Reflections – Manchester Beer & Cider Festival 2016

• By thenoisethatwemade
• •
• 18 Jul, 2017
• •

My blog has stood still for quite a few months...well seven to be exact. I've really not had the inspiration to write outside of the normal day job. I guess that could be seen as an unusual thing to say considering I work in the beer industry and spend most of the hours in the week buying, invoicing, stacking, selling, shipping and occasionally drinking the stuff. But sometimes you just want to enjoy the downtime and get out of what seems like a constant echo chamber from the usual voices. Saying that I kept getting messages on my phone about storage issues so I've finally succumbed to writing as I didn't want to delete all my photos, but rather document them somehow and somewhere!

In a funny way it puts a different angle on things when you can reflect back. With that in mind, I was leafing through these photos from Manchester Camra's Beer and Cider festival 2016 held at Manchester Central. It was the first time a Camra branch hosted a UK 'key-keg conditioned' exclusive bar - the big banner up to the side explaining a thorough technical definition and why it was being included (though I'd like to hear a brewer's thoughts on the content). I didn't see anyone spend time reading this on the Thursday I attended, it only seemed to block the bar. I thought this was a good addition to the festival and quite forward-thinking of the branch. It also meant a number of breweries were present with their own bar such as Runaway Brewery and I felt finally great local independents were getting the support they should be from this organisation. This still seems an extremely fraught area, even 18 months on and even into their own reflection through the 'Revitalisation' project. Accepting key-keg conditioned beer, even though technically detailed and outlined by their own internal commitee, is being seen as akin to accepting keg to a number of active party members and therefore a devastatingly bad thing. I attended an event only a week ago organised by the Society for the Preservation of Beer from the Wood and a conversation with a couple of very active members lead to statements such as - if the organisation accepts this i.e. key-keg conditioned beer, they're going to loose a lot of active members. I batted back with the - well they may well gain lots more active new members, which wasn't taken with belief. I think one of the flippant comments was - well they may as well accept Watney's Red Barrel, everything we've been fighting against all this time. I did my best to counteract with - there's lots of small, independent breweries using quality ingredients and making great beer; it's nothing like THAT beer from moons ago. But I somehow felt my comments were falling on deaf ears. I am one Camra member that does hope this KK conditioned beer is continued to be supported by the organisation but we shall wait to find out. If the organisation accepts bottle conditioned beer to support, why wouldn't it accept this too? The conversation also got me thinking whether I should continue my Camra membership, or not, as I felt quite down after the interaction. But for now I'm continuing as I believe the organisation as a whole does a lot of valuable campaigning and things won't evolve if you're not a part of it and speak your piece.

 

 

In January 2016 Cloudwater still produced cask beer and at the Manchester festival they had both handpulls and kegs out in full force. I actually remember the Cloudwater cask ale as being some of the favourite beers of the day for me, which is kind of a shame that they're no longer around in this form. It was actually a year on from this event that Cloudwater shared their reasons for discontinuing cask in this blog post > http://cloudwaterbrew.co/blog/looking-back-whilst-pushing-forward

Another favourite beer of the festival was this trio collab between Hawkshead, Quantum and Blackjack breweries (pictured above). A Belgian inspired pale ale with manuka and kaffir lime leaves. 18 months on.....Quantum have ceased trading (after five years) and Jay has actually gone to work for Cloudwater (he posted the ins and outs on his Facebook). I think the life of a small individually run business can take its toll and I can fully understand people wanting to leave that responsibility (and tiring nature) of doing EVERYTHING and just go and work for someone else (and focus on one specific work area they enjoy). It takes a lot of stamina and spirit to run your own business and to also wrap it up and move on.

Around March 2017 it was announced wines and spirits company Halewood purchased a majority stake of Hawkshead. It kind of went under the radar. My opinion was that it seemed an unusual partnership with Halewood looking after drinks like Crabbies and Belgravia Gin. I guess this quote from Hawkshead's Manging Director Alex Brodie (from the previously linked announcement) hints at his ambition and reasoning, “I am convinced that Halewood share our values. We have had a long negotiation and I believe that this deal gives Hawkshead a way of getting significant investment without being absorbed into ‘big beer.’" A funny statement as you could say it's a defence against being absorbed by 'big beer' but you could say it is shedding your 'craft brewery' credentials if you take the BA defintion as some guidance:

"Less than 25 percent of the craft brewery is owned or controlled (or equivalent economic interest) by an alcohol industry member that is not itself a craft brewer."

And if you're not a craft brewery you.....*______________________________________________

*add your own statement here

Overall at the Manchester Beer & Cider Festival there was a good beer selection and it was positive to see the variety of beer styles on offer (including a good international and key-keg bar). The space felt very large and empty with multiple longs bars and only a few seating areas; I preferred the space last year at the velodrome to be honest. There was an incident of being questioned whether I want a beer that I've specifically come up to the bar and asked for by a male volunteer. 'Are you sure you want that beer? You do know its dark, strong....' Which often seems to happen at Camra beer festivals. I don't know whether it's an age or gender thing, but whatever it feels patronising to say the least. You note these things, but sometimes you just can't be bothered to respond back, so you just say - yes I would like to buy that beer I just asked for and walk away. I didn't actually go in 2017 partly due to the negative experience at the bar (which seemed liked a good decision after reading Mark Johnson's blog posts) and partly due to the wealth of 'other' beer festivals that have sprouted up that appeal to me more including Birmingham Beer Bash (sadly gone), Craft Beer Calling, London Craft Beer, Liverpool Craft Beer, Leeds International, Beavertown Extravaganza (new this year - very excited!) and Independent Manchester Beer Con.

On a final note it was great to see Karkli, who make one of the best damn beer snacks going with their crunchy lentil Indian spiced twirled delights.