Arty pints no.8



Photo - Paul Evans

 Veltins, at the Saracens Head Hotel - Beddgelert.

Tavern porter

This is a 4.7% bottle conditioned porter from the Thwaites brewery of Blackburn, Lancashire.

Photo - Paul Evans

The beer is very dark and enticing, with a strong coffee like appearance, and a very lively frothy head. The aroma is of sweet malts and juicy currants, with a slight hint of liquorice and a subtle warming bourbon feel in the nostrils.

Photo - Paul Evans

The taste is instantly bitter with biting roasted malts, and a warming Irish coffee feel that blushes the cheeks.  There are notes of liquorice and a satisfying smoky subtleness. Very good.

Rating: 4*



New kids on the block

The hangovers have just about gone, so it's time for the commercial room to have a look back at this year's great Welsh beer and cider festival.

Photo - Paul Evans

I attended this year on Thursday and Friday, wanting to ensure that I tried all the beers I had selected from the beer list.  In past years I have been left disappointed that particular beers I really wanted to try had sold out, this year the event was very well stocked.

The champion beer was awarded to the Heart of Wales brewery for its very strong 'high as a kite'. It was particularly pleasing to see the judges pick a less conservative beer this year and opt for a strong 9.5% almost barley wine style beer.

Photo - Paul Evans

Highlights included beers from the Waen brewery, particularly the chilli plum porter and the always good blackberry stout. Otley had their usual selection of top notch beers, and it was good to be re-acquainted with thai-bo and the spectacular odessa. Brains had their new craft beers on offer, and I enjoyed sampling those, but the star of the show was Tiny Rebel, who sold 3500 glasses of beer over the weekend - incredible!

All weekend the longest queues were at the Tiny Rebel bar, and it was not difficult to see why once I sampled the entire range on offer.  Hadouken was a particular highlight, whilst fubar served dry hopped through the hop rocket was an unusual and interesting take on serving beer.  Doc brown, cwtch and dirty stop out were also top notch beers.


Photos - Paul Evans


The festival saw a debut for the new Pixie Spring brewery of Llantrisant, and their IPA 'prince of Bengal' was very good. We also love Bullmastiff at the commercial room, and it wouldn't have been a beer festival without trying the always brilliant 'son of a bitch'. Other brewers we particularly enjoyed were Acorn of Barnsley, Wentworth of Yorkshire and Brecon's ever expanding range.

Photo - Ross Evans

In all, a thoroughly good festival this year and a definite improvement on years gone by.  My only gripes - the slightly confusing beer tokens, and a lack of tables and chairs.

I tried too many beers to list them all, so here's the commercial room's top 5 festival beers:

1. Hadouken 7.4% - Tiny Rebel

A double IPA with massive flavour from a complex mixture of hops. the commercial room's beer of the festival by some distance.

2. Chilli plum porter 6.1% - Waen brewery

A warming dark beer with coffee and dark fruit flavours.

3. Dirty stop out 5.0% - Tiny Rebel 

A subtle smokiness from this smoked oat stout makes it very complex, and very moreish.

4. Rampant gryphon 6.2% - Wentworth

A strong golden beer, quite hoppy, with fruity hints and a good biting alcohol sweetness.

5. 06 Porter 6.6% - Otley

Another of the commercial room's favourite beers. A full-on, smooth and complex porter.

Roll on next year!

The beer scoring system

After much discussion at commercial room towers, we've decided to amend the beer scoring system we use.

Currently a beer is awarded points out of 10 in three categories (appearance, aroma & taste) which gives it a final score out of 30.  What we've found is that the system unfairly favours stouts and porters for example, as we think they look the best, and often they top the scoring chart simply by attaining a very high score for appearance.

We've also found that ciders score in the low 20s simply because, and let's be honest, they don't look particularly attractive.  So, to make it a more even playing field we are adopting the star method, and whilst we'll still judge beers and ciders on the 3 most important categories, we will be giving a final star rating out of 5.

Cheers!

The hit list

The great Welsh beer and cider festival has just opened its doors. We're very exited at the Commercial Room, and we've compiled our must try hit list to abate our anticipation (which isn't working). Roll on 5pm!

1. Brains craft brewery Barry Island IPA, 6%
2. Kelham Island pale rider, 5.2%
3. Pixie Spring prince of Bengal IPA, 5.5%
4. Tiny Rebel hadouken IPA, 7.4%
5. Tiny Rebel dirty stop out, 5%
6. Waen brewery chilli plum porter, 6.1%
7. Waen brewery blackberry stout, 3.8%

Cheers!

Jolly Jubilee

Photo - Paul Evans

Celebrating the Jubilee with some Westons cider.

Great pub views no.4



Photo - Paul Evans


This was taken in the front bar area of the Torrent Walk Hotel in Dolgellau.