News in Brief #38

You can see the signs. Just don't TOUCH them

Top Beer Writer Does Kipling

"If you can extol the virtues of Craft Beer while making most of your money from corporate tastings and marketing advice.

If you often refer back to your Eighties youth about being mocked for listening to New Order and Morrissey, but your former peers now say they liked the same as you did when you know very well they actually preferred Tears For Fears and Duran Duran.

If you can constantly say London is dying, but won't move away despite everywhere else being cheaper to live in and making no difference to whether you can write your crowdfunded book or not (though it is further from those Drinks Corporation HQs you don't talk about).

If you go anywhere in the world, and can get into some kind of fracas about beer dispense, temperature, knowledge or barstaff being less than polite to your friends due to misunderstandings.

And if you can do all that and say afterwards you don't like being a dick about it all...then you'll be Britain's Top Beer Writer, my son"

"<GASP!> A half pint dimple mug!"

Pub Glass Hoard Discovered

Last week, West Midlands County archaeologists were stunned upon being informed by the police of a 10,000 plus cache of stolen glassware in a Wolverhampton terraced house. "We believe this is the largest find of these items ever found in this country." wittered overexcited field type Mick Trowelsifter.

"I was called yesterday to this long unoccupied dwelling," continued Mick "and I peered through the letterbox. I was asked what I saw. 'Wonderful things', I replied"

"Take this glass here. An excellent example of a 1962 Nonik. These can fetch anywhere between 50p to £1 at auction now. A quick glance through the collection revealed that these items have been stolen from Black Country pubs over a 50 year period. Also unearthed were glass concealment paraphernalia, such as big coats with large pockets and thick plastic carrier bags."

"I've yet to find any beer festival glasses yet. My hypothesis is that the collector would actually have had to pay for them. Our plans are to put this collection on a touring exhibition documenting pointless petty theft in the 20th Century."

Minutae-lovers and obsessives Bake and Bowley were called in to bring their expertise for the item recording "Sadly, we've still not found that octagonal pint we've been looking for since 2010. But there are another 6 rooms left to sort through."

"We should be done by 2022."

You'll be sorry when there's no more cask beer. Yes, sorry.

Keg Filth Takes Over CAMRA Fest

Attendees at the 2016 Manchester Beery Festival last weekend were shocked to find the organisers had allowed some local brewers to set up a keykeg bar. "It's disgraceful," muttered Branch Treasurer Greg Steakbake "It goes against everything that we as an organisation stand for."

"I was so incensed," ranted Greg "That I stood next to this Keg bar muttering about excess carbonation, icy coldness and dead yeast cells to those punters who asked for the beers. Not that I tried it myself, of course. Quality is immaterial anyway."

We asked hackneyed metaphor personification Thinend O'Wedge what its plans were "It's excellent!", it said.

"Now we've got keg into a CAMRA beer festival, it won't be long before I can get my Corporo-Beer chemical fizz minions to install these bars at every place in the country.  And once that's done, I can simply abolish Real Ale."

"My aim is to have everyone drinking Watney's Red Barrel again by the end of 2017.  It will be 2% abv and cost £5 a pint. And those complacent idiots who let keg in will be on their knees, crying. Bwah-ha-ha-ha!"

Local pub landlord WorStonch told us when he heard about this "Murst real ale's fuckin' crap man, y'knaa.  I'm doon the Schloss, on my 18th pint of tank Pilsner Urquell."

"Keg is fuckin' greeeyat, man!"

The Angelica Pickles of Beer Bloggery

Talks to both Babies and Grown Ups

The longer I do this thing, the more I become aware of the Generation Gap in the beer blogosphere.

On the one hand, there is the Crafty brigade. Usually about 25, urban, digital and social media savvy, highly educated and wanting to express their connoisseurship of everything they're into.  Tends to drink awesome juicy bangers at the local Craft Bar. Generally disparaging of traditional beer and pub culture as chapeau vieux (as they no doubt do not say in France). Run blogs with photos showing themselves and their alarmingly similar friends drinking Evil Keg at a big table.

On the other, there are the Veteran Pubgoers. Usually about 55. Been in CAMRA since the late 1970s. Can usually work Blogger and Twitter but not much else. Likes pubs on quiet afternoons to drink 4% brown bitter. Generally disparaging of Craft Beer as overhyped and unbalanced, and Craft bars as uncomfortable. Run blogs with photos showing themselves sat with a couple of friends at a country pub or biergarten in Germany.

But what strikes me most is how little there is in between.  Sure, there's Boak & Bailey who drink both the Evil Keg and the Boring Brown Bitter, but they're doing it for the record (and their blog will become an important historical document if some way is found to preserve it), rather than simple personal amusement. But what is being done my my generation, those around 40?

Possibly the reason is we came of drinking age in the early 1990s. There wasn't any Craft in those days, and even back then a 20 year old would have regarded Real Ale as a middle-aged man's drink. No, we drank Lager. And it seems a lot of us have stuck to it. Plus, most of us have families and careers and so have little time for bloggery and social mediasing.

As for me, I have no family and few commitments to speak of.  So, I can spare the time for this sort of thing. I'm young enough not to have the baggage against the Craft, but old enough not to be swept away with enthusiasm about how awesome it all is. Not being the greatest of social bunnies, too, helps me maintain a detached perspective on beer matters. No mutual reinforcing feedback loops for me.

As I always say, if you don't really fit in anywhere, then embrace your difference.

Drinkin' the Evil Keg

Session #96 : Festivals - What Are They For?

I don't often go to beer festivals.  I don't like crowds or noise much, so when I do go, I pick the quietest day.  Usually Wednesday or Thursday.  Also, I find them slightly alienating, as I always tend to be there on my own.  I'm guessing it's not like that for other people.

No, other people LIKE massed throngs, and that's what you can get at beer festivals.  A massed, drunken throng at that.  It's a social event with beer.  And for your average beery type, be it Beard or Crafty, then there's few things better on this Earth.

Festivals come in many types.  My local cricket club holds one every so often with about 50 local ales on.  I've never been, but I've heard more reports of rowdy behaviour there than anything at a CAMRA event.  Then you get the charity fundraisers, the ones held at a local hall or museum space, who think a good way to get cash for a good cause is to sell beer cheap and write it off against tax.  Often about 100 on or so.

The most popular ones are the Festivals run on strictly commercial lines.  One my town's pubs, The Continental, runs one every three months or so.  It's always absurdly crowded.  If you're lucky, you can queue up to get your glass and get three pints in before the place closes.  Stops people getting pissed and falling into the Ribble, I suppose.

Like everything in life these days, it's all about the money.  Festivals in my experience are ok, but no more than that.  They often make big promises they can't fulfill, be it either that special rare beer that got lost between the programme being printed and the opening day to the sheer unexpected demand meaning they've run out of beer.

The mid-size Beer Festival, save for a few major events, probably has it's days numbered.  Few Crafty Hipster brewers, even if they do brew cask, will have either the will or capacity to supply 100-beer events.  As Craft becomes more popular, those wanting it will be disappointed when they see a large selection of mediocre bitters and golden ales.  The massive events will stay, if only for publicity purposes.

They are mainly for neither Geekery nor Dissemination now.  They are just there.  Because certain people expect them to be.  A demand is there, and a service is provided for someone who wants to make money out of it.  That's how Capitalism works.  And while we prefer to believe the beer world is friendly and cheerful and for the love and everything, it isn't.

There's more good and rare beer around than ever.  And unlike the old days, it's probably near you.  So who will need the festival, with it's hope-for-the-best beer presentation?

I was so drunk, I bought a tin advert for Lout. Photo by Cooking Lager

I have to admit though, the last beer festival I went to I ended up staying rather later than intended, putting the blogging world to rights with Cooking Lager. If only I remembered what I was talking about...

I drank far too much real ale that day.  I've stuck to the Evil Keg ever since.

When I'm Breaking Windows

Not closed pub. Surprising in Preston, I know

I was in the pub last Wednesday night. Surprising I know, but as I've said before the Moorbrook is the premier outlet for Evil Keg in Preston. I was dared to drink a whole pint of Mad Hatter's Manchester Tart. I took them up and finished it with ease. It wasn't even the sourest beer I'd that week.

I went home as usual at 11pm and left the place in full working order (apart from the Evil Keg sour beer that nobody else likes). Imagine my surprise the following morning when the pub's owners posted this photo on Facebook.

Mudgie declares entire pub as "outside" and smoker friendly

Yes, Preston is dangerous even at 4am. Apparently the knob population was staggering back from the town centre and spied the casks piled up beside the Moorbrook. Lots of road rolling fun there, they thought.

Rich, the manager, lives on the premises and heard this, and naturally went out to remonstrate. Sadly, one of the aforementioned knobs took exception and went fist-first through the window (a good measure of how drunk he was, because he could have just lobbed an empty cask at it).

So, Preston is now one 150-year-old frosted glass pub window down, but it's gained an utter cock with a badly sliced up arm. Yes, you can imagine the sympathy pouring in for him from all quarters.  I'm guessing they'll be some kind of fundraising thing to pay for a replica window. My guess is for the thick end of £2000.

The Moorbrook now has one boarded up window. Hope people don't think it's shut again. I'll have to ask Mudgie if anyone's submitted it to Closed Pubs yet.

I Wish I Was In Crafty Hipster Land

Tourist idiots, Yesterday. And pretty much every day.

It's always some sort of experience going back to a place where you've not been for several years.  Oh, THAT's not there anymore, oh THAT'S become a Starbucks, oh THAT'S been demolished for city regeneration. I remember experiencing this with Stoke, where very little from my childhood remain (some would say this is a good thing).

So, having a week off, I went to Edinburgh for a couple of days. I've stayed several times, but most recently in March 2010 (where I spent most of the time arguing with my ex, but that's another story).

Most of all I went for the drink, of which there is no shortage in Edinburgh. I availed myself of The Scotch Malt Whisky Society members rooms to try and get my £59 a year's worth and avoided places that advertised they had Belhaven Best and Deuchars IPA (you'd think they'd want to keep it quiet).

Most of all, I discovered that Edinburgh has been slowly taken over by Craft. The aforementioned places that used to be there are more often than not now trendy bars full of Evil Keg and hipsters.  Now, I'm not saying this is a bad thing exactly, and it's much preferable to dark pubs of 80 Shilling, but it is disconcerting when you didn't expect it.

Whereas it's fashionable on this blog to blame BrewDog for everything (I was reassured at the Edinburgh branch when a massively bearded barman was finally spotted), there are actually places that are even CRAFTIER than BrewDog.

I can't be bothered putting enough all the A's in "Craft" for this

So, eventually I reached The Hanging Bat on Lothian Street, after walking around for 90 minutes looking (I probably needed the exercise after the dubious drinking binges of the previous two days). I knew the place was Craft, but nothing prepared me for HOW Craft. It was like playing hipster bar bingo :

1. No pumpclips or keg font displays. Blackboard instead. Check.
2. Entirely decorated in weathered wood and reclaimed bricks. Check.
3. Bar staff either thin, bearded young men or very thin young women. Check.

4. All beers served in 2/3 measures. Check.
5. Onsite brewery on display out the back. Check
6. Urinals made from sawn-off beer barrels. Check
7.  (and this is the clincher) The taps in the Gents were keg fonts. Check.

Yes. It was the craftiest place I've ever been to. And that's saying something. Mark my words, every pub will be like this in 10 years.

Festival Non-report

EvilKegFest, yesterday

Just an average day. End of August. At work, on my break, playing about with my phone. Feel it buzz. Odd. An unfamiliar icon appears in the top left corner. Twitter private message. Don't get many of those.

"Hi, Matthew. Would you like free trade tickets to IndyManBeerCon?", it said. Am even more peculiarly, it was authentic. IndyManBeerCon WERE offering me free stuff. Thank you, I replied.

And so, Friday arrived. Inconsiderately, they'd scheduled the even for Retail Christmas Merchandising Week. Seen all that stuff appearing in your local shop, which you probably moan about saying " Bloody hell, it's only October". Well, someone has to put it out, usually staying until 3:30am to make the morning deadline.

That's what I'd been doing for the previous few days. And yes I was knackered. I woke up at 11 on the day and thought "I can't face this." You know you're in trouble when you're still tired after 8 hours sleep.  So I stayed in bed for the whole day. Reader, I was so out of it, I didn't even drink.

Regular readers of this blog will know that I'm not really a social bunny. I usually find beer festivals hard work, as I'm on my own and there's little else to do but drink. And one of the bitter ironies of alcohol is that it impairs your judgement at the times you need it the most.  I've got lost and confused numerous times. It makes life more interesting than it really should be.

So, you can imagine how I felt when waking up exhausted.  Spending 4 hours in an empty swimming pool in Manchester, drinking Evil Keg with crafty hipsters would not have been the best thing for me that day. People plus strong beer plus unfamiliar surroundings was too much to contemplate.

Maybe next year.

Stranger in Town

I'm sure everyone who reads this is, shall we say, experienced in the ways of drinking and pubbery. You know what's good, and where to get it. But what happens when you're in a town you've never been to before and want a drink. What do you do then? There is always Spoons as a safe option, but what happens if you don't like Timbo and all that is associated with him? Pete Brown had problems with this recently.

There is a very simple way to tell the quality of any pub you go into. Do not go by what the signs say outside. These will either be complete bullshit, or have been put up in the last century so are now inapplicable, but the owners cannot be bothered to pay for a screwdriver to take them down.

No, all you have to do is walk through the door and get close enough to see exactly what they have on draught. It's that simple. This can be divided into 6 types :

Noooooooooooooooo

Type 1 - Nothing but keg fonts. They will be serving Fosters, Stella, Kronenbourg, John Smiths or some other smooth, and Guinness. The patrons will be either tattooed and shaven headed, or have makeup applied with a muck spreader. Your best bet is to leave. Quickly. Before the death stares kill you. 

(Ironically, a couple of my acquaintance went to a place like this. They'd left the pub I recommended to them and naïvely went to next nearest. Bearing in mind this is a female same-sex couple. Astonishingly, nothing bad happened to them. I can only assume the 'interesting' clientele were so shocked they were paralysed into inaction).

Type 2 - As Type 1, but has one or two handpulls. Usually something like Wells Bombardier or Greene King IPA. Probably best to leave this place also. The lager and smooth is likely to be the only drinks that sell here, and the cask is likely to be cloudy vinegar soup.

Type 3 - Possibly the most awkward type of pub. They have 4, 5 or maybe even 6 handpulls. Often half with the local favourites, half with semi-obscure stuff that the pub company have picked up cheap somewhere.  The important thing here is see what the other patrons are drinking. If it's cask, then you're probably safe. But if it's lager, then, well, you pays your money and you takes your choice.

Type 4 - If you're fed up of uncertainty the you can go the family-owned brewery pub. Variety is not the forte of such places. In fact, you'll probably have a choice of five different bitters between 3.6% and 4.8%. It will be boring, but safe. See also Robinson's, Thwaites, Marston's etc.

Type 5 - This is the pub which tries to cater to both the Crafties and the Beards. Microbrewed cask ale and Craft Keg on the fonts. You're usually safe here.  The only problem could possibly be untrained student staff who know nothing about beer as they've been hired for cheapness and looks. If that's the case, then order a bottle from the fridge. It's good.

Craaaaaaaaaaaft

Type 6 - I hesistate to call this the BrewDog type, but that is the most typical and famous of the breed. If you like good tasting beer, and are not put off by low temperatures and carbon dioxide then it'll be wonderful. Probably best also to bear in mind that if you are over 35 you will likely be the oldest person in the building. If you're averse to facial hair and flannel shirts then do not, I repeat do not go to these places. You will be scared.

There are probably more types, but these are the most common. You could just use Untappd or a simply Google the reviews. But that would be too simple. Where's your sense of adventure, man?

Natural Soda Water

I admit it. I work in a shop. And, surprisingly, we sell drinks. And even mixers.  Two types of soda water. One Schweppes, one the cheap brand. The former is £1.35, the latter 50p. I don't suppose I have to educate you about what soda water consists of, but here we go.  It's water. With added Carbon Dioxide and Sodium Bicarbonate. Since these are fairly simple chemical formulas (H2O, CO2 and H2CO4), there doesn't seem to be much justification for premiumisation as far as the ingredients. But there you go.

Carbon Dioxide is Carbon Dioxide. It's the same whether it's created by natural means by yeast or by simply burning the black stuff. So, is there any difference between a cask ale and a force carbonated beer through a keg?

Of course, the Keg will be "fizzier", and usually colder ( CO2 being more soluble in cold water), but would there really be any difference in taste? I'm guessing the taste differences that occur in cask ale are mostly mythical, and the products of the imaginations of the more hirsute of CAMRA members. Would not, I ask, the flavour potential of any beer be best fully developed by the brewery concerned rather than leaving it to pubs to take "care" of it as they see fit?

I'm not saying the whole concept of cask ale is a fallacy. If nothing else, the sight of most keg-only pubs gives me some idea of what to avoid as far as fellow clientele goes. But is the whole mystique of the  allegedly vastly superior flavour of cask over craft keg a complete myth?

Cask is not crap, by any means. But it does seem to be the flavour equivalent of going the long way round because the view is prettier.

What No Evil Keg Bitter?

A thought occurred to me while engaging in my latest heavy drinking session at The Tap House.  It's the age of Craft Beer, right?  That much we know.  We have it all, it seems.  Craft keg IPAs, craft keg pale ales, craft keg stouts etc. etc.

But there's one thing we don't seem to have.  Craft keg session bitter.

There does seem to be a few reasons for this.  A big one is the defeated spectre of Watney's Red Barrel, the infamous keg bitter from the 60s and 70s.  A drink so vile, that the legendary Jimmy Anstruther put it on the same level as crypto-Trotskyists, papist rapists and Chinese restaurants.

There is also the antipathy of the Crafties towards the "boring brown bitter" that the Beards drink.  Seen as having no discernable flavour, the Kernels and Partizans of this world would be extremely wary in making a beer that their hipster clientele is unlikely to even try, never mind consume in any quantity.

So, since the two major tribes of BeerWorld will never try a keg bitter, that must be the reason one has never been made.  Or, at least, not one that I have ever seen.

But I say - Why not?  Surely if these innovative, cutting-edge Craft Beer brewers are as skilled as they claim, then could they not make a palatable keg bitter?  Would this not be the supreme test of beer making skill, since apparently any idiot can chuck in kilos of hops and chill it down to 4 degrees Celsius?

Come on you Crafties - take up my challenge.  I will be first person at the font to try it should you do so...

Euston Tapping and Evil Keg Paradise

I've been on holiday.  You may have noticed the lack of posts here.  Or maybe you were grateful for my lack of snide remarks about Crafties and Beards. Anyway, when I wasn't being shouted at in Wales, making bizarrely incoherent whisky-laden speeches, or throwing up in my £125-per-night hotel room toilet, I was trundling around London visiting some local beer places.

The first place I went to was the Euston Tap, helpfully just round the corner from the aforementioned hotel room.  Just to prove I was not desperate for refreshment I waited a whole ten minutes after opening time before going in.  I bought a pint of the Finest Cask and, if any reminder were needed, it told me I was not in the North any more.

I sipped my headless pint slowly, as my other hotel in Islington wasn't due to be checked into until 2pm.  I sat there and watched the intermittent rain and Swedish tourists while listening to the 60s girl group music playing over the speakers. Sadly, the barstaff were about 20 and had to ask me who the "mad producer who shot someone" was.  Given the playlist, I said Phil Spector.  They seemed satisfied, probably as they didn't know the Dixie Cups tracks playing were modern re-recordings.

After finding the Northern Line closed, I walked to my hotel, dumped the suitcase and headed off to BrewDog Camden.  This took me half an hour.  Still, it wasn't raining by now.   I found it easily enough.  It's not like you could miss the place.

I looked at the price list and was pleasantly surprised.  I had heard all kinds of horrible things about beer prices in London and the cost of BrewDog, and was expecting Punk IPA to be £6 a pint.   I went up to the compulsorily-bearded barman and ordered a half to settle my nerves.  I sat at an industrial themed table (concrete and girders) and looked around.  "It's not often," I thought "that I'm the oldest person in a pub."

Glancing through their characteristically restrained and subtle literature, I began to get the place's ethos.  Basically, if the Scientologists were to run a brewery and craft beer bar chain, this is what it would be like.  The proselytising about the one true way of craft.  The stinging denunciations of other brewers, depicted as both evil and banal.  The proclamations that Messrs. Watt and Dickie will save us all with their selection of hop and malt based beverages.  I have to say the beer was good, though.

I wondered who would be more offended - CAMRA, for one of their members entering the Den of Evil Keg, or BrewDog themselves for being infiltrated by a late-thirtysomething Beard.  The staff weren't complaining though.  Especially when I spent £27 on bottles to take back home to the craft-free land of Thwaites Wainwright.

Still, there was plenty of fun to be had.  Mainly by taunting my local craft beer barman friends with pictures of BrewDog Camden's tube-based beer/hop infusion device.  "You wouldn't like this place." I texted as I sipped my half of 7.2% Jackhammer.

I would go again to BrewDog, despite my reservations.  Just maybe at a less crowded and noisy time.  And maybe fewer hipsters.  A vain hope, probably, in Camden.

The Future Of Beer Magazines?

The Beardy Bastard

Your friendly local CAMRA newsletter for Northwestcentral Lancashire.

Spring/Summer/Autumn 2013

  

Membership news

Not much happening as far as membership goes in this issue.  Still only 3 active members in our branch.  Come on you bastards, and get to the next committee meeting at the Cask & Condition next month.  I’m finding it increasingly hard to get my dog and cat to come each time to make the quorum.  Not to mention getting them to drink a pint of Scruttock’s Old Todger.

New Pub Report

It appears a new hostelry has opened in our area since I updated the last pub list.  It’s called The Clown’s Revenge Bar.  I went there to rate the ales and found they were selling their pints 2% under measure and 0.5 degrees too warm.  Needless to say, I have reported them to Cask Marque and am noting it here so our members don’t have to put up with such shoddiness.  I hope the place closes down, the twats.

Keg Is Evil

Reading the beer blogs recently, I see there have been arguments about a new category of beer called “craft keg”.  I’ve been a branch secretary for 35 years and have never heard the like.  I remember the days of Worthington E and Watney’s Red Barrel and don’t want to go back.  Apparently, these beers are of so-called “higher quality” than old keg.  But I say they are WORSE.  They are PRETENDING to be good beer which makes them WORSE than the tasteless fizzy keg of the 70s. If these new “craft beers” become popular, what’s to stop Big Brewers from marketing their smooth mild as “craft beer brewed with highest quality ingredients”?  Repeat after me - KEG IS EVIL AND MUST BE KILLED OFF LIKE THE DEAD BEER IT IS!  Do it NOW!   You’ll be sorry when in future there’s NO real ale, and you have to pay £8 for a pint of John Smiths.

Pub Closures

Several pubs have closed recently in our branch area.  I would name them but they were only student and chav pubs selling lager to louts and idiots.  Some would say that any pub closing and people losing their jobs is a tragedy, but I disagree.  Any so-called pub that sells chemical filth to morons deserves to close in my opinion. As long as MY favourite pubs which cater for decent people like CAMRA members stay open, then that’s fine and dandy.  Only real ale drinkers deserve to drink in public.  The rest of the bastards can sit at home in front of the football with their supermarket slab of Carling.

(the above is a cruel parody of the worst sort of CAMRA activism and should not be taken as representative of my views of CAMRA as a whole)

The Local Beards and Evil Keg

My local CAMRA branch has 930 members, yet the Branch Secretary complains regularly on the website and branch magazine that he sees very few of us. Well....

As you may have seen on the news in recent times, bad things happened in the 1970s. Savile. Hall. Glitter etc. But, apparently, the worst thing that happened in the 1970s was keg beer. Enormous national breweries tried to foist 'tasteless fizzy beer' upon the poor drinker in an effort to make more money. And even though the Big Six breweries barely exist anymore, the industry as a whole has not been forgiven by those who went to pubs back then. The mere mention of kegs will get CAMRA members of a certain age foaming like a pint of Whitbread Trophy.

But whereas 40 years ago, keg was used to dispense brown dishwater bitter, the influence of US craft brewers has meant that UK craft brewers are using them to serve up their fancy expensive IPAs and Imperial stouts.  And, although these beers are undoubtedly  of higher quality that Watney's Red Barrel, the mere sight of the keg font has the beardy end of CAMRA ranting about evil chemical fizz.

And, unfortunately, the committee of my branch tends towards the hirsute.  For any discerning beer drinker under the age of 40, the free CAMRA rag they put out is both hilarious and exasperating. Keg beer, of whatever provenance, is referred to as 'zombeer'. Punk IPA, Schneider Weisse, Tetley Smooth. All the same. All evil. In fact, the craft keg is reckoned to be worse, as the 'thin end of the wedge theory' means its increasing popularity will allow the likes of Heineken to brand John Smith's as "craft". On the other hand, any previous keg-only pub that sticks a hand pump or two on the bar is lauded for giving customers the chance to buy Marston's Pedigree or Thwaites Wainwright. Cask, any cask, is by default better than any keg.

Sadly, the local committee are now confused. The anti-keg motions at the CAMRA AGM were defeated, and the member who stood for the National Committee on a 'death to zombeers' platform was soundly defeated. The next local mag is due out in June. It will make interesting reading. I plan to read it over a BrewDog at the craft place in a nearby town.