Spring Time

Spring time. The time of rebirth. I have in the past slated Spring. With its bank holidays disrupting things like workflow and isolating our friends the yeast from our near semi constant care. You can't just make days disappear without changing the game plan.

But anyway, bank holidays can also be pleasant. Time with the family, friends or homies.  I'm fairly sure I've covered the subject of spring at least a couple of times on the quest but what I've really come to learn from it is this; At Mordue Spring is where all the action happens.

First up you've got SIBA Beer X (where Killswitch 51 won big last year). Gateshead Beer Festival (still to get round to visiting that) and Newcastle Beer Festival with its 'battle of the beers'. The first Panda Frog Project beer of the year often comes out in spring so you've got seasonals/specials left ,right and centre but the local trade seems to pick up so it kind of balances itself out.

It's the time of year with the most opportunity to take awards with SIBA events and Newcastle Beer Festival fairly close to each other. So when it's all over the long brew days and often endless national orders of summer come in, you might well be able to drink beer in the evening outside again but at Mordue things certainly don't go at the same pace as spring. Face it, summer's a great season but it does tend to go on a bit.

Five years

Five years ago this month I was first introduced to the Mordue crew and brewing kit. At the time I was working as a brewer/assistant for Daleside brewery, Harrogate and was to part from their band of mostly Yorkshire folk. I first got the call on a Thursday afternoon between the hop store and mash tun from Matt (now my brother priest of the yeast) and I was ecstatic.For a long time I had been after a job in the local scene. No more renting in two different places. Although I new the job involved more responsibility little did I know I was about to embark on what has been a seemingly epic journey.

Since 2011 I have promised never to take any of this for granted. To contribute to the beer world through Mordue and Panda Frog I am ultimately gifted with two sets of children. At work, some of them I invented, others are adopted, some adopted and modified, they are the products of fermentations. At home I have my own cute little brew babies Susie and Harvey not to mention the most awesome loving caring journalist wife. Being surrounded by the humble yet beautiful surroundings of Alnwick is also an honour.

Where ultimately I have achieved feats beyond anything I imagined, it hasn't always been like that film Vanilla Sky. It wasn't always victory after victory.

Major campaigns/big tender orders have come and gone like chapters of brewing, each one like an elongated chess match relying on organisation as much as graft. Staff have come, and gone. My perspective has changed. The kit has changed. The beer world has changed. Although I realised what past Daleside brew master Craig Witty was getting at way back then with many things.

Ultimately being surrounded by a work crew wearing Panda Frog t-shirts is something I will never tire of being chuffed with. I see my work written about on blogs, social media and sometimes printed on award certificates. However small, large or relevant, my time at Mordue has granted me the chance to leave my own imprint on the world.

I can't really speculate much on what's to come but prefer to be optimistic. I can't see myself getting tired of this but perhaps envision a few care nurses at the home getting tired of that crazy old guy going off about Pandazilla, Battle of the beers, Operation Black Beaver Storm and when we won at GBBF. Because even at the worst of times I never did stop believing.

Discovering a new beer style; Grodziskie

Grodziskie is a traditional Polish style wheat beer known to feature oak-smoked wheat. The style is highly carbonated, not overly cloudy and brewed with sulphate-heavy water and moderate hop bitterness. Combined with a low abv (3.1% in this case) this style is dry and flinty.

This take on it, Piwoz Grodziska from Polish micro brewery Browar w Grodzisku pours with no more yeast than your standard bottled conditioned beer. The aroma is faintly smokey, peaty, seaweed. The taste is dry and spritzy. There's a subtle clean, but fresh, noble hop pilsner esque feel about it that doesn't distract from a soft smokeyness. Note, no banana or crazy phenolics and light on the palate (tho I certainly doesn't come across watery for 3.1%).

Obviously this is a fairly rare traditional European beer style and it would be interesting to see if this ever caught on with the UK craft beer scene one day.

And like that the year was over

That's right, it's certainly gone quickly. 2015 has been an interesting year, for me I would say 2015 has been a year of change. That point where you think you had the game sussed, everything under control but then the game changes. Like looking after two kids instead of one for example.

me and bairn number two

While there's been sucess there's also been set backs but without a doubt the arrival of Harvey has been the highlight of the year. SIBA awards from IPA and Killswitch 51 also perked things up and on the whole it's been a good  year. Having a second kid has kicked ass more than it's been hard work, yet 2015 on the whole has been hard work. Nearly as hard work as 2012.

Mordue IPA SIBA awards

Not a great number of beers have been discovered this year hence the lack of material on the quest. There's been some intense periods of brewing (again affecting blogging duties) especially during the summer. Of course the wider beer world is changing too. More successful independent brewers being bought out by the dark side. Or is it really the grey or teal blue side depending who's opinion it is. The big get bigger, cover more territory to compete with the small brewers getting more numerous and diverse.

Locally more breweries are opening up, too many for me to keep up with. Will probably get to try the wares of many of them at next year's Newcastle beer fest, by that time another new wave of upstarts will be on the way.

One thing that has often surprised me is how much the North East beer scene has thrived in recent years. Despite the expanse of competition the respective brewers of our region are up scaling, thriving beyond the region's borders and winning awards. I am still enormously proud to be part of this region's beer scene and represent one of the oldest most respected breweries of the area.

So at the end of this very balanced year, I may not feel we totally smashed it like 2013 but I do feel the prospects ahead ain't half bad. Happy new year everyone.

Being prepared for; The December effect

December, the busiest time of year for local trade at almost any brewery. Sometimes it's called unpredictable, almost every time it goes by like a festive flash of brewing, racking, cleaning, assembling orders and so on. Before you know it the relatively steady January period is here and it's all over.

So what is the December effect? Big sales and lots of beer going out? It's more complicated than that. You plan ahead, 10-20% increased stock flow from November. All the brew dates are in place, especially in response to national orders. But at some point things change, almost from under your feet, a few barrels of product leave the door. Next thing you know another core beer gets hit, then another. Panic sets in, next week's stock levels look somewhere between insufficient and very tight.

So within the space of an hour or so an entire fortnight's brew schedule has been re-written. Brew schedules get re-written far more often in December. So the answer must be simple I hear you say, just brew a heap load of beer. Yet one of the worst outcomes of this season is the possibility of landing in January with masses of (by then slow moving) stock.

So, like a very drawn out penalty shoot out the December effect is a long, enduring, nervy balancing act of stock fall against volumes brewed, solid graft against party, alcohol and relaxing with the family. So being prepared for the December effect isn't really that simple, its more about being prepared for anything.