– Old and Dark Festival 2013 / Tuesday 3rd December – Sunday 22nd December
It’s that wonderful time of year once again! Yes it is cold…and arguably miserable. True it is getting dark so early that it feels like there’s barely any point getting out of bed. Indeed it could be said a commercial Christmas is being stuffed into our brains at every opportunity…
However! This means it is the perfect time to comfort ourselves with some Old, Dark and generally delicious beers! As ever we have tried our hardest and harassed multiple excellent brewers into providing us with an array of their darkest and most delightful beers. These brewers include Moor, Brewfist, Kernel, Magic Rock, Fyne, Thornbridge, Summer Wine, Fyne, Ashover, Quantum, Black Jack, Brewdog, Hopcraft, Kirkstall, Black Edge and others.
Some are old favourites, whilst others are new and exciting ones to try for the first time. You’ll have to come in to find out which though and yes those who’re not dark beer appreciators we’ll keep a token offering to placate you.
We hope this will offset the trauma of this challenging month…and are pretty confident it will-it worked last year anyway!
– Photos / Meet The Brewer with The Kernel – Monday 26th November
Our final Meet The Brewer of 2013 was host by Evin O’Riordain The Kernel, more of an education in ‘beer philosophy’, this was a great end to our event schedule.
We had the pleasure of sampling Citra IPA, Barrel Aged Biere De Table, Raspberry Sour, Double 4 C and London Export Stout 1890.
Thanks to all who made it down to fastest selling Meet the Brewer event of this year! Here’s to 2014, see you at our next event on Monday 27th January. More information will be revealed on Thursday 2nd January 2014, tickets will also be available from this date.
– Up and Coming / Hopcraft
Every once in a while, pretty much just by chance, you taste a beer that you have never heard of before, have no idea who brewed it and your jaw drops. Recently I was lucky enough to have one of those experiences here at Port Street with a beer from a fairly new brewery named Hopcraft.
Hopcraft Brewery in Pontyclun, South Wales, has been in full production for almost half a year now and has been in the public eye since mid 2012. It is a partnership of Tom Barlow and Steve Lewis from Pixie Springs and Gazza Prescott from Steel City in Sheffield. Together they have opened up a new 10 barrel brewery to fulfil their needs, a place to make Pixie Springs beverages on a bigger scale, and also for Gaz to have a place to make crazy hoppy liquids.
Considering they’re relatively new, Hopcraft have made quite a number of beers. As their name suggests they’re not afraid of using hops liberally and have a tendency to use them well, a good example of this is their highly drinkable Mosaic Plus, this is a common theme throughout their beers. The guys have also made some pretty exciting, quite different beers such as Graveyard Eyes a Sorachi Aci porter that has wowed staff and customers alike. As they are already demonstrating a high proficiency in their hop use and a pioneering attitude towards making new and interesting beers it seems highly likely we can expect more good things from this brewery.
– Up and Coming / Burning Sky
Burning Sky. Kind of Old Testament apocalyptic, no? Death raining from the sky, that sort of thing. Well you’d be quite wrong to think that. Actually, if you did, shame on you. It’s more like a Slayer song title.
Amongst other things, Burning Sky is a song by Paul Weller-led erstwhile Mods, The Jam, who split up and then Paul Weller, for some reason, formed the Paul Weller-led The Style Council. He now makes solo records under the name ‘Paul Weller’. He’s a caution, that one.
Burning Sky is also a skydiving collective that jump out of planes over spectacularly tedious hippies/hipsters-in-the-desert festival, Burning Man. Their parachutes are, alas, in tip-top condition.
More important than any of these, though, if you are a lover of beer, at least, Burning Sky is the new brewery from Dark Star co-mastermind and all round good egg, Mark Tranter, very ably assisted by Tom Dobson.
Now, anyone who knows beer surely knows the Sussex brewery Dark Star, which started life under the Evening Star pub in Brighton in 1996. We’ve sold them here at Port Street since we opened, such is their quality and consistency. There were bemused stirrings on the Internet when Mark announced he was leaving to pursue other ventures. What would it be? Where would it be? How long until it opened?
All these questions were answered earlier this year when, in typical understated fashion, Mark announced Burning Sky would be starting up in the autumn, located on the Firle Estate in East Sussex, upon which Mark also lives (he’s not a big posh sod with plums in his mouth, though, he just rents a cottage there). They are based in a converted stable in a tiny village with a crazy (in a good way) vicar.
Burning Sky are ‘Artisan Brewers and Blenders’. Blenders. That’s what excited me most of all. It suggests one of my favourite types of beer, the sours of Belgium. I was lucky enough to visit the brewery just after it was finished, but before brewing had commenced. They had a test batch of the Saison a la Provision that I willingly accepted a sample of. Well, a half. And then another half. It’s remarkable, it really is. Fruity, tart, slightly spicy – everything you’d expect from a Saison, and the best I’ve tasted outside Belgium.
Anyway, all this bluff and nonsense is leading up to our announcement that we have taken delivery of five of their beers – Saison a la Provision (6.5%) in keg, Saison L’Automne (4.2%, with rosehips – keg), Plateau Pale Ale (3.5%, cask), Aurora strong Pale Ale (5.6%, cask), and Devil’s Rest IPA (7%, cask and keg). We’re very excited about this development, and we hope you are too. They’ll be on sale in the near future, so keep an eye on our Twitter feed, @portstreetbeer, where we’ll be posting when they go on sale.