Sexy Sadie

Well, Sadie the Goat went very well. We know a beer is going well when we make arrangements to go to a pub to check it out only to find its been drunk very quickly before we get there. Sadie kept us on our toes while we hunted her down.

Since this is a development recipe we are working on different aspects of the beer with a view to the final product. This time we have decided to gear up the hops towards our expected IPA level and this is why Sadie has become sexy.

Dark amber beer with a buzz’n hoppy fruit citrus aroma that leads all the way into the flavour.

Sadie the Goat

Sadie the Goat was a very naughty girl. Her real name was Sadie Farrell and she was an American criminal and a river pirate. She first came to prominence as a vicious street mugger in New York’s “Bloody” Fourth Ward. Her modus operandi was to find a lone traveler, she would headbutt  them in the stomach, her male accomplice would then hit the victim with a sling-shot and rob them. Sadie, according to popular underworld lore, was engaged in a longtime feud with rival female bouncer Gallus Mag who once bit off her ear in a bar fight.

Taking inspiration from Sadie we are testing out malt and hops combinations for a new IPA which will bottled and kegged. The beer is deep amber with a first hint of fruity mango leading onto lemony lime grapefruit finish.

The British Guild of Beer Writers announce Sara as their Brewer of the Year

It was a fabulous end to 2012 for Sara to be named as Brewer of the Year by the British Guild of Beer Writers. The award was presented by Tim Hampson at the awards dinner in December 2012. Sara is the first woman to be given the award in the history of the Guild. Among the other winners were Roger Protz and Pete Brown who was crowned Beer Writer of the Year.

Here is a link to a video of the event

We’ll be on the telly… Jamie Oliver’s Food Fight Club (Channel 4 Dec 27th)

Sara travelled to the Grand Place in Brussels with Jamie Oliver and Jimmy Doherty. In the main square Brewster’s Pale Ale joined other British beers from Kernel, Ampleforth Abbey, Stroud and Innis and Gunn to battle it out with some big hitters from the Belgian beer scene.  It was a Britain versus Belgium battle of the beers for Jamie’s new series Food Fight Club. As well as the main event there was a visit to a classic Belgian brown bar along with beer cocktail mixing.

We are in episode 4 which will show on Channel 4  December 27th

The  Food Fight Club series starts on December 6th at 9pm on Channel 4.

For more details try Jamie’s website and Channel 4′s website

Good King(s) Wenceslas… our new Christmas beer

There were two Good King Wenceslas. They both lived in Bohemia which is a great beer making country. The first one was the Duke of Bohemia who braved harsh winter weather to give alms to the poor on the feast of Stephen (Boxing Day). As he was an all round good egg, he was made a Saint and bestowed the title of King after he died. The second one really was a King, Wenceslas the First, and to his credit he was very interested in beer. In his day Bohemian hops were so prized that he ordered the death penalty for anyone found exporting hop cuttings. While he was at it, he also convinced the Pope to revoke an order banning the brewing of beer in Bohemia which lead to the growth of the beer industry in the area which later became the Czech Republic. That reputation for great beer still goes world wide today.  That is why, each in their own right, they  both became the Good King Wenceslas.

So what has this  Ronnie Corbett ramble go to do with our Christmas beer. Well as a nod to the name, all the hops are continental European; Junga from Poland, Herkules and Perle from Germany. We loaded the hops, as you would, for a chunky American Pale Ale onto a grist that included a good dose of crystal and we are really pleased with the result. We were not expecting high aromatic top notes but a altogether different style. You still get the sense of powerful hops but with a much fruitier, rich, “cakey” and rounded beer.  Merry Christmas

Heavenly beer for Wetherspoons Festival

We are really excited to be part of the worlds biggest real ale festival and thrilled to be chosen to be on the  bar along with some of the most interesting international brewers.

Our planning started last year. First came the hops. Galaxy and Stella were ordered from the last Australian hop harvest to be ready in time for this festival. With the hops already chosen, a simple malt grist with a touch of colour from Munich malt to showcase the hops was in order.
As part of the Wicked Woman range we needed a name. With celestial names like Galaxy and Stella we thought of the constellations and while not strictly wicked Andromeda fits the name for a heavenly beer.

In Greek mythology Andromeda was chained to a rock to be eaten by a sea monster as punishment for her mother’s bragging. She was rescued  by Perseus who became her husband.

The artwork for the pump clip was specially commissioned from Phillipe Fenner

Andromeda has a rich golden colour, with a passion, tropical fruit aroma on the nose. The taste is lightly malty overlayed with zesty citrus hop notes giving a satisfying fullness on the palate.

Brewster’s Trademark Dispute with Morpeth Brewing Co

Morpeth Brewery have decided to bring details of this dispute into the press while they are promoting their new trading name, Anarchy Brew Co, having changed it from Brew Star. As a result we have started to receive negative emails and twitter messages from people sympathetic to them. We have decided to put our side of the story as we have noticed our followers have been contacted by some of those people. 

We have been trading as Brewster’s since 1998, nearly 14 years. We also own the trademark Brewsters in the Beers and Lager class and several related classes. With currently over 800 breweries in the UK a clear brand identity for each brewery and their beers is more important than ever. By owning the trademarks we have clear legal rights for Brewsters which cannot be disputed. We learnt this the hard way when we started up, we did not take it personally. By taking a conciliatory approach, in due course we were able to buy the first and original Brewsters trademark and then collected the others. We also started to work with the trademark lawyer who originally worked for the other side in our case and who now advises us on any trademark issues.

We first came across Morpeth Brewing Co which was trading as Brew Star a couple of months ago. We were alerted by the confusion of a publican mistaking their beer for ours. Alarmed by this, we took advice from our trademark lawyer to clarify our rights and they agreed with us that because it was similar it was clearly infringing our trademark. Starting from the position where we have a registered trademark and 14 years of trading with the mark, we think we have a much stronger case than that to which they will admit.

How would anyone feel after years of building a business, in our case Brewsters, to find someone set up the same business, a brewery, with a similar sounding name. It is up to anyone new to any business who wants to create a brand to do their trademark checks. The trademark office will do a search which gives some guidance for a very small fee. We suppose with a 100 breweries starting a year and people with a lack of experience in this area it will happen again.

Aside from our existing trademark rights, we are aware that having two breweries with similar sounding names is asking for trouble especially when much business is done over the phone. While we may be miles apart, these days we all end up on wholesalers lists and on the internet. Additionally it is not just at the customer/selling end where there is confusion, we know of some similar sounding breweries that are always having mixed up deliveries from common suppliers. In the long run it will be much better for both breweries to have clear distinct branding and to build up their reputations that way with no confusion.

In some of the messages we have seen and received, it appears we have become the Goliath, “the suits”, “the twats” or the big nasty company bullying a small husband and wife company. Well just to put the record straight we are a wife and husband company brewing with help from our head brewer Richard Chamberlin. Not only that, we brew on a 10 barrel kit the same size as Morpeth. Brew Star’s offering of craft beer and lagers was very similar to us despite how new and “punk” they might have felt their beers were. 

One thing does worry us and that is the recent method of brewery promotion. Where the brewery draws attention to itself and tries to align consumers to themselves by positioning the brewery as a victim of some sort of establishment figure whether it is a run in with the Portman Group, the local council or some other perceived obstacle to their rock and roll operation. We hope this issue does not go down the same route.

P.S. Amusingly, in one email we received  (we are based in Grantham, birth place of Margaret Thatcher) the writer was sure that “protecting money was important to us because of the area’s right wing roots”.

 

Brewsters Porter Video Review

Terry Kay has reviewed Brewster’s Porter

Brewsters Pale Ale Video Review

Hope you enjoy this video review by Terry Kay aka The Beer Goggles Review. It’s good fun and Terry is a real character. Who else could slip the words “a naughty orgy” into a review of beer. Cheers

Winter Draws On 2011 – Whimsicale Series

Here we are again, it is that time of year and there is a certain nip in the air. Our thoughts turn to thermal underwear and some invariably smutty innuendo. (Yes, it is a half dressed woman on the clip, we’ll cut out the middle woman and send it to Pumpclip Parade ourselves)

We think its a great name but the beer has very little to do with winter when you think this fantastic beer has been liberally hopped with gorgeous sun soaked New Zealand aroma lupulins.

We pimped the malt grist this year, pale pilsner malt  accented with a splash of Carafa and Carared malts from the German malting specialists, Weyerman located in Bamgerg. There is a real depth and dimension to the malt side.

For hop grist, Motueka and Nelson Sauvin were added through the boil to capture some of the different elements of the precious hop oil fractions. The lemoney lime citrus from the Motueka melds with the sweet malt to hint of grapefruit bitterness. The Nelson overlays with a winey passionfruit and fresh mango. Mmmmm Deeeelish.

The aroma is really rich tropical fruits and it carries through into the flavour which balances really nicely as the subtle touch of  roast malts play on the citrus hops to give the beers its fruity characteristic…