La goule - Bière Ambrée

Brewed by Brasserie Artisanale Océane, this is a French amber beer, top fermented, 6% abv. It's also bottle conditioned, unfiltered and unpasteurised.

On opening, the bottle foams over the top slightly. The beer pours rich amber, slightly hazy with a thin but persistent white head and a strong effervescence of extremely tiny bubbles. The aroma is reminiscent of wheat malt and sour fruit with a hint of tomato.

The taste is clean, refreshing and moreish. It's light bodied and slightly sharp but not overtly sour. The finish is dry, fruity and slightly hoppy with citrus, grassy flavours.

Not a bad effort and dangerously drinkable, imagine a summer's afternoon dozing in the shade by a French lake.

I'm not sure that this will ever be a personal favourite, I'm not a fan of the style, but it's a well crafted beer, full of flavour and pleasing to gulp.

Long Gap Between Posts

Sorry I've not posted for a while but things got a bit mad with work for a while. The upshot of which is that two thirds of the people in my factory were made redundant including me. I started a new job today. However, it means being away from home during the week and away from my family. On the plus side more time to blog then and catch up on all the stored material in my notebooks.

Positive beer experiences in the last few days included the Californian Pale Ale at Wetherspoon's and a bottle of Orval. I knew there was a reason I liked beer.

Negative experiences, an empty brewpub on a Sunday evening, explained by appalling off beer and a bottle of Shepherd Neame Spitfire.

SARL Bières de Ré

Bières de Ré is a small craft brewery on the idyllic Ile de Ré, just off the coast of Charente Maritime in France. The island is covered in picturesque villages of white painted houses and is surrounded by unspoilt fine sandy beaches. The rest of the island is made up of forest, heath, sand dunes and, oh yes, a great little brewery.

The brewery is housed in an industrial unit on a small estate just outside the charming village of Sainte Marie de Ré. I visited the brewery on a warm sunny day in June this year and was shown around by Arnaud Roy, owner and brewer.

The brewery is small, modern and immaculately clean, almost to the detriment of any character but this is a working modern brewery not an old German pub so I suppose I shouldn't complain too much. To summarise the brewing process runs something like this (my ability to listen to French and write notes in English being tested to its limits).

Mashing takes place over a two hour period commencing at 40°C and terminating at 80°C. With the malt coming from French, Belgian and German suppliers.

The wort is then tranferred to a second vessel and kept warm while the spent grains are removed from the first vessel. Then the wort returns for the addition of hops and boiling (the one vessel acting as both Mash Tun and Brewing Kettle). There is just one addition of hops, at the beginning of the boil. The wort is boiled for one hour before the temperature is reduced to 20°C for fermentation.

Primary fermentation takes place in open fermenting vessels and lasts for about one week. The beer is then bottled with new wort on the brewery's own bottling line and undergoes secondary fermentation in the bottle.

The bottles are conditioned at the brewery for three weeks at 20°C after which it is available for sale, from the brewery, other local outlets or from the brewery's website.

http://bieresderefr/

The following is a brief history of the brewery translated from the website.

The brewery "Blanche de Ré" was born at the beginning of 1996. Following brewing tests by a master brewer bottled "Blanche de Ré" beer went on sale in June 1996.

Further innovation led to the development of two more beere in 1998 and 1999, "la Déferlante" and "l'Ecume de Ré", all to the same purity procedure in line with the Bavarian purity law of 1516.

The brewery was bought by a young couple (Anne Laure et Arnaud Roy) in 2005 who created, a few months later, to celebrate the occasion and the 10th anniversary of the brewery, the fourth beer "la Blanche Amb'Ré".

In March 2006 a new 10hl brewhouse was brought into service in order to pursue the new owners objectives of quality and tradition.

So that just about covers the brewery. I expect I should say something about the beers, yes? OK here goes. BDR produce just four beers: la Blanche de Ré; l'Ecume de Ré (foam); la Blanche Amb'Ré and la Déferlante (breaker).

la Blanche de Ré (5%)

This bière blanche (white beer) pours a lightly cloudy gold colour with a coarse but persistent head and is strongly effervescent. I left a large amount of yeast debris behind in the bottle.

The aroma is of a type that I am beginning to associate with French craft beers, some sweet maltiness, wheat malt and grassy hops. As well as a hint of prianiki (Russian spiced honey cakes) yeastiness and vinuous fruit.

The taste is light and clean with malt and wheat malt apparent, there's a hint of sweetness and an astringent slightly citrus finish.

Very refreshing, you could drink a lot of this chilled on a hot day!

la Déferlante (8%)

This beer (breaker) named after the surf famous all along the Atlantic coast of France, pours a luxurious rich, hazy gold. Highly effervescent with a dense head that begins to form shortly after pouring finishes!

The aroma is of sweet malt, dried dates, buttered blanched cabbage with some grassy hops.

The taste is well balanced with neither sweetness nor acidity quite winning the battle. Vinuous fruitiness betrays the alcohol and there is a very full bodied mouthfeel with clementines and blackened bread crust bitterness in the finish.

The bottle notes suggest "unctious with a pronounced character" and "aromas of cereals, fruits and vegetables". I'm not going to disagree with any of that.

l'Ecume de Ré (5%)

The next beer (foam) again has a surf theme and it pours a dark red/brown almost black, opaque, effervescent, with a coarse but persistent head.

The aroma is fruity and grassy with well cooked but cooled brown bread.

The mouthfeel is very full and malty, typically French with a graininess and a little roast flavour. Some alcohol is apparent although this is not an especially strong beer. As the bottle notes suggest, there is a definite but subtle coffee note to the taste with a less pronounced spiciness.

la Blanche Amb'Ré (5.8%)

This beer, punning the style Ambrée (Amber) and the name of its island home is the newest beer in the range. A thin coarse head sits atop a hazy amber beer of fierce effervescence and a thick sludge again remains in the 33cl bottle. The head is persistent and becoming thicker.

The aroma is sweet and malty with vinuous fruit, citrus and brown bread.

The taste is more light bodied than I expected, malty and sweet yes but with a pronounced citrus edge, especially in the finish. As I drink more the finish is becoming more bitter. As with all these beers the flavour is brought to your tongue amidst a champagne like mousse of bubbles giving them a very definite brewery character, as does the wheat beer style common to all the beers of BDR.

The bottle notes suggest "honey and caramel".

Summary

These beers are not in a style that I would normally choose, not a bad thing as I surprised myself by enjoying them all. They are skillfully made wheat beers of imposing character, all are bottle conditioned and all share the same ingredients list of: water; barley malt; wheat malt; yeast and hops.

My thanks go to M. Roy for the informative tour and the beer samples to review, I hope I've done them justice.

Back From France with Beer

Just a quick post to say I'm back from France with loads of beer and lots of Breweries to tell you about.

Brasserie de Bercloux (17770 Bercloux)

Stout (5%)
Spéciale (8%)
Cognac (7%)
Ambrée (7%)
Blanche (5.5%)
Blonde (5.5%)

Brasserie de La Rainette (16380 Chazelles)

Bitter Ale (5.5%)
Blanche (5.5%)
Ambrée (7%)
Noire (5.5%)
Noël (7%)

Brasserie des Gabariers (16100 Cognac)

XO (5.9%)
Blonde (4.5%)
Au Pineau (4.5%)
Fée d'Hiver (7%)

SARL Bières de Ré (17740 Ste Marie de Ré)

Blanche de Ré (5%)
L'Ecume de Ré (5%)
La Déferlante (8%)
La Blanche Amb'Ré (5.8%)

SARL Bières des Naufrageurs (17190 St Georges d'Oleron)

Blonde Spéciale (7%)
Brune (6%)
Gingembre (6%)
Napoléron (7.5%)
Blonde (5%)
Noire (7%)
Blanche (5%)
Ambrée (6%)
Cardamome (6%)
Blanche à la Fleur de Sel (5%)
Rousse (6%)

la Brasserie Artisanale Ocèane (16170 Vaux-Rouillac)

La Goule "Bio" (6%)
La Goule Bière OR (6%)
La Goule Bière Ambrée (6%)
La Goule au Bois-Bandé (6%)
La Goule Black Prince (6%)

I also picked up the following bottles during my stay

Ch'Ti Ambrée (5.9%)
Ch'Ti Blonde (6.4%)
3 Monts (8.5%)
La Choulette Ambrée (8%)
L'Eurélienne Blonde (6.5%)
L'Eurélienne Rousse (7%)
Vivat Triple (8.3%)
Lancelot (6%)
Piste Noire Ambrée (5.9%)
Jenlain Ambrée (7.5%)

That's quite a few beers mostly strong so bear with me this may take a while as I'd like to try the beers before posting the reports on the brewery visits!

The Session

The Session is a concept created by Appellation Beer.

http://appellationbeer.com/blog/

It is a monthly event for the beer blogging community to post on a common subject on the same day (the first Friday of the month).
Each month a different blogger hosts "The Session" and chooses the subject. For June the subject is "beer festivals". and The Session is hosted by Geistbear.

Much has been written about beer festivals and the question of beer festival or pub, which is better? Has been done to death.

So I'm going to talk about the beer festival in isolation and look at some of the beer festivals I've attended, both at home and abroad. I'll try to answer the questions:

• What makes a good festival?


• What is the best type of location?


• Should there be music?


• Should there be food?


• How big should it be?

St Ives, Cambridgeshire

An annual CAMRA beer festival in the middle of September usually selling about 55 draught real ales as well as cider, perry and foreign bottled beer. I used to live in St Ives and worked at this CAMRA festival for a few years. It's great to get involved and so I have a special fondness for this festival. I'd have to say that the location, within a modern sports complex was not the best and that the food was a bit basic. It was a one room festival so there was nowhere to escape the music, I think that a musical element should be present but I would like the option of escaping at times. The size was about right in terms of size of venue, number of beers and number of people.

Annafest, Forchheim, Franconia, Germany

Annafest is held in july each year, in theory as a festival in honour of St Anna, however, the dominant feature of the festival is the beer. 26 bierkeller on one hill open there doors and sell specially brewed festbier in volumes of one litre (mass) only. The location is unbeatable, there is a variety of music but you can always move on. A good variety of food is on offer and it is plenty big enough. However, I have one big criticism, I would prefer the option to buy smaller quantities and the prices are far too high.

Cambridge

An annual CAMRA beer festival in June usually selling about 150 draught real ales. The location is within marquees on a park near the centre of Cambridge, I can't remember much about the music but it is possible to escape from it, food was average to reasonable and although the number of beers sounds impressive the number actually for sale at any one time was only about 50%

Thetford Forest

A festival I came across by accident in a small tent at High Lodge in Thetford forest. great location, no music, no food although there is a cafe nearby and only a dozen or so beers. I liked it a lot.

Bedford

Another CaMRA festival similar to the St Ives festival in most respects but in a slightly more pleasant hall.

Peterborough

CAMRA's second festival after the GBBF in terms of size and number of visitors. Over 300 beer and 40,000 visitors. Held in three large marquees by the river Nene in the centre of Peterborough. Good live music in the centre marquee only, reasonable food selection and just about enough beer. Held during the week leading up to the August Bank Holiday. A magnificent effort regularly let down by the weather.

German Beer Festival in London

Held recently at the Zeitgeist pub in London over three days, unfortunately I chose to attend on the third day but all the beer had been sold by the second night. I hear it went really well and judging by the speed of beer consumption I suppose it did!

Pub Beer Festival in Pucklechurch Somerset

Some friends used to live in this quant village and invited us each year for their local pub's beer festival. Held in a marquee adjacent to the pub with a barbeque, excellent live music and a selection of 20+ local beers. Always felt more like a big party than a beer festival and I think that's a good thing.

Pub Beer Festival Rose & Crown, March

My local has started holding two beer festivals per year in a small marquee in the beer garden, a small range of local beers is the only attraction. I'm not complaining, that's all I need.

Summary

The term beer festival seems to cover a wide range of types of event and all the factors that I've been considering vary enormously from one to another.

Overall the outdoor festivals do it for me and of this type I suppose a German bierkeller environment is about as good as it gets.

Music is generally a good thing as long as it's live and that the festival is big enough to give you somewhere to escape to if necessary for conversation and /or quiet contemplation of your beer.

Food if done at all should be good value but of a reasonable standard. Also the greater the range on offer the better.

I think the size is possibly the least important facto although the largest of festivals can become very impersonal.

Conclusion

In the final analysis, I intend to visit more beer festivals of as many different types as possible. It seems to me that the overall quality and value of what's on offer is far more important than any individual factor.

Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale

I've seen this beer for sale in Tesco dozens of times but it's strong and in a small bottle so I've always passed it by. Yesterday it was reduced to £1.18 (all the beers were reduced) so I bought a bottle took it home and drank it immediately.

A Christmas beer on a warm late spring evening, hmmm?

Anyway I was initially impressed by the aroma which strongly reminded me of hot cross buns. Then there's the taste which is fruity for about a nanosecond before the hops come in like tsunami, dark bitter marmalade and burnt toast explode in your mouth.

Glad I wasn't going to have another beer after this, I'd never have tasted it!

Breweries of Poitou-Charente (France)

The following map shows the locations of the breweries I intend to visit during my forthcoming trip to France. Click on the tags to view the brewery details. (map deleted).

Bamberg & Franconia July 07 (23)

Yes back to Franconia and the third brewery of my walk on Saturday 28th. If you recall I was following a walk written by the late great John White and I had just left Geisfeld after sampling the beery delights of the Krug and Griess breweries.

My next stop was to be Rossdorf am Forst. After leaving Geisfeld I passed by Griess's Keller which unfortunately was closed. The sky looked very black and I suspected that I might get drenched before I reached Brauerei Sauer in Rossdorf. I was right, a very heavy shower soaked me in a matter of minutes so I found myself arriving at Sauer in need of a beer to cheer me up.

I found a table and ordered a Lagerbier.

The Lagerbier has a dense head that dissipates quickly to reveal a pale beer. The aroma is balanced and the taste is more malty than the Geisfeld beers. Not much in the finish, some malt and a little hop.

The food looked very good at Sauer, I settled for a salad as I still had the walk back to Strullendorf to contend with, maybe I'd get a pizza later in Bamberg and maybe meet up with Jim for a few more beers.

Details of this walk can be found on John White's website, I highly recommend it.

Cains Dark Mild

I usually drink a beer in the evening. During the week I want a beer that's good quality, reliable, cheap and not too strong.

Easy then there must be loads of beers like that!

No actually there are very few. A range of only three, in fact, that I buy on a regular basis. Banks Original, Thwaites Dark Mild and Cains Dark Mild. Of these three the Banksbeer is a little thin and the Thwaites a little one dimensional. So that just leaves the Cains Dark Mild, an excellent beer but I'd like a few more as good for variety.

Oh yes, and they all come in cans.

More Lists

Reading Ron's Blog about list got me thinking along the same lines. Since I read a similar thing in Steve Thomas's Good Beer Guide to Germany I've been meaning to compile my own. So for what it's worth here is my opinion on what constitutes excellence in the beer world. If you don't agree with me I don't care these are purely my own favourites as of today, tomorrow you may get a different answer.

Destination

1. Bamberg

A town that has everything. A great buzz to the place, it's pubs and it's beers. All this and it stands on its own as a tourist destination without all the beer.

2. Düsseldorf

What can I say. The four Alt brewpubs of the old town make for one of the best Friday nights imaginable, if you can get a seat that is.

3. York

A bewildering array of great pubs, beers and people. My brother lived in York for years and never tired of it, and why should he. we'll be back there to celebrate his 40th in July.

4. Kreuzberg, Hallerndorf, Franken, Germany

Four great Bierkeller on a wooded hill surrounded by villages with their own breweries, how could you go wrong?

5. Prague

I shouldn't include Prague, but I did inspite of myself, should have picked somewhere clever and unusual like Antwerp (Belgium) or Sedan (France).

Brewery

1. Mahrs, Bamberg

Could almost go in any category and has a good argument for most, there are better beers but there's only one Mahr's.

2. Adnams, Southwold, England

A traditional family run brewery in a small Suffolk seaside town that somehow never left the 1950's. Adnams do just about everything right, except axing Extra!

3. Timothy Taylor, Keighley, Yorkshire

A great range of beers from the best brewer in Yorkshire, how could anyone leave it out.

4. Göller, Zeil am Main, Franken, Germany

Again a great range of beers in some of my favourite styles. It's a winning formula that keeps me buying more

5. Tinkoff, St Petersburg, Russia

The Russians beating the German's at their own game. If only every modern German brewpub was this good. Clinically excellent beers served in a location that even persuades me that modern can be great.

Pubs (As They Are Today)

This was a hard one, some great pubs didn't get included, but these are the five that did.

1. The Chequers, Little Gransden, Cambridgeshire

Small unspoilt village boozer, in the same family for generations and selling Adnams Bitter in perfect condition.

2. Krug, Geisfeld, Franken, Germany

Spookily similar to The Chequers only in a different country. The buildings and the look are completely different but the people and the atmosphere are exactly the same.

3. Zum Schlüssel, Düsseldorf

From one extreme to the other, Schlüssel is a huge multiroomed brewpub, again with one dominant product for sale, Alt. The one pub in Düsseldorf that I've visited twice in one night. Once the Alt is flowing it's difficult to find a reason to leave.

4. Mahr's, Bamberg

The Schwemme in Mahrs is another one of those "public bar" kind of places where the beer and conversation flows and you rarely leave before closing time.

5. The Ferry, Cawood, Yorkshire

My favourite place to drink Taylor's Landlord, always in great condition, in a riverside pub with centuries of history, did I save the best 'til last? Even I can't answer that one.

Pubs (As They Once Were)

1. The Garibaldi, St Albans (1986)

Great Fullers ESB in this great pub of the time. It was a bit of a drain on student funds but we always had a great night, thanks Tim.

2. The New Inn, Appletreewick, Yorkshire (until 2007)

Daleside beers, great lunches and my first experience of a real foreign beer list, thanks John.

3. The Falcon, Arncliffe, Yorkshire (1983)

Great memories of late nights drinking Younger's No. 3 then the long walk back to the campsite. The landlord, who's name I forget was always most helpful in checking that we were "all right for beers" no matter what time it was!

4. The Red Lion, Histon, Cambridgeshire (about 1985)

Always an interesting range of beers including Adnams, in great condition, the landlord and landlady were from New Zealand unfortunately I can't remember their names.

5. The Rose & Crown, March, Cambridgeshire (until 2006)

Doug's beer quality, cellar management and dedication to providing an ever changing range of interesting beers, is something I expect I'll never have the pleasure of enjoying again.

The common theme here seems to be: great landlords make great pubs. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that the people factor is so important.

Beer

As for the beers, I think I'll just give you the list without further comment. Again it's hard to decide what to include and what to leave out.

1. Timothy Taylor's Landlord

2. Hummel Kellerbier

3. Spezial Lagerbier

4. Orval, Belgium

5. Adnams Bitter

Bamberg & Franconia July 07 (22)

My next stop in Geisfeld was Brauerei Griess, the pub has a large room all in pale pine with similar chunky furniture and a Weyermann's poster in the corner. I ordered a Kellerbier and sat at a table on the far side of the room to enjoy it.

This Kellerbier has a dense but dissipating head through which floral hoppy aromas can be detected. Some pale malt aromas are starting to come through but it's very cold and there's no sign of a "fass" so it's not gravity dispense. The barman disappeared to get it so combined with the temperature that suggests "direct from the lagering tank." The beer is hoppy and bitter to taste with a pronounced bitter finish. It's a much paler beer than the Krug beer. I'm starting to taste malt towards the bottom of the Seidla but I've nearly finished it and it's still much too cold.

The barman is a funny guy who speaks good English, good enough for his humuor to work! He's very interested in the brewery's entry in Steve Thomas's Good Beer Guide to Germany.

So once again a tiny village close to Bamberg manages to support two great breweries, my personal favourite was Krug but I could easily have spent a lot more time in both of them. However, time is short and there are more breweries to check out so I set off for Rossdorf am Forst. It had been raining as I walked into Griess which was not a problem as the distance between Krug and Griess is not more than a few hundred metres. now the rain had stopped but I was to get seriously soaked walking between Geisfeld and Rossdorf.

Maisel Closed!

I just heard a rumour that the Maisel brewery in Bamberg has closed down! I'll ask the original claimed source of the rumour and post more news as soon as I hear something.