A Busy Weekend Ahead

I've a busy weekend ahead with a varied programme of events to keep me amused. Early tomorrow morning (Friday), I'm off to Canterbury, on the train, with a group of fellow CAMRA members. We'll be visiting the Kent Beer Festival , for the lunchtime session and then heading back into Canterbury, to enjoy a few of the city's pubs in the evening. It must be over 10 years or so since I last attended this long-running (now in its 35th year) festival, held in the rural surroundings of Merton Farm, and I'm really looking forward to it. As well as beers from just about every brewery in Kent, there will also be a good selection from outside the county, plus a variety of foreign beers. For lovers of fermented apple juice, a range of traditional ciders will also be on sale, along with stalls selling hot snacks, curry and local cheeses.

The evening in Canterbury also promises to be good, as there's some excellent pubs in the city, and a return visit there on my part, is long overdue. I'm particularly keen to visit the City Arms, scene of the first ever CAMRA meeting I attended back in 1974. The pub is now owned by Canterbury Brewers, who also own the Foundry Brewpub in nearby White Horse Lane. (We may also call in there as well). Finally, as we make our way back to the station, there will be a chance to call in at the Bottle Shop, which stocks an incredible variety of bottled beers (both British and foreign) to take away, or enjoy in the historic surroundings of the adjacent Goods Shed.

Saturday sees a complete contrast, as my son Matthew will be dragging me over to the Hop Farm at Paddock Wood for the War & Peace Show; an event billed as The Largest Military Vehicle Spectacular in the World, and a show we have attended on several occasions in the past. There'll be no decent ale, of course, but I'll probably have had enough the day before, and I'll also be driving. I'll be driving later in the day as well, when Eileen and I attend a party hosted by one of her former work colleagues, over at her family's farm near East Peckham.

Hopefully, Sunday will be a day of rest and relaxation, although the hedges need cutting, and all this rain has made the weeds grow even taller!

At Last - A Half Decent Beer From Shep's!

I'm not kidding either; Shepherd Neame, Kent's largest, and the country's oldest, brewer seem to finally have turned the clock back to the 1970's, when they still produced some pretty good beers, (their Bitter, before they re-named it Master Brew for example), and come up with a bottled ale that's both half decent, and eminently drinkable. It's also selling at a bargain price of just £1.19 for a 500ml bottle at our local Lidl's.

Cashing in on the fast approaching Olympics, London Gold Rush Ale is a  golden coloured, well-hopped  and very refreshing beer, and with an abv of just 3.8% it's a perfect drink for summer, (if it ever arrives!). Now that's praise indeed from me for a brewer who's products I normally avoid; and I must admit I would probably have done the same with this one had the colour and the price tag not caught my eye!

The beer itself has a citrussy, hoppy nose, balanced against a fruity zestiness  from the blend of malt and hops used to brew the beer..Whilst there is still a trace of that harsh, unpleasant bitterness, that so spoils the company's beers, lurking in the background,  it is at a low enough level as to be hardly noticeable, (I was probably, looking out for it subconsciously). It's never going to win any prizes, (not in my book anyway), but sold at such a knockdown price it's worth heading down to Lidl's and picking up a few bottles, just in case summer does decide to grace us with its presence!

Footnote: Lidl's often seem to feature cut-price promotions of beers from both Shep's and Marstons.

Kloster Andechs

No visit to  Munich is complete without a day out to Kloster Andechs, the monastery brewery some 40 km to the south west of the city. We have visited this legendary establishment on every previous stay in the Bavarian capital, so a fourth visit just had to be undertaken.

 For those not in the know, Kloster Andechs is situated  on top of the Holy Mountain and unlike many such breweries that claim a monastic connection, is still run by the holy fathers. It is quite easy to reach, just take S-Bahn S-5 to the the end of the line at Herrsching, from where a short bus ride will deposit you at the foot of the Heiliger Berg. Better still, providing you have plenty of time, why not enjoy the walk up through the woods to Andechs?  That way not only will you feel spiritually refreshed, but you will enjoy your beer all the more when you get there!

I must confess I have only done the outward walk once, which was on my first visit to the monastery, and that time was travelling alone. On subsequent visits I have been accompanied by my son Matthew who, like many young people of his age seems to have an aversion to exercise! On my second, and his first, trip there I did actually manage to get him to walk back down into Herrsching, but I have not managed to repeat the feat since!

On that first visit I was relying solely on Graham Lee's pioneering  Good Beer Guide to Munich and Bavaria, published by CAMRA in 1994. Graham recommended the walk, and being a keen rambler myself  I thought it sounded an excellent idea. With the aid of a basic map, obtained from the local tourist office, I managed to find my way to Andechs without too much trouble, although at one stage I was beginning to wonder just how much further ahead my destination lay! When I finally arrived I just couldn't believe how many people were there, bearing in mind I had seen very few other people on my very pleasant jaunt up through the woods. I later discovered that most of them had made the journey by bus!

It was worth the hike up to Andechs, and saving the monastery church and the souvenir shop for later on I made straight for the Braeustuerbl. I discovered that a self-service system operated, with separate queues; one for the beer, and the other for the food. Beer first and then food after (got to get the priorities right!), but on that first visit I made the mistake of ordering a Haxe (huge lump of roast pig) which was as much as I could manage and which more than negated the calories I'd burned off in walking up through the woods!. The beer was excellent though, and I tried the 5.6% Spezial Helles, the strong 7.1%  Doppelbock Dunkel, plus a special celebratory brew called Jubilaumsbier Dunkel. who's strength lay somewhere in between.

After looking round the monastery gift shop I tried to burn off a bit more of the roast pork by climbing to the top of the onion-domed monastery church. The view from the top over the surrounding wooded countryside, against the backdrop of Ammersee lake, was worth the climb, and I felt a little less guilty for my lunchtime over-indulgence. The walk back to Herrsching was a doddle, as it was all downhill, and when I arrived in the town I wandered down for a look at the lake, before catching the S-Bahn back into Munich.

On our most recent trip we were able to introduce Matt's friend Will to the delights of Andechs. Will had flown out to join us for the last two days of our holiday, and although he was fresh off the early morning flight from Gatwick, we insisted on him accompanying us on our regular pilgrimage. It was pouring hard with rain; in fact it was the only wet day of our trip, but we didn't let a drop of rain spoil our enjoyment. After Will had dumped his bags in one of the left-luggage lockers at Munich Hauptbahnhof, we caught the first available S-5 train to Herrsching where, as luck would have it, we boarded the privately run Rauner line bus that was waiting outside the station. There were a lot of school kids on board; I say kids, but they were probably all sixth formers. They too were making for Kloster Andechs and whilst we were marginally surprised to see then drinking beer later on, one must remember that the legal age for the consumption of beer and wine in Germany is only 16.

Despite it being a wet and rather miserable Monday, the Braeustueberl was packed when we arrived, so after availing ourselves of a half litre each of  Spezial Helles, grabbed a place under cover out on the terrace that overlooks the brew-house down below. A bit later on we queued up again, this time for the lunchtime special of roast pork (with crackling), plus potato salad. I must admit I was feeling a bit "porked out" from the night before, but at only 3.8 Euro's a throw this meal was too much of a bargain to miss. Resisting the temptation of the Doppelbock Dunkel, and plumping instead for some more Spezial Helles, it was soon time to leave. This time we caught an MVV bus back to Herrsching and were able to use our Partner-Tageskarte for the return journey.

We stopped off for an obligatory look at  Ammersee lake, plus a refreshing ice-cream (it had stopped raining by then), before catching the train back into Munich. Our visit proved, once again, that come rain or shine a trip out to the Holy Mountain is an experience not to be missed!

SIBA South East Beer Festival Update

Last Thursday morning reports began to trickle in that, owing to flooding, the SIBA South East Beer Festival had had to be cancelled. Now we are all aware that so far this summer has been a washout, but surely for an event of this magnitude not to go ahead must have been due to something pretty serious? I later found out that all was going to plan the day before, with the beer all delivered on time, the casks all stillaged ready for tapping and spiling and the cooling system in place, leaving the organisers well pleased with their efforts. Unfortunately the vagaries of the English climate put paid to that and torrential rain overnight rain on Wednesday evening into Thursday had left parts of Tonbridge Sportsground knee deep in floodwater. The situation had not been helped by the Environment Agency opening the sluices of the Flood Barrier upstream at Leigh; a decision that sent a surge of water rushing down the Medway and right across the already saturated playing fields.

Come Thursday morning, the marquee where the beers were housed and neatly racked, was only accessible to those wearing waders, and faced with the threat of further rain, the organisers had no choice but to call off the event. Later that same day came reports that Tonbridge Juddians Rugby Club were determined to salvage something from the event and were planning to hold a mini-festival in their clubhouse, featuring a much smaller selection of the 150 or so beers originally scheduled. The clubhouse is an impressive, bright and airy building raised above the surrounding playing fields as a precaution against  flooding so, unlike the adjacent marquee, at least this venue would be safe and dry!

This still meant that there would be no competition, so far as SIBA were concerned, and for those planning to attend the min-festival, a much reduced range of beers on offer. With these SIBA organised events, all the breweries concerned supply the beer foc. After all it is in their own interest, especially if one of their beers wins an award in the various classes. As the beers in this case had not been tapped and spiled, it was no problem for them to be returned to their respective breweries, once the flood waters had subsided. This way any losses would be kept to a minimum, and with TJ's Rugby Club going ahead with the small scale event, some of their costs too could also be re-couped.

I turned up, along with my friend Eric, on Saturday at TJ's clubhouse just after 1pm. The doors had only been open for an hour, but the place was already quite busy. There were four beers available on hand pump, with a further four available from the cellar room out the back. The range was scheduled to alter as the festival progressed, but there were some good choices amongst the eight that were on sale initially. I plumped for Spirit of Kent, from local brewers Westerham, and this new, 4% pale beer was a good one to begin with. Shortly after I bumped into Clive, who is our branch treasurer, and not long afterwards chairman Iain and secretary Carole also turned up. Clive had bagged a table, so we made ourselves comfortable, and got chatting to a couple who were already sitting there. It turned out they had travelled down from Stockport specially for the festival and were unaware until their arrival that the main event had been cancelled. They still seemed to be enjoying themselves, even though many of the beers they had wanted to "tick" were unavailable. Several colleagues from work also came along; their village cricket match having been cancelled due to the inclement weather.

I'm not quite certain at what time I left, but the place had filled up nicely long before. Amongst the other beers I enjoyed were Sambrooks Powerhouse Porter, Tonbridge Coppernob, Royal Tunbridge Wells Beau Porter and, beer of the festival so far as I was concerned, Dark Star Revelation. This exceedingly well-hopped 5.7% pale ale was everything one would expect from this well-respected West Sussex brewery, with the strong flavour of the American hops used really coming through.

I'm not certain how many beers were left on Sunday, but judging by the way things were going when I left early Saturday evening I reckon most, if not all of them would have sold out. I have to say full marks to all involved at Tonbridge Juddians for managing to pull something out of the bag at the last minute, and for pulling off a such a successful event out of adversity.

Footnote: For non-local readers, until very recently, Tonbridge had a history of flooding. The town is sited where the River Medway divides into a number of smaller streams and this, coupled with the low-lying surroundings, makes it vulnerable to flooding. The most devastating floods occurred in 1968, after which substantial  defences, in the form of a sluice-operated flood barrier, were constructed upstream at Leigh. The defences were severely tested in 2000, when heavy rains left much of the Sportsground, plus a few town centre car-parks, under several feet of water. Fortunately the flood barrier proved its worth, and the town was spared the deluge it received 30 years previously. 

It is not that unusual for the Sportsground to be under water in winter, but in the middle of July is unprecedented!

Czech Mate

 
I've recently enjoyed a couple of very good, but very different beers from the Czech Republic. The first was Bud Premier Select from Budweiser Budvar, which I picked up ready chilled at our local Co-Op. It weighed in at an impressive 7.% % abv., so it was perhaps just as well it only comes in 33cl bottles. Brewed using only the finest Saaz aroma hops, Moravian malt and soft water drawn from the brewery's 300 metre deep artesian wells, and then given a 200 day maturation period prior to bottling, this really was an excellent beer, well-balanced and dangerous;y drinkable!

The second beer, Lobkowicz Baron, was a complete contrast, but no less good. I bought this one at a small branch of the budget supermarket chain, Norma whilst in Munich, and wish now I'd had room for a few more in my suitcase. At just 44 cents (plus deposit) a bottle, it was an absolute bargain, but more to the point a very tasty smooth, yet full-bodied dark lager to boot, with distinct chocolate notes . This 4.7% abv beer reminded me very much of the Bernard's Specialni cerny lezak that I enjoyed during my visit to Prague, back in 2009.

A bit of on line research shows that the brewery in Vysoky Chlumec in Southern Bohemia was established in 1466. In 1474 it was purchased by the Lobkowicz family , who began a long association with the brewery. It was interrupted only in 1939 when the brewery was confiscated by Nazis and the Lobkowicz family was forced to exile to Great Britain. After World War II they returned to Czechoslovakia just to see the communists take over their properties, including the brewery in 1948. In 1992 the brewery was returned to Lobkowicz family and American born William Lobkowicz took over management of the family's assets in the Czech Republic.


Lobkowicz produces its own malt from Bohemian barley, and the beers are produced in a traditional brew house with copper vessels, using aromatic Saaz hops. Fermentation takes place in open vessels, and like the Bud Premier Select, the final balance is rounded off by months spent in the lager cellars. As well as Baron dark lager, the brewery produces a blonde bock beer called Prince and a bohemian style lager called Knight.

A Munich back-street branch of a budget supermarket was an unusual place to find this gem of a Czech beer; as was our local Co-Op for the Bud Premier Select. It just shows you that good beer can sometimes turn up in the unlikeliest of places!

SIBA South East Beer Festival

I haven't drunk that much English beer since my return from Bavaria the other week; I bought a fair few bottles of local stuff back with me, although it was touch and go as to whether my suitcase would be over the  weight limit for the flight home!  So apart from a few bottles of Ringwood Boon Doggle (which were excellent), that I picked up in Lidl's for the bargain price of £1.19, plus a bottle or three of Fuller's Bengal Lancer that were on promotion in Sainsbury's last week at three for £5.00, my sole sampling of English ale was an excellent pint of Thornbridge Jaipur, on sale over the weekend at our local JDW.

All that will change next weekend though, when Tonbridge Juddians Rugby Club play host to the 6th SIBA South East Beer Festival, at their club headquarters overlooking Tonbridge Sports Ground. This is the fourth time that TJ's have staged this prestigious event, which just seems to get better and better each year, and I must say I'm really looking forward to it. The festival acts as a show-case for SIBA members in the South-East Region, allowing them to exhibit their beers, and also to judge them alongside those of fellow members.

According to the festival website, there are 150 different cask beers to choose from, including offerings from companies I've never heard of, let  alone had the pleasure of sampling. As is usual at such events Friday is reserved for the serious side of the festival, namely the judging. This takes place during the day, before the festival opens to the public at 5pm. There are eight categories in the draught section, plus five in the bottled, with separate awards for the best draught and the best bottled beers. That's an awful lot of beers for the judges to get through and to deliver their verdict in an un-biased and objective fashion, but I'm certain they'll manage it somehow!

If you live within travelling distance of Tonbridge, and bear in mind that the town has good rail links with London as well as many other locations in the South East, then do come along. Admission is free, and all beers are £3.00 a pint. As well as the cask ales, there will be a wide variety of bottled beers along with traditional cider. Food wise there will be various barbecued items, plus a hog-roast, and Friday night is billed as "Curry Night". There will also be a variety of  local acts playing live on Saturday.

Hope to see you there!

A Day Out With BOB

On the 4th day of our trip to Munich we had a ride out into the beautiful countryside of Upper Bavaria. Our destination was a place we had been to on our last visit, but as we thought it so picturesque, decided we'd make a return visit. The place in question was the town of Tegernsee, on the lake of the same name in the Bavarian Alps, some 30 miles south of Munich. Tegernsee is home to the Herzogliche Brauerei, and its large Braeustueberl on the shores of the lake,  is an excellent place in which to enjoy beers from this regional brewery.

So where does BOB fit into all this? Well BOB stands for Bayerische Oberlandbahn, which is a private rail company that operates train services between Munich and Tegernsee, along with a number of other destinations. We had used the BOB service before, but only from Holzkirchen, which is at the end of the S5 suburban rail line to the south of Munich. This time we wanted to travel the entire distance using the private rail company, so for the sum of 25 Euros we purchased a return ticket to Tegernsee, which also allowed us to travel anywhere within the inner area on the MVV public transport system.

We caught the 10.10 from Munich Hauptbahnhof,  taking care to travel in the correct portion of the train as it splits twice en route in order to serve two other destinations (Lenggries and Bayisschzell). An hour later we arrived at our destination having left both the city and the flat lands to the immediate south of it behind and climbed up into what are the beginning of the Bavarian Alps. As we approached we could see the lake unfolding below us. The sun was shining and the temperatures rising (it had been quite chilly when we left Munich and we wondered, unnecessarily as it turned out, whether we might have departed under-dressed).

Leaving the station we walked the short distance down into the town and over to the lake, passing the Herzogliche Brauerei on the way. Tegernsee itself is an attractive small town with many buildings constructed in typical Alpine style. With their window boxes exhibiting colourful displays of geraniums, and other flowers, the whole place looked like a picture postcard. Tegernsee is nevertheless a busy working town, as well as a popular tourist destination and its Herzogliche Braeustueberl is undoubtedly one of its most popular attractions so far as visitors are concerned. The  Braeustueberl is housed in former monastery buildings, but the ecclesiastical connection ended in 1803 when the abbey was secularised and taken over by the Bavarian Royal Family, who continued with the brewing business that was formerly conducted by the monks.

Before calling in to slake our thirst, we had a short walk down to the lake shore, pausing to some photo's of the picture-book scenery. That done we returned to the Braeustueberl which houses a centuries old vaulted beer hall. Last time we visited we sat inside, but as the weather  this time was so good, we sat outside on benches shaded by some large vaulted umbrellas. Having arrived quite early we had no difficulty in obtaining a seat, but as the morning turned into afternoon more and more of the benches and tables became occupied, as an increasing number of  visitors started to arrive. Many seemed to have either cycled (not much fun in such hilly countryside), or walked. One groups of walkers told us they had been walking in the woods overlooking the lake for the past few hours and were now looking forward to a drink and something to eat.

Speaking of drink and food we ordered ourselves a half litre glass each of  the 4.8% Tegernsee Helles to begin with, before moving on to the much fuller bodied Spezial, which weighs in at 5.6%. To eat I treated myself to a Bavarian delicacy that I had been meaning to try for a long time, namely Weisswurst. These white, anaemic-looking veal sausages arrived swimming in hot water in a covered metal dish. They certainly tasted much better than they looked, and went down well with some sweet Bavarian mustard and a Brezn or two. Once we'd finished we had a quick look around the brewery shop, and I wish now that I'd bought a few bottles of the two Bock beers produced by the company.

We re-traced our footsteps up to the station and caught the 14.57 train back towards Munich. We didn't go the whole way to begin with choosing instead to break our journey at Holzkirchen, where we alighted and walked into the centre of this small town to undertake something we had failed to achieve back in 2009. The object then had been to try the beers from the Holzkirchener Oberbraeu brewery, but unfortunately we picked a day when the principle pub inn the town, and the former brewer tap, was closed for a rest day (Ruhetag). This time around Zum Oberbraeu was well and truly open, but was understandably quite quiet mid-afternoon. We sat outside in the courtyard at the rear and ordered a Helles each. I had noted that Holzkirchener Oberbraeu were acquired a few years ago by Koenig Ludwig Brauerei (the one owned by Crown Prince Luitpold of Bavaria), but according to the company's website the Holzkirchen plant continues to operate and still produces the Oberbraeu range of beers. I was therefore slightly puzzled when our beers arrived in glasses carrying the Koenig Ludwig Brauerei logo. I asked the waiter whether the beer was the locally brewed version and he assured me that it was, but this is one of the frustrating things about drinking in Germany as there is often no indication at point of sale as to what the beer is! Most of the time the beer is just dispensed from a series of anonymous looking taps.

I found the beer rather thin tasting, so we decided just to have the one and to make our way back to the station. On the way up to Zum Oberbraeu we had noticed a pub selling beers from Klosterbrauerei Reutberg, another former monastic brewery situated some 11 km from Holzkirchen. This was another brewery who's products I was particularly keen to try, so we stopped off at Gasthof Oberland in Muenchner Strasse and were very glad that we did. The pub had a covered veranda type area, overlooking the street at the front of the building, so we parked ourselves at a table there and waited for the waitress to come and serve us. When the beer arrived, the Reutberger Export Hell (5.1%) proved to be one of the best beers of the trip, coming only second to those we sampled at Forschungsbrauerei. Despite its relatively modest strength this Helles was a full-bodied and extremely malty tasting beer, and we were left wishing we had called in there first and given Zum Oberbraeu a miss!

It was very pleasant sitting out on the veranda watching the world go by; people were starting to make their way home after finishing work with the weekend about to unfold. Tempting though it was to stay and have another glass of this excellent beer we decided we had better head back into the city, particularly as the BOB trains only operate on an hourly basis. We walked the short distance back to the station and caught the train back to the Hauptbahnhof after what had been a most enjoyable day out in the Bavarian countryside.