UK Ministers have withdrawn the planned 10% tax on Cider after fierce opposition from both workers in the cider industry and MP's desperate to save the large number of 'craft' cider producers in the country.
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Monday 12 April 2010
Tuesday 30 March 2010
St Peter's Brewery team up with Munton's
Muntons have announced the release of their latest beer kit. This 3.0 kg twin-tin boxed beer kit is the 'first' in a planned new range of beer kits made in association with the world famous brewery - St Peters, based in Bungay, Suffolk.
The first kit unveiled is the Ruby Red Ale – A delicious tawny red beer with subtle malt undertones and a great spiced hoppy aroma.
St. Peter’s Brewery is located in beautiful untouched countryside in North Suffolk nearby the historic market town of Bungay. St. Peter’s Hall is the centerpiece of the brewery site and dates from around 1280. In 1539 the East wing was added using resources from the cloe by Flixton Nunnery, which was one of a dozen Monastic houses gifted to Cardinal Wolsey by King Henry VIII to fund the building of a school in Ipswich, Suffolks main town. Just as today, Suffolk barley was skillfully malted to produce beers and that tradition is carried on today in the St Peter’s brewery.
Their beers are available the world over instantly recognised by the distinctive and unique “medicine bottle” design of their bottle. These unique bottles will also be available to homebrew wholesalers for distribution to the the retail trade.
The first kit unveiled is the Ruby Red Ale – A delicious tawny red beer with subtle malt undertones and a great spiced hoppy aroma.
St. Peter’s Brewery is located in beautiful untouched countryside in North Suffolk nearby the historic market town of Bungay. St. Peter’s Hall is the centerpiece of the brewery site and dates from around 1280. In 1539 the East wing was added using resources from the cloe by Flixton Nunnery, which was one of a dozen Monastic houses gifted to Cardinal Wolsey by King Henry VIII to fund the building of a school in Ipswich, Suffolks main town. Just as today, Suffolk barley was skillfully malted to produce beers and that tradition is carried on today in the St Peter’s brewery.
Their beers are available the world over instantly recognised by the distinctive and unique “medicine bottle” design of their bottle. These unique bottles will also be available to homebrew wholesalers for distribution to the the retail trade.
Top 10 Beer Instructional Sites
Below I have listed my Top 10 Home Brew Beer Guides. There are plenty of sites on the web but you may find that some become too technical or others are just hard to follow. Below is my selection...
1. Jim's Beer Kit
www.jimsbeerkit.co.uk/
Jims Beer Kit is a site that is packed full of information and written by one of the great homebrew enthusiasts. A great source for home brewing technique and practise and also includes one od the best user forums on the net.
2. Go Make Beer
gomakebeer.com/
Go Make Beer is an easy to read step by step guide to all the processes of making beer - from using starter kits to all grain brewing. Full of useful tips and information and never over complex. Great starter site for home brew newbies.
3. Beer In The Making
www.beerinthemaking.co.uk/how-to-brew-beer.php
This is a great concise instructional on making your own beers and ales using the pre-bought beer kits - the ones where the ingredients are pre-prepared so there is no boiling or mashing needed. Great for beginners as it is so easy to do.
4. 2 B A Snob
www.2basnob.com/homebrewing-instructions.html
An odd URL but good step by step guide on the basics of brewing beer. The idea of the main site is to 'become a snob' on a particular subject - quite a fun read.
5. YoBrew
www.yobrew.co.uk
Superb site for those wishing to design their own beers. Great resource of home brew information for both wine making and beer/cider making. Quite large pages to work through but definately worth the effort.
6. John Palmer's How To Brew
www.howtobrew.com/
John Palmer is a great writer. His website is basically a free edition of his first home brew book 'How To Brew' in it's entirety. The book itself is now onto it's 3rd Edition and is available at all good home brew shops and book shops. He goes into great detail about all processes of home brewing and is probably more beneficial for people who have at least started brewing and have a vague familiarity of the brewing processes. Basically you are legitametly getting a great book for free.
7.Home Brew Zone
www.homebrewzone.com
Simple guide to starting homebrew. Useful check list style. Great for the beginner to get an insight into what is required to make beer.
8. ehow Videos on Home Brewing
www.ehow.com
This site contains some useful videos to your home brew arsenal. There are quite a number of videos in the Home Brew Category offering a wide variety of tips on all the processes of home brewing.
9. Instructables
http://www.instructables.com/id/Make-Beer
Instructables is a great site for learning how to do virtually anything. The beer making section is relatively good for beginners and all the instruction guides are down-loadable and printable via PDF.
Monday 29 March 2010
Save Money by Brewing Your Own Beer - Where to Start
There has to be a beginning to all interests. Homebrew is no exception.
Active in the beer world for over a decade I have witnessed many price rises happen, most commonly twice a year regardless of any government added taxation. Prices have risen by almost 53% over the past 10 years in the UK. Imported beers are now being produced under license in huge breweries and the expense of running a licensed premises has increased due to many causes, along with rises in utility bills, rateable values and the minimum wage.
Undoubtedly it is the end user of the beer that atones the bill.
The other day when spending what seemed like a small budget deficit for a round of drinks with colleagues, I thought to myself 'this is wrong - lagers made out of rubbish...'.
This was the dawning, the dawning of something incredibly good.
The next afternoon I went to my local homebrew shop. I walked through the doorway to be confronted with a massive selection of plastic barrels, buckets, tins of 'ale kits' and stands of packets of malts - all sorts of grains, additives, head retention mixes. The list never ends. In other words I felt as though I really had stepped out of my depth. The shop was full of customers. There were people enquiring about mash tuns, hop strainers and hop utilisation. I felt small and nearly ran out of the store with my newly gained bundle of homebrew befuddlement. Then I was collared...
"What can we do for you sir ?"
I hesitated - to be truthful I did not know where to commence - on the basis I had no clue to the processes of home brewing.
"I want to make my own beers" I stated "unfortunately I no nothing of the homebrew process."
There was a slight pause and I assumed that the woman was cursing my lack of research into brewing. I was incorrect.
"One moment" she reassuringly interjected and disappeared into the back of the shop returning almost immediately with a handful of instructional guides. "I will give you these pamphlets on the main ways of making beers." These contained easy to follow information on home brewing from beer kits, malt extract brewing and all grain brewing.
She advised starting with brewing from ready prepared home brew kits as this was the most simple way to start yet taught the 'must do' practises of cleaning and fermentation. They also had a ready to go homebrew bundle which contained all the tools needed - and a high price beer kit. This was starting to sound simple...
The beginners kit contained a primary fermenter bucket, a pressure barrel, a racking cane (syphon), hydrometer, thermometer, airlock, a choice of gas systems, sterilising powder and a free choice of beer kit from the shops 'premium range' with the ingredients capable of making 40 UK pints of ale.
After that she went through the full instructions of brewing with the equipment in sufficient detail, including using the hydrometer and thermometer and the option of bottling. A highly complex spiel on water then started but the little that did not go over my head was very beneficial.
I was sold but concerned about the re-usability of the supplied items in the kit particularly the pressure barrel - how many times can I us it ?
The shop assistant claimed that they prided themselves on the quality of the products they sell and that despite the barrel being known as as a budget barrel it will undoubtedly last for years (of which it has along side the other barrels I have since acquired).
OK, I have developed my hobby into All Grain brewing and still use all the original products from the starter kit. I enjoy going out to my local bars and sampling the wide variety of beers and ales available with the nose of a connoisseur. Many of my friends have now been infected by the homebrew bug and we enjoy many an merry night tasting each other's brews.
Finally...
I really have to champion the homebrew shop. It is daunting to firstly enter in there with little or no knowledge but the service you will get is without exception superb. Obviously - these people are heavily involved in the hobby themselves without a doubt and they are there to make sales.
If you are thinking about making home brew beer for yourself then take the plunge. It is not costly and quite refreshing to consider that the ale you are drinking costs only about 20-30 pence per pint. The other day I visited into a bar and was charged £3 for a pint of lager. It hurt that this cost the equivalent of ten pints of my own brew.
For an easy to follow breakdown of accoutrements required and the brewing process go to Brew Beer the easy way ! or do a google search. Just don't be reticent by your lack of knowledge of the brewing process - it is easy.
Active in the beer world for over a decade I have witnessed many price rises happen, most commonly twice a year regardless of any government added taxation. Prices have risen by almost 53% over the past 10 years in the UK. Imported beers are now being produced under license in huge breweries and the expense of running a licensed premises has increased due to many causes, along with rises in utility bills, rateable values and the minimum wage.
Undoubtedly it is the end user of the beer that atones the bill.
The other day when spending what seemed like a small budget deficit for a round of drinks with colleagues, I thought to myself 'this is wrong - lagers made out of rubbish...'.
This was the dawning, the dawning of something incredibly good.
The next afternoon I went to my local homebrew shop. I walked through the doorway to be confronted with a massive selection of plastic barrels, buckets, tins of 'ale kits' and stands of packets of malts - all sorts of grains, additives, head retention mixes. The list never ends. In other words I felt as though I really had stepped out of my depth. The shop was full of customers. There were people enquiring about mash tuns, hop strainers and hop utilisation. I felt small and nearly ran out of the store with my newly gained bundle of homebrew befuddlement. Then I was collared...
"What can we do for you sir ?"
I hesitated - to be truthful I did not know where to commence - on the basis I had no clue to the processes of home brewing.
"I want to make my own beers" I stated "unfortunately I no nothing of the homebrew process."
There was a slight pause and I assumed that the woman was cursing my lack of research into brewing. I was incorrect.
"One moment" she reassuringly interjected and disappeared into the back of the shop returning almost immediately with a handful of instructional guides. "I will give you these pamphlets on the main ways of making beers." These contained easy to follow information on home brewing from beer kits, malt extract brewing and all grain brewing.
She advised starting with brewing from ready prepared home brew kits as this was the most simple way to start yet taught the 'must do' practises of cleaning and fermentation. They also had a ready to go homebrew bundle which contained all the tools needed - and a high price beer kit. This was starting to sound simple...
The beginners kit contained a primary fermenter bucket, a pressure barrel, a racking cane (syphon), hydrometer, thermometer, airlock, a choice of gas systems, sterilising powder and a free choice of beer kit from the shops 'premium range' with the ingredients capable of making 40 UK pints of ale.
After that she went through the full instructions of brewing with the equipment in sufficient detail, including using the hydrometer and thermometer and the option of bottling. A highly complex spiel on water then started but the little that did not go over my head was very beneficial.
I was sold but concerned about the re-usability of the supplied items in the kit particularly the pressure barrel - how many times can I us it ?
The shop assistant claimed that they prided themselves on the quality of the products they sell and that despite the barrel being known as as a budget barrel it will undoubtedly last for years (of which it has along side the other barrels I have since acquired).
OK, I have developed my hobby into All Grain brewing and still use all the original products from the starter kit. I enjoy going out to my local bars and sampling the wide variety of beers and ales available with the nose of a connoisseur. Many of my friends have now been infected by the homebrew bug and we enjoy many an merry night tasting each other's brews.
Finally...
I really have to champion the homebrew shop. It is daunting to firstly enter in there with little or no knowledge but the service you will get is without exception superb. Obviously - these people are heavily involved in the hobby themselves without a doubt and they are there to make sales.
If you are thinking about making home brew beer for yourself then take the plunge. It is not costly and quite refreshing to consider that the ale you are drinking costs only about 20-30 pence per pint. The other day I visited into a bar and was charged £3 for a pint of lager. It hurt that this cost the equivalent of ten pints of my own brew.
For an easy to follow breakdown of accoutrements required and the brewing process go to Brew Beer the easy way ! or do a google search. Just don't be reticent by your lack of knowledge of the brewing process - it is easy.
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