2019 - The Year in Beer - Part One

The year 2019 was rather a strange one as far as I am concerned. If I described it as disjointed, you might get an inkling of where I am coming from. I wasn’t a year of stunning achievements, although it will go down as the year I paid off the mortgage on our property. It was also the year that our twice-postponed bathroom renovation project finally came together.

We are now proud owners of a totally revamped bathroom, complete with walk-in shower. The latter is an important feature, given that neither of us are getting any younger, and it certainly helps make life easier when we are rushing to get ourselves ready for work each weekday morning.

The disjointed nature of the year was primarily down to two business trips I undertook during the first half of 2019. The first one, to Cologne for the biennial International Dental Show was planned, but the second one, a visit to China, was a much more hurried affair which came about following a meeting with some colleagues, from our Japanese parent company, whilst we were at the dental show.

Both were enjoyable trips in their own right, and the opportunity to visit China was certainly not one to be missed, but two weeks out of an already busy work schedule, plus the need to fit in annual leave around other members of my department, did mean both June and August were unavailable.  Moral of tale – get in early next year!

However, despite the quite topsy-turvy nature of 2019, there were still plenty of good things to experience and enjoy. What I intend to do with this review, is follow similar headings to previous years, and see where this takes us. There is also quite a lot to get through, so I have divided this look-back into two halves.
 

Best Beer on Home Turf

Harvey’s Sussex Best. As in previous years, no beer comes close to beating  this classic beer from the “Cathedral of Lewes.”  For everyday drinking, Harvey’s Best is one of the finest examples of a full-bodied and well-hopped southern bitter, and if I could only choose one cask beer to drink for the rest of my days, this would be it. 

Vocation Brewery. This Yorkshire-based brewery have really caught my attention this year, and I have enjoyed numerous glasses of their  Pride & Joy, plus Life and Death, both at home and in a number of pubs and specialist beer bars.

Larkin’s Porter.  Strong, dark and packing in masses of flavour. Still my favourite winter beer by far, this excellent  Porter makes this cold, and often depressing time of the year, much more bearable. What’s more I treated myself to a 5 litre mini-cask to see me through the Christmas period.

Best Beers Abroad

Zwyiec Porter at the Wrega Pub in  Krakow. An excellent, dark and full-bodied Baltic-style porter, with just the right amount of residual bitterness. In short, it was a most satisfying beer, and far more enjoyable than the myriad of different “craft” offerings I sampled during my short break in Poland. 

Päffgen Kölsch. Dispensed straight from the cask, at Bierhaus en d'r Salzgass, Cologne. Päffgen are one of the smaller Kölsch brewers in Cologne, and one of the few that are still family-owned. Their beer is, in my opinion, the best Kölsch in the city.

Westmalle Dubbel. One of the more common Belgian Trappist beers, but none the worse for that. I enjoyed a glass of this excellent dark ale, served in the correct glass of course,  at the American-themed, Café Chevvy's, in Zeebrugge port, in the company of Mrs PBT’s, her sister and brother-in-law.

 Brewery Visits on Home Turf

Harvey’s Brewery 

Back in March I was fortunate to have a tour around Harvey’s Brewery, in Lewes. This renowned Sussex brewer, picked up an award for their excellent Bonfire Boy seasonal beer, at the previous autumn’s Spa Valley Railway Festival, so the company invited volunteers, who’d worked at the event, to visit the brewery, for a tour. This was followed by the award presentation plus, of course,  a generous sampling of Harvey’s beers.

  

Harvey’s legendary Head Brewer, Miles Jenner, acted as our host and conducted us around the brewery. This was probably my 5^th tour of Harvey’s and although Miles acted as guide on each previous occasion, he always has something new and interesting to say,  coupled with the odd amusing anecdote to add a bit of spice to the proceedings. 

Cellar Head Brewery

On the way back from Harvey’s, we called in at Cellar Head’s brewery and newly opened taproom, at Flimwell, East Sussex. The brewery was celebrating its 2^nd birthday, and with plenty of interesting Cellar Head beers to sample, their birthday bash was a fun event with everyone having a good time.

The whole brewery-taproom set-up, along with the al fresco drinking, reminded me of the Vanish Woods Brewery in Leesburg, VA, which I visited whilst attending the Beer Bloggers & Writer’s Conference in the United States, in August 2018.  

Brewery Visits Abroad

For the first time in several years, there were no foreign brewery visits for me to enjoy. With only two rather short foreign holidays, neither of which had any CAMRA, or other formal involvement, there wasn’t the wherewithal to organise one.

Beer Festivals

Spa Valley Railway Beer Festival 2019. 
This festival, organised jointly between West Kent CAMRA and SVR, is becoming a victim of its own success.  Recent events have been manic, especially for those working behind the bar. This is a shame for those of us who like
to engage with customers, and chat  about the various beers on offer, but is impossible when there are thirsty punters pressing against the bar, several deep, and all waiting to be served.  

You also get awkward individuals wanting a beer from the other end of the bar, which means barging past your fellow bar staff, whilst trying to remember where you’ve got to return to. Even worse are those indecisive customers asking for tasters. After they’ve had three or four, you just know they’re taking the piss!

This constant pressure, with little or no respite for staff, meant the fun had gone out of the event for me, so I didn’t offer my services at last autumn’s event. Whether I do so this year really depends on the organisers arranging proper rosters, with adequate breaks for staff. The fact we are volunteers, shouldn't mean we can be taken advantage of; a fact which CAMRA as a whole ignores at its peril!

SIBA South East Beer Festival 2019. Once again hosted by Tonbridge Juddians Rugby Club  this excellent festival is now in its 13^th year. I attended on the Friday evening, with son Matthew, and on the Saturday with Mrs PBT’s and some of her relations and friends. With good weather, good beers (in the main) and excellent company, this event continues to be a highlight in the Tonbridge social calendar.

Great British Beer Festival (GBBF). It hadn’t been my intention to go to GBBF last year, but I was persuaded to change my mind by the well-illustrated and extremely positive write-up in CAMRA’s BEER magazine. I therefore went along with the intention that this would be my make or break year.

It was a day of two halves really, the first enlivened by the excellent company of fellow beer blogger, Retired Martin. I then spent the second half of the day, after Martin had wisely departed, sitting upstairs in the gallery area with group of friends from West Kent CAMRA.

As we sat there chatting I discovered we all seemed to be suffering from beer festival fatigue. The idea of meeting up in an attractive city such as Salisbury or Winchester, was floated, as an alternative to GBBF. So rather spending money travelling to London, followed by extra cash for admittance to the festival, we could visit several pubs in the suggested locations, get to sample a number of different beers and have a decent day out.

This confirms, that for me, GBBF 2019 was definitely  a “break” rather than a “make” event.

To be continued.............................................