirts over XXL bellies. The trick is to ignore them and hang around long enough to get at the good stuff for yourself.

*With the exception of folk music, obviously.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: stallion
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 07:11 PM

Oh good ale thou art my darlin!

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Flashmeister
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 07:11 PM

aw deepest of joys is my Tuesday session in a CAMRA country pub of the year.....never a more enthusiastic shanty has been sung than that sung through a warm fuzz of bloody good ale :-)
I do agree with Kosmo though that ale (ha ha a bit like folk) has a bit of a beardy bad-jumper label on it when it's miles better than any piss water lager any day...a GOOD lager however can also be a thing of joy, just not these awful mass marketed serve-it-cold-so-they-won't-notice-it-tastes-of-nothing overpriced beverages that fuel the kebab-shop duellers every weekend in dear old Albion :-D

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 07:22 PM

Sharp's brewery in Rock, Cornwall, are true champions of spiffin' real ale. Many a Cornish pub will serve Doom Bar, the brewery's main product, and excellent it truly is, but aficionados will seek out such delights as Sharp's Own, draft Eden Ale, Cornish Coaster and Sharp's Special Bitter, as well as individual beers made for particular pubs (I'm thinking of the superb PSB, Pendoggett Special Bitter, made for the Cornish Arms at Pendoggett) and their range of bottle-conditioned ales such as Chalky's Bite and Chalky's Bark, Honey Spiced Wheat Beer and Sharp's Special in pint bottles. If it has to come from a bottle, it has to be bottle-conditioned for me, none of yer pasteurised crap thanks.   Music connection: I shall drink at least six pints of Doom at the session on Friday night... :-)

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 07:35 PM

Oh no, not another airing for that hoary old tale about Wetherspoons and late beer. When he only had a few pubs in London, he used that ploy. Now he has hundreds, he mainly sells Greene King products in ALL of them, how much late beer can they brew?
They also do festivals advertised weeks in advance.... beer specially ordered IN ADVANCE.
    Anyway, if its within date, its OK. Many traditional breweries have pubs that can't shift it fast enough, so it goes off.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 07:45 PM

"...he mainly sells Greene King products in ALL of them" Not in our Spoons, which stocks a very wide range of beers (includoinh Green King of course). And I've never had one yet that wasn't in very good health.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Aug 09 - 08:02 PM

The proof of the pudding and all that. The real scandal is that a huge number of pubs serve perfectly good beer far too warm and fail to shift it within the recommended time-scale after tapping the casks - but still sell it to you.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: treewind
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 02:46 AM

"those groups of complete bores"
Yes, I joined CAMRA when I was a student, and the secretary of the organisation was somebody I'd been at school with a couple of years before, (so it wasn't all old men with grey beards and beer guts then) but after a year of CAMRA hysteria I decided I'd had enough. I got the "real beer" message, though and have never forgotten it. Once CAMRA had served its purpose I didn't want to make it a lifelong hobby.

I always go for local brew when away from home, and that includes drinking foreign beer when abroad. The Germans and Czechs understand how to make beer, even if their product is very different from the English one.

Anahata

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: MBSLynne
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 03:03 AM

But what about real cider????

The real ale battle has been going for years and most pubs sell it nowadays in one form or another, but I STILL can't go to a pub with any expectation of getting anything other than Strongbow or Magners which are almost but not totally unlike real cider. I don't even bother to go to pubs mostly these days because I end up drinking water so what's the point?

Someone support MY campaign! Please!

Love Lynne

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,MC Fat
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 03:23 AM

Dave is right near the Kelham * are the Fat Cat*, The Manchester Railway Hotel* (sorry but in my mind it can never be the Harlequin), The Riverside*, the Shakespeare*, the Milestone, the Wellington (formerley Cask and Cutler, the Hillsborough Hotel*, the New Barrack Tavern* and the soon to be reopened Gardners Rest. Those marked with * also do music and I play at Hillsborough and the Barracks. The kelham is now as of Monday a 'Carling Free Zone'
By the way the previous post about Wetherspoons buying late beer is pure bollocks, they just screw the prize down that they pay their suppliers

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 03:42 AM

The good thing about wetherspoons is that, whilst they do screw their suppliers, at least they pass the savings on to the customers. The other pubcos screw both the suppliers and the customers.

R

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Sir Roger de Beverley
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 03:52 AM

That was me - keep losing it recently (my cookie that is).

I used to belong to CAMRA but eventually got fed up with the anorak element at meetings. I still believe in their basic premise and will only drink real ale and play in real ale venues including beer festivals when I can get the work.

We musos do all we can to support the real ale venues here in Beverley.

Oakham JHB anyone?

R

R

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: mandotim
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 04:05 AM

Beer festivals can be good gigs. I was an early Camra member, and generally prefer proper beer. However; I'm married to a brewer, who is generally reckoned to have one of the best palates in the brewing industry (she once competed against a beer testing machine live on Tomorrows World, and won!). She has shown me how poor some small brewers are at producing a consistent, good-tasting beer, and regularly takes pints back to the bar and explains in detail about what's wrong and what the cause is. (Usually out of date beer, dirty beer lines or poor production). When real ale is good, it's very good indeed, but it can be truly horrid. What put me off Camra was the people who would drink pigswill if it came out of a cask, and would refuse nectar if it so much as hinted at top-pressure.
That said, beer festivals can be good gigs for folkies. We've played a few, and generally get an appreciative, gently swaying audience.
Tim
PS By the way, we're at the Northwich Beer Festival on Friday 18th September. http://northwichbeerfestival.webeden.co.uk/ The band can be seen abnd heard here . It would be nice to see 'catters there!

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,MC Fat (at work)
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 04:33 AM

I think what most people forget is that CAMRA is basically a volunteer run organisation (apart from a few national staff) and that's what you get with most volunteer societies ...inconsistancies. Some members (and especially tickers) drink crap but I don't think you can take away CAMRA's effect on the industry. At best we now have more choice with lots of small craft breweries than ever most of them producing good beer. At worst we have the fact that CAMRA's campaign to get rid of the beer tie actually caused the break between brewery and pubs by creating the infernally worse pubco's.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 04:57 AM

I agree about the variability of real ale but that, to some extent, is the beauty of it. None of us should put up with beer that is badly stored or served because we know that when it is looked after correctly it will taste divine.

I don't mind how it is dispensed and have had some wonderful microbrews in The States (Seattle area) that would not be classed as real ale here because they weren't hand pulled.

Real ale and real music - who can beat it?
R

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Sir Roger de Beverley
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 05:15 AM

lost it again - what is going on? That guest was me.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: mandotim
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 05:44 AM

I absolutely agree about Camra's generally positive effect on the beer market; only old buggers like me remember the sixties and seventies when the big breweries laid waste to the industry, and all you could get was poor imitations of continental lager, Watneys Red Barrel, Double Diamond and Whitbread Tankard. Craft brewing almost went under completely due to the policy of big breweries buying up smaller competitors and closing them down. I also agree that the breaking of the tie was a very mixed blessing. Guest ales are fine, but pubcos....ugh.
I'm a lucky, lucky boy for beers these days; I work in Sheffield, and fully endorse the comments above; I live in Leek, North Staffordshire, which must be easily the best small town for beer; loads of great and varied pubs, fantastic variety of beers (including the semi-legendary Hartington Bitter from Whim Ales at the Wilkes Head, and a proper Belgian beer bar) and a group of landlords who compete ferociously on the quality of their ales and run regular beer and cider festivals. That's just the town pubs; in five minutes you can be at any number of really good country pubs. Oh, and almost all the pubs encourage live music, and gigs are plentiful and properly paid.
Don't tell anyone, we're trying to keep it a secret....
Tim

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Sir Roger de Beverley
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 06:40 AM

mmmmmmmmmmm Hartington bitter. Haven't had any of that in an age.

R (after resetting my cookie yet again!)

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Kosmo
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 07:00 AM

I;ve been checking out the oubs in glasgow - The Three Judges is AMAZING they have a regular circulation of 10 different real ales and one or two real ciders!

They have the volume, the price and the location written on a big chalk board - it's considered by some people to be "an old man pub" but everytime i get served there I'm treated very well and the locals are very friendly and think I'm good for bringing trade in and drinking the good stuff.

xxx
Kosmo

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 07:13 AM

Mild is also my drink of preference, Will - Luckily I am in Manchester and my local pubs (primarily Holts houses) do an excelent mild:-) My favourite is a Midlands one though - Sarahs (if my beer addled brain remembers correctly!) Ruby Mild - Nectar of the Gods! If I am not drinking beer for whatever reason I tend to go for a dark mild shandy - made with dandelion and burdock if possible. Doesn't half get some funny looks though and is described as cocktail in an Holts pub:-D

Cheers

DeG

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Folkiedave
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 12:06 PM

Real ale does not have to be hand pulled of course. Gravity, water pressure (in Scotland) are two other ways to serve it.

I had some cracking beers in Oregon and what I found interesting was that people really knew what they were talking about - not just in the pubs but (Portland, Oregon)in shops and things.

We asked in one shop for a micro-brewery and the lady behind the counter gave us a run down on the local bars and the beers they sold!!

Draught Guinness is not real ale under any circumstances IMHO. In a pub without real ale go for some bottled beer - but preferably find another pub. Not always easy I know.

As for Wetherspoons, £1.79 for Thornbridge Jaipur was ridiculously inexpensive. Which is why two other folkies and I got pissed on it wa couple of weeks ago, Shame they hadn't enough staff. We'd have been even worse.

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,sir roger (cookieless again)
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 01:52 PM

Dave
One of the things that made me leave CAMRA was the number of motions put down for the national conference about methods of dispensing ale - boooorrriinngg.

R

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 02:38 PM

Not that I am biased ...

Valmai (Lewes)

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 03:02 PM

Lynne there was a Camra offshoot called CAPE that addressed your need, not sure if it's still going, anyways up here on Tyneside we have a few pubs that have a reputation for good cider and one of them
the Oddfellows Arms in North Shields is having 16 ciders and perries on from the evening of Thursday 24th to last orders on Sunday 27th. The Cumberland Arms in Byker also recently had a cider/perry/pyder fest and The Bacchus does regular guest ciders. Anyways this all very well for the Tyneside crew but i can only recommend Camra's Good Cider Guide for outlets of the good stuff elsewhere.
regards,
Ritchie

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 03:31 PM

Just to be a CAMRA bore I'd just mention that most of the bottled beers in supermarkets, though they are often from excellent breweries and some taste pretty good, are noot real ales. There are exceptions Hop Back & Consiston beers for example which are bottle conditioned and therefore can be classed as real ale.

Another vote here for Oakham JHB - one of the very best!

Now back to my tankard and bus enthusiast magazine.............

Subject: RE: Campaign for Real Ale
From: GUEST,Ritchie
Date: 20 Aug 09 - 03:56 PM

Oakham, Thornbridge and Brewdog. 3 breweries doing something just that wee bit different. Honourable mentions to Mordue Radgie Gadgie, Jarrow McConnells stout, Big Lamp Keelman Brown, Dunham Massey stout. Gagging for a beer now...