Comments on: How to grow a beer consumer group

By: Tandleman

Tandleman — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 16:58:16 +0000

PS. No offence, but who are you?

By: Tandleman

Tandleman — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 16:57:01 +0000

Don’t damn me with faint praise until I’ve tasted your beer. Then we’ll see.

By: Rod

Rod — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 10:14:03 +0000

Oh – I have just looked at your blog, and you merely “dislike” pasteurisation…
As a brewer, I don’t “dislike” pasteurisation – I would HATE it if someone ruined my beer by cooking it after fermentation.

By: Rod

Rod — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 07:39:49 +0000

Tandleman -
I withdraw the ill-advised word “no-one” from what I said. No CAMRA member that I have ever personally met and discussed this with has ever understood this point, but that’s not the same thing, I accept.
I should say “few, to very few” rank and file members understand this.

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 16:02:28 +0000

Totally agree.

But surely it’s better for establishments that want to sell decent beer but don’t have the resources to achieve decent cellarmanship to sell keg made by decent breweries than pedal poorly kept cask.

The latter is a lose lose scenario.

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 16:00:37 +0000

Good point. Although the publican’s opinion was stressed much more sternly. From recollection I do think the brewer said something like “we think it’s better” or something, whereas the publican didn’t.

(Appreciate I am changing my story slightly to suit my point, but I do remember raising an eye brow at the time)

By: Phil

Phil — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 09:00:07 +0000

PS More detail here (thanks to Gazza for mentioning 'Ecofass', of which I had not heard). "Gas/air pushes content out." Mm-mmm. I do like a pint of content.

By: Phil

Phil — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 08:56:22 +0000

OK, so what are the defining characteristics of ‘keg’? I think keykeg, in particular, has made this whole discussion a lot more fuzzy.

If you simply take brewery-conditioned beer that’s dropped bright, re-rack it and serve it somehow or other – let’s just assume you pour it out – that’s not Real Ale, but it’s not keg either. Does it become keg if the vessel you re-rack it in is an bag inside a pressurised box, so that you can serve it by opening a tap and letting the air pressure squeeze the bag? (Stop me if I’m getting too technical.) Or is it only ‘keg’ if there’s CO2 in direct contact with the beer, or if it’s been chilled, or both?

For bonus points… let’s say you take brewery-conditioned beer that’s not dropping bright – so that, if it was in a cask, it would be classed as Real Ale – and put that inna bag inna box. It might not be very nice, but would it be keg? Why, or why not?

By: Nick Boley

Nick Boley — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 08:15:43 +0000

As usual Tandleman speaks very good sense. The main issue is quality and cellarmanship.
At our beer festival at Ascot, where we get a lot of “ordinary punters”, i.e. not CAMRA members or fellow-travellers, the main comment I get sick of hearing is “this beer is excellent but it doesn’t taste like this in my local so I drink the lager or smooth”. If we, a bunch of amateurs (may my cellar tem colleagues forgive me for calling them that, they know what I mean) can look after 200+ casks of beer to a high standard why can’t the licensees of many pubs with half a dozen in their cellar?
Poor cellarmanship is the biggest single enemy of CAMRA and cask beer, as it completely undermines so much of what we do. Perhaps we need to go back to the 80s when pubs selling cask beer usually kept it well and the others just sold lager and keg and could therefore be safely avoided. If pubs are going to sell (and sometimes even promote) cask ale then the least they can do is look after it and serve it so it tastes like the brewer intended. It’s not rocket science – why don’t brewers and pubcos do more to train and monitor quality (Fuller’s are generally an honourable exception here in the south) of beer?

By: Tandleman

Tandleman — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 07:09:41 +0000

Rod. Look at my blog. Read what I say in my intro about pasteurisation. It has been there for nearly five years. Also my remarks about keg predate the current keg arguments.

I’m very much in CAMRA and probably understood these fundamental points years before I had a blog.