Duke of Hamilton, Hampstead

I am happy to add my support to the campaign to save the Duke of Hamilton in Hampstead. It takes two minutes to register an objection through the Camden website. If you have ever spent an afternoon or evening in this great pub, perhaps you might like to add your voice too.

Duke of Hamilton, Hampstead. Latest News.
=========================================
(Written by John Cryne)

The campaign to Save the Duke of Hamilton gathered momentum this week when pub regulars, concerned local residents, members of CAMRA and local councillors Linda Chung and Chris Knight gathered at the pub as part of the campaign to prevent the pub's closure and conversion into housing. Councillors Knight and Chung spoke to the gathering who also heard from regulars at the Pineapple in Kentish Town, saved from
closure by a similar campaign a number of years ago. They made one very clear point - 500 objections were lodged to the Pineapple's conversion. That carried weight. If everyone who receives this newsletter can, at the least, go to Camden's site and lodge an objection to both applications then we will have over 700 objections.
So please get clicking, see details below. Clearly if you can embellish the objection with strong reasons against all the better but if you don't have the time, just object! It should only take a few minutes for each application.

Both are on Camden's website, just enter the application numbers when you open this link http://tinyurl.com/2u2wteb 2010/1923/C - was filed on 28 May and 2010/1901/P - was filed on 1 June - the closing date for
on-line objections is 30 June.

At its AGM on Monday, the Heath and Hampstead Society joined the campaign by expressing their objection to the change of use. All Society members will be encouraged to lodge objections to what, if allowed, would bring about a massive change to the character of New End and indeed this whole part of Hampstead. I am also asking residents of Camden to write to their local councillors and MP Glenda Jackson, who has already expressed her strong support for the Duke staying as a pub. It's easy to do this for both councillors and MPs at http://www.writetothem.com and entering your home post code.

The campaign has also gone on-line with a website set-up by another local resident to act as a focus for all the activity that is going on - check out http://www.savetheduke.com/ for the latest news. We also hope to file detailed technical objections to the applications on the
site either later today or tomorrow.

As part of the campaign local residents are having a street stall on Hampstead High street outside Barclays Bank this Saturday (19th) from 11.00 - 13.00. They will have flyers encouraging local people to send in objections to the planning applications, and information on how to object and the sort of grounds that should be used in objecting. They will also have a petition but the real object is to mobilise people
to write in to Camden Council. It is hoped that David Bedford, pub regular and London Marathon Race Director will come along. If you live close by why not pop along and see if you can help in any other way, say by delivering flyers.

Brewery History Society

I have just had my annual reminder for the £18 subs for the Brewery History Society and it is probably worth telling people that this is among the best value subscriptions of the year.

The BHS is a small membership organisation with about 500 members. The Society was founded in 1972 to promote research into all aspects of the brewing industry, to encourage the interchange of information about breweries and brewing, and to collect photographic and other archive information about brewery history.

It does not campaign against brewery closures being much more interested in their history. Take a look at the website to get a better flavour of what's on offer.

One thing the website cannot demonstrate is the strength of the Journal that is sent to members three or four times a year. Typically each Journal runs to over a hundred pages, is material you are not likely to find anywhere else and is easily readable being a collection of short papers on brewery history. It is like being a member of a book club but every edition is about breweries - perfick !

The latest edition is a "special" which means, I think, niche interest. The title is Brewing Culture in Early Modern Towns and the papers included are Making, retailing and regulating beer in Southampton, 1550 to 1799; Brewing, politics and society in an early modern German Town, Gorlitz; The University Brewery of Frankfurt an der Oder in the early modern period and finally Women, ale and company in early modern London - all about twenty pages each.

If that is all a bit geeky and intellectual for you the previous edition (not a special) included a collection of excellent photographs of the Young's Ram Brewery before closure, Beer Tourism USA, the New York Brewery Trail and a paper taking an up-to-date look at Peter Mathias - Brewing Industry in England 1700-1830 as it is fifty years since it was published and quickly became the standard reference book for that period.

All-in-all it is something that I always look forward to dropping on the doormat and it is much credit to the editor Tim Holt and the Editorial Board who have done much to make this a very valuable part of the membership subscription of the Brewery History Society.

Newby Wyke Brewery

As much as I love drinking in London's pubs, and I guess the City is now going to see a bit more of me, I also love getting out of town and last week saw a visit to Grantham in Lincolnshire and the five pubs that appear in the 2010 Good Beer Guide.

The highlight of the day was finding beers from the local brewery, Newby Wyke, in most of the pubs. I have had beers from Newby Wyke at beer festivals before and although always enjoyable they have never proved to be memorable. Well, that all changed on Tuesday. I don't care what anyone says, there is a clear difference between a quick half in a beer festival and a pint or two in the pub. The beers I had last week have moved Newby Wyke right up there into my favourites and "must drink whenever seen". The beers were fresh, clean tasting, well hopped, flavoursome and right up my street. They have been around for a while now and I guess they are on most people's radar but if they are rarities to you, I suggest you try them when you see them. I don't think you will be disappointed.

One of their regular outlets is the Nobody Inn in Grantham. The strange thing about this pub is that the toilets are "secret". Push the door marked Ladies/Gents and you will find it locked. Push the adjacent bookcase and a hidden door to the loos is revealed. Another delightful curiosity that makes Britain's pubs so enduring.

London Ale Taster

Thanks everyone for your congratulations. As you might expect I am still pretty excited about this.

London Ale Taster

And the winner of the City of London Ale Taster competition is .......

Me !

.....fanfare.....appluase.....cheers......general acclaim ......

I pitched my taste buds against five other beer lovers at The Old Spitalfields Market this afternoon and after four flights of four beers trying to identify each beer, followed by a one minute speech I was the overall winner and will now hold the title of City of London Ale Taster for the coming year.

Cheers all - more on this to follow, I dare say.

London Ale Taster

Best news of the week is that I have been fortunate enough to be selected as one of the final six in the London Ale Taster competition which will be held this coming week. Forgive me for posting large chunks of the press release but I am spending every waking moment revising, researching and rehearsing - practice, practice, practice. Not strictly true but the event does look like it might be a lot of fun and it would be great to have some friendly support.

Spitalfields, London, UK- Following last month's call for applicants for the ancient position of London Ale Taster, on Wednesday 9th June, London's historic Old Spitalfields Market will play host to an special beer event which will see six, short-listed candidates battle it out for the coveted role.

The free event, which is open to the public, takes place at 1pm on the 9th June and will see the six contestants challenged with four tough rounds of ale tasting. They'll have to correctly identify unmarked samples of different ales and match them to a list - earning points for each one correctly identified. This will include a round dedicated to Porter, London's famous brew.

In the fifth and final round, the six hopeful candidates will each have to make a one-minute presentation to a panel of judges, again earning points. The panel includes many well-known names from the industry, including: Pete Brown, a leading beer writer and historian; Steve Wellington, master brewer with the famous White Shield micro-brewery; George Philliskirk, representing the Beer Academy andknown to many TV viewers as the 'Beer Doctor' and Malcolm Ball, chief executive of the Wellington Market Company, the company responsible for Old Spitalfields Market and the revival of this historic role.

The candidate with the most points will be crowned as London Ale Taster for 2010 and it is planned that this will become an annual event.

The competition will, notably, be accompanied by a special 'beer market', which is open between 9am and 3pm, and feature some of London's best-known brewers - including some from further a field. These brewers will offer free samples to the public and sell their ales, in what could be described as a 'mini' beer festival.

Brewers that are kindly supporting the day's event include Brodie's Beers (Leyton), Fullers (Chiswick), Meantime (Greenwich), Redemption Brewing Company Tottenham), Sambrook's Brewery (Battersea), Sharps (Rock, Cornwall), The Kernel Brewery (SE1 and the White Shield micro-brewery (Burton). The Beer Academy and Campaign for Real Ales(CAMRA) will also attend the event and promote their respective organisations activities.

The general public are welcome to come along to the free event, watch the battle for the coveted role and try out some of the ales on offer in the special beer market.

The role of Ale Taster (also known as Ale Conner) would have disappeared in the early nineteenth century and their duties would have involved visiting stalls and inns on market days and during the town's fairs to ensure that the ales, beers and other produce on sale were of good quality.

"The new London Ale Taster will have a much more modern-day role." explains Malcolm Ball, chief executive of Wellington Market Company, the company responsible for Old Spitalfields Market.

"The winner for this year's event will be given a weekly beer budget so that they can carry out the role of 'mystery drinker' in the capital's pubs. We'll set them up with a blog (website diary page) so that they can report back to consumers on what they find on their travels.

"We are planning a number of food and drink-related events at our market this year and the successful candidate will hopefully preside over a number of beer-related activities, such as tasting classes, food / beer matching sessions and the launch of a new beer called Old Spitalfields Bitter (OSB) which we hope will be produced with the help of London's brewers.

"I'd like to stress that the London Ale Taster is all about responsible drinking and in no way are we promoting binge drinking - I guess you could sum up the role with the phrase 'quality, not quantity'!"

One of the London Ale Taster judges, Pete Brown, leading beer writer and historian, whose books have charted the history of brewing and drinking, added: "There's an unprecedented level of interest in great beer these days and a lot of that interest is coming from people who love locally sourced, flavourful, crafted food and drink of all types and don't see why beer should be any exception.
"This post should help spread the appreciation of beer even further and help turn more people on to the variety and depth of flavour in great beer - I think everyone is going to be surprised by how knowledgeable and passionate some of the applicants will be!"

The beer market event opens with the normal market stalls at 9am and the competition commences at 1pm. Further information can be found at find out more at the London Ale Taster website www.london-ale-taster.co.uk

Old Spitalfields Market is a short walk from Liverpool Street Station and Aldgate East Tube - please visit www.oldspitalfieldsmarket.com for further information.

Ancient Order of Froth Blowers

I found this in a charity shop in Putney last week. Does anyone else recognise what it is ?



The Ancient Order of Froth Blowers was a charitable group of beer drinkers that ran from 1924 to 1931 - at its peak over 700,000 had paid the life membership fee of five shillings which included a rather natty pair of cufflinks.
The following is a quote from their membership handbook :

A sociable and law abiding fraternity of absorptive Britons who sedately consume and quietly enjoy with commendable regularity and frequention the truly British malted beverage as did their forbears and as Britons ever will, and be damned to all pussyfoot hornswogglers from overseas and including low brows, teetotalers and MPs and not excluding nosey parkers, mock religious busy bodies and suburban fool hens all of which are structurally solid bone from the chin up

Amen to that, I say.

For more information, I can do no better on this blog than to draw attention to the very excellent Friends of the Froth Blowers website : www.frothblowers.co.uk

or for a shorter history, take a look at Wikipedia

Windhoek Lager - the adverts

As Windhoek Lager is promoted in this country you will see publicity championing the beautiful untouched landscape of its homeland, Namibia and you will be told that the beer is the taste of adventure.

In Namibia and South Africa where the beer has a massive following the advertising focuses on the beer's purity and quality. I share some of the TV adverts below. I thought they were pretty funny. I hope you like them too.

International Beer Challenge

It would seem that I am going through a lager stage of beer appreciation. On my holiday the only draught beer on the cruise ship was San Miguel, good for refreshment value but if there is a more highly carbonated beer than this I have yet to come across it. Then last week I had the pleasure of the company of the boys from Namibian Breweries and enjoyed supping the Windhoek Lager.

This week my lager quest is continuing. Yesterday, I was invited to be a judge at the International Beer Challenge, a competition for packaged beer that has been held for many years and is one of the year's most significant competitions. The judging this year was held at the White Horse, Parsons Green, the judges were hauled together by Des Mulcahy, organiser of the fabulous Beer Exposed event held in 2008, and the judges were led by beer writer, Jeff Evans

There were over 400 beers to judge and six tables of six judges. You don't have to be an arithmetic champion to work out that this was going to be a long day.

First up was pale lagers and the second flight was the stronger lagers over 5%. I thought I was being punished for previous indiscretions but given that most of the packaged beer sold in this country is some sort of pilsner derivative, it appeared that most of the tables were on lager and most were now realising it was the International Beer Challenge. Our group was definitely challenged but we awarded some medals to those beers which were clearly better than standard.

Next up was a group of golden ales, where I found my beer of the day, a beer with a dominant hop aroma and bursting with citrus and spicy flavours. An clear gold medal for me and the judges were unanimous. I'll be very interested to learn what this beer was when the results are announced in a week or so.

After lunch we moved onto best bitters, dunkels and other dark beers, and closed the afternoon with Trappist, trippel and Abbey beers which livened up my tired palate no end.

My day was complete when my body finally rejected a mouthful of water which came straight back up and nearly nearly sprayed over fellow judge, Richard from the Rake/Utobeer.

Some went to the bar for a pint, others went of to the Rake for an Italian beer tasting. I went straight home after the most exhausting day for a long while. Who says this is easy ?

It was a fun day and always interesting to drink beer in the company of experts. Although I knew many people in the room, there's always new people to meet who have similar passion for beer as myself - particularly those who are lucky enough to work in the industry rather than us enthusiastic consumers.

If you are interested in the results, you will find them at www.ibc-awards.com in due course.

Windhoek Lager is coming

There have been times when I have been accused of attending the opening of an envelope but I am firmly of the opinion that it is only polite to attend any beer event if someone goes to the effort of extending an invitation. It is also my experience that the more reliable you prove to be, the more good times you are likely to have.

Now, you know that I am no lagerboy so it was with some nervousness that I trotted off to the UK launch of Windhoek Lager, Namibia's most popular beer held last week at the National Geographic store in Regent Street. Windhoek (pronounced Vint-hook) is the capital city of Namibia and the lager of the same name is brewed and bottled by Namibian Breweries Limited. It also has a massive following in South Africa with output of over 2 million hectolitres and exports over 50% to 22 countries worldwide.

The UK launch is being led by mega drinks group, Diageo, who own 14% of Namibian breweries (Heineken own 14% too, the rest is still in private hands, I believe). Diageo is currently weak in the UK beer sector, notwithstanding the success of Guinness. They have the rights to distribute and market 13 or 14 other international lagers but it is Windhoek that has been chosen for their next major push into the World beer market and they hope to build it into a major UK seller within two years.

Namibian Breweries has a family heritage that remains with the founder's great grandson, Sven Thieme in charge today. Sven speaks passionately about the company (and the beer)'s heritage but is also just as proud of Namibia itself. Just a short conversation with him makes you want to visit such a beautiful country with its untouched landscapes and vast open wilderness. The head brewer, Christian Muller is even more passionate about the beer. While conceding that the output is massive, he is adamant that quality is never compromised by using the industrial size brewing plant and loves to talk about beer and brewing as much as any British brewer I have ever met. I have yet to meet someone in this business that I don't like but these two guys will do as much to make sure that Windhoek is a success in this country as any financial weight that Diageo are able to throw behind it.

The brand ambassador is an absolute headcase and it will be fun to see how much we see of him in the promotion of the beer here. Adventurer, Riaan Manser could talk the hind legs off a camel but he has plenty of stories to tell of his solo 38,000km cycle around Africa followed by paddling a canoe around the coast of Madagascar. Slightly mad ? Yes, I think so !

The main point of difference for the beer itself is that it is African and should do well due to the imminent world cup tournament and the subsequent legacy that Africa will enjoy but the real test is in the taste. The beer is brewed according to the German purity law, Reinheitsgebot, with a nod to the German founders of the brewery, and both the malted barley and the hops are imported from Germany.

Windhoek Lager is a 4% helles style lager, brewed slightly weaker at 4% to suit the African heat, and served ice chilled in a glass rather than from the neck. The head pours white and fluffy but disappears quickly. There is grassy hop aroma that increases if you let the beer warm up and the malty sweetness in the mouth gives a dry, crisp flavour without being cloying. In brief it is an accomplished, inoffensive, clean tasting, easy drinking beer.

This is never going to be my first choice beer, preferring a more full bodied ale with more distinct hop character. It would not even be my first choice lager style beer for the very same reason. I am not even in their target demographic customer base of 25 - 45 but there is definitely a place for this beer for me and a real chance that Windhoek is now my first choice barbecue beer - nudging aside my long term favourite to refresh while heating the coals, Becks.

The beer already has listings at Tesco and Morrisons and retails at a reasonable £4.29 for four 33cl bottles. The price in Namibia is less than a pound for a 75cl bottle and the scenery's nicer there too.