R.I.P. Stef

Bad news fellow beer drinkers of Sheffield; Stef, the Fat Cat's cat, has been put down due the worsening of her heart condition. Approx 15 years old, she has been a regular feature of the popular Kelham Island real ale pub over the last few years. Alas though there was only one option last Wednesday when it became apparent that her quality of life would never be the same again.

Stef was owned by the previous landlord, Steve, and Duncan, the current landlord, has no plans to replace her. I am told he has a recently got a kitten but it will remain in the living quarters upstairs, a very wise move given the occasional abuse Stef suffered at the hands of drunken customers or their dogs.

None the less, Stef was a graceful and resilient feline who did not suffer stroker’s gladly if she was not in the mood! Although she did seem to be getting friendlier recently. Indeed, the last time I saw her a few months ago she was sat on the stairs and was quite content to let me stroke her.

Stef you will be much missed.

Beer Escalator and Beer X

So all that hard campaigning has paid off! It’s a nice reminder that democracy does work sometimes; if you shout loud enough with enough voices those in power occasionally listen. I’d like to think that common sense also won over when the pub closure numbers and unemployment figures were examined. Good Ol George even went one step further and took 1p off the price of a pint! They must have been serving a strong ale in the House of Commons bar today. Although his expectation that the saving will be passed on to consumers was perhaps a little optimistic, but you never know.

There are certainly some local pubs that should lower their prices, that’s for sure, along with a handful of micro breweries with an inflated sense of self importance that could knock a little off a barrel of beer. I don’t think I need to name names, I’m sure everyone can think of appropriate examples!

By whom that expectation should most definitely be honoured by, however, is by the unfair pub companies and perhaps the national and regional breweries as well. But I think that a lot of free houses that rely on passing trade would do well to keep that extra penny. What is better, beer that is the same price or a closed public house?

But then again the argument could be made that all pubs passed on the VAT rise in 2010, so why would they not pass on a saving? Now I know a 1p is not a lot but according to the BBC’s budget calculator I’ll save £6.94 a week! That’ll do me thanks George, I’m sure you’ll make it back off me somewhere else.

On a separate note, I attended Beer X last Friday which was the beer festival that followed the Society of Independent Breweries (what on earth does the A stand for??) AGM and award ceremony. Well... I wasn’t really very impressed to be honest. To say it is the Society of Independent Brewers it looked very corporate with low lighting, purple and red spot lights, a PowerPoint style display on the screen above the stage and an eclectic music selection. Not that I was expecting a mahogany bar with a sawdust floor. Although...

To be fair the style of the event was quite a welcome change having been to a good many CAMRA beer festivals. But what really upset me was the lack of organisation of the available beer on the bar. Because there really was no logical order to what was on offer, which was very little. They started running out of beer sooner than last year’s Steel City Beer Festival! The substantial programme had the beers listed in regional order, only the bar did not. In fact not all the beers were on at once so looking at beers in the book was completely pointless, you had to walk up and down the bar and hope that could get a beer of something good before it went off. Suffice to say my party and I did not stay all night. We checked out the new room at the Sheffield Tap, which is very impressive, and then visited the Rutland Arms and the Red Deer which pulled the night back nicely.

I’ll try and blog more often! Not that I don’t have any interesting thoughts (insert joke) about the beer industry, I just stopped writing them down. And believe me, real ale is always being drunk!

Local Christmas/Winter Ales

The infamous Christmas beer from Bradfield Brewery has been available from 1st November but is now being seen more often. A minimum 50,000 pints of Belgium Blue will be brewed but so far I have only managed about 10! It'll be popping up in various Wetherspoons and is a mainstay in the Porter Cottage over the festive period and may also be permanently in Forum group outlets. The Broadfield and The York certainly had it on last week and my local; The Sheaf View, has 9 barrels but they are saving it for nearer Christmas as it will fly off the bar. Various other pubs also have it/have had it/will have it and I got a pint of in the University Arms last Friday night. Simply cannot get enough of the stuff. I may have to go and pick up a take out box of it from the Brewery to drink at home over Christmas.

Abbeydale Brewery have no less than 6 festive beers although 2 are sold out already. Head here http://www.abbeydalebrewery.co.uk/beers for

the full list but I can say that Baubles is a very nice beer as I tried that a couple of years ago. As I am drinking around Kelham Island tonight I am hopeful that I may see one of them in Shakespeare's or perhaps the Kelham Island Tavern. Should end up in the Museum and they can usually be relied on for Abbeydale specials. Fingers crossed!

Kelham Island Brewery have two Christmas Specials; Fairytale of New York 4.2% and Captain Crimbo 5.4%. Looking at the tasting notes I think I’d opt for Captain Crimbo; http://www.kelhambrewery.co.uk/specials.htm. As I am drinking in the Fat Cat tonight I hope to be sampling it this very evening!

Sheffield Brewery are offering two Christmas beers; Christmas Pudding Porter 5.2%, and Christmas Amber Ale 4.1%. Sadly I don’t think I’ll make it as far as the Gardeners Rest tonight, but I will try to next week in order to sample one.

Blue Bee have Hoe Hoe Hoe, a 5% pale ale that is probably best looked for in the Rutland Arms or the Three Cranes.

True North have First Noel, 5.2%, a traditional dark ale, which I have seen in the Broadfield and I imagine will be in the York too if not the Old House and the Forum. I haven’t been in the last two since the brewery started so I’m not sure if they have extended their hand pump range.

Wentworth have brewed Santa’s Secret a 4.0% dark and hoppy Christmas ale and you may still see their Plum Porter which I’d also like to sample.

Welbeck Abbey have catered for all with two beers that cover the pale and dark camps. Cocoa Noel 5.5% is a chocolate stout and Santa Baby a 5.9% Australian style IPA. I’m curious about the chocolate stout but I will naturally gravitate towards the pale. Yes I know it’s not original but it’s what I like so there.

Acorn have 10^th Noel a 5.7% ruby ale that I have seen (but not yet tried) in the Sheaf Island so I would think it’ll crop up in other Wetherspoons too. As the name suggest this is their 10^th version of this ale and in keeping with tradition it is 0.1% stronger than last years version.

Raw has Blizzard Bitter 5.0% which in their words is a ‘strong festive bitter with caramel flavours and a smooth dry bitterness’. I can’t reliably say where you’re likely to see that and at some point I might contact every local brewery to what which pubs they regularly supply to. Because I’d like to know that, and even though there are apps that try to do that, I’m uncertain of their comprehensiveness as they are often reliant on user info.

Peak Ales winters ale is Noggin Filler a 5% traditional dark winter ale. Again, this will be hard to come across in Sheffield as their beers are rarely seen here.

Duncan Gilmour Article in Beer Matters

Well... it has been a while. But as some of you may know beer articles have consistently been appearing in Beer Matters. The biggest one yet went in the November issue and provided a brief look at Duncan Gilmour, traces of which can be seen all around the city.

Feedback from that article is featured in the December/January issue and I was warned that history articles do provoke a response! Which should be expected if there are mistakes and there are bound to be when dealing with the past.

The trouble is that I did not do any original research as such, I merely summarised the data in David Lloyd Parry’s book South Yorkshire Stingo and added in some info from Mark Bone’s entry on The Tamara Valley website. This was sufficient enough to tell the overall story of Duncan Gilmour and in one place. However I am the first to concede much more work needs to be done to confirm the details. Of which there are a lot. And seeing as I work full time I am not really in a position to undertake a huge project like that. Because I could not stop there, I would have to chronicle the history of Wards and Stones too, and then all the breweries that they took over. I would try and find pictures of the pubs, map where they where located, collate anecdotal evidence and check business accounts.

So one day, in about 35 years, when I am retired then perhaps I will do that! It is something that will certainly hold my interest for a long time as local history fascinates me.

The Duncan Gilmour piece is not on this blog as Blogger is extremely inflexible when it comes to imbedding pictures. I tried but anger was the only result. So it is on the Face Book page along with some more pictures of ex Gilmour Windsor pubs. The historic photos are not included as Picture Sheffield own the copyright and despite me checking that Beer Matters was ok to publish them, I still managed to email the article to Sheffield CAMRA with the wrong reference on. Oops.

But either way I think I will be drawn to write a piece on the history of Wards and Stones (separately) sometime next year.

Steel City Beer Festival

So the Steel City Beer Festival is over for another year. I think it was a good improvement on last year, the layout was much better and all the familiar trappings were present; Chilli Chocolate, Billabong, traditional pub games and a beer merchandise stall.

I worked on the Thurs night and found it very enjoyable, helping out on the bar and then manning the games stall. Worked out how to score to win a prize on the bagatelle by watching some talented lads who won all the beer on offer. So when I went on Friday as a punter I was able to win three bottles of beer for myself!

However there were a couple of niggles; the glass was exactly the same as last year with just the number changed. Now, due to the poor monetary success of last years festival it is hard to blame the organisers for trying to keep costs down. Which also explains the second niggle of beer starting to run out on the Friday with the bar shutting on Saturday night at 10pm (so I'm told) due to all the beer being sold out! No waste this year at least.

But before it ran out there was a good range of beer. Not sure who won the grand title of beer of the festival but I'm sure the next edition of Beer Matters will inform us. However I think my favourite was probably Jorvik Blonde from Rudgate Brewery in York. And I was lucky enough to get a half of Farmers Jack O'Lantern on Thursday as it had gone by Friday. A wonderful halloween beer from Bradfield Brewery do try it if you happen to see it anywhere. The Chilli Chocolate Stout from Wentworth almost took my head off and I couldn't stop drinking Yakima IPA from Great Heck. A dangerously drinkable beer as it is 7.4% but very smooth and easy going. Managed to have the Dr Morton's special but missed out on Abbeydale's special, Concussion which was annoying. Suffice to say though that I tried enough different beers to have the worst hangover on Saturday that I've had in a long time! But that's beer festivals for you.

Well as they say, third time lucky (in an indoor venue), and I have every confidence that next year will be an overwhelming success. I shall try and be more involved myself. :)

38th Sheffield Beer Festival

What better way to celebrate cask ale week than to visit the 38th Sheffield Beer Festival? Yes I know, it is not the most glamourous of locations but I think we struggle in Sheffield for mid sized venues that have character. Nothing comes close to the Winding Wheel in Chesterfield for instance, the location of the Chesterfield Beer Festival earlier this year.

But what does the venue matter really? There's going to be a truck load of beer! Breweries that you don't see in Sheffield and special beers from our resident breweries. I have already worked out what I am going to drink!

I did volunteer to work on the bar tonight but unfortunately the confirmation email did not come through unti 2:26 this morning. Which is a bit late notice. So off to the Broadfield later for £2 a pint and quiz night!

Nearby Beer Missions

It occurred to me that seeing as the Mrs lives in Worksop and we have frequently drunk around there, that is deserves a write up like everywhere else we go. And yes, there should be some write ups of areas of Sheffield too. I have made some notes on pubs in Crookes and Woodseats just have too much to write up!

So there will be a Worksop write up pretty soon. There are only really 5 places that deserve the attention; all four establishments that feature in the Good Beer Guide plus the Wetherspoons which usually has 3 local guest ales on.

A return ticket to Worksop is £5.90 and it is a similar price to Chesterfield, check out the write up of our trip there in June. It is also well worth a visit to Barnsley to go to Old No. 7, the brewery tap for Acorn, winner of many local awards and plaudits.

Sheffield has an amazing beer scene but there are others nearby that are worth trying, go and explore!