New Doctor Who Found

I got this email this morning but cant afford the $3000 myself, im hoping some of you can help me get these episodes back.



Dear Respected One,

GREETINGS,

Permit me to inform you of my desire of going into business relationship with you. I got your contact from the International web site directory. I consulted the Stars over it and selected your name among other names due to it's esteeming nature and the recommendations given to me as a reputable and trust worthy person I can do business with and by the recommendations I must not hesitate to confide in you for this simple and sincere business.

I am Emil Keller, the only Son of late Mr Sir Gilles Estram. My father was a poor Janitar  at the Prasar Bharati Corporation in the nineteen sixties, Sadly this week he passed  in a fire but amongst the ruins we found keys to a safety deposit box. We have been out to visit the bank and discovered the first three episodes of Dr Who and the Smugglers.

I have been told that these episode are very valuable and could be sold for that he has a sum of $12.500.000 (Twelve Million, five hundred thousand dollars).

Sadly the bank will not let us take the epiodes out of the bank with out the proper paperwork, but sadly the paperwork was destroyed in the fire. The bank say in absence of the proper paperwork we would need to visit the Capital and have the paperwork redone. But sadly we cannot afford the $3000 that it would take for me and my 2 sisters to visit the lawers in Deli and have the paperwork redone.


Moreover Sir, we are able to lend me the $3000 i would be more than happy to repay you and in addition  to offer you 15% of the sum as compensation for effort in releasing these episodes. If you can find it in your heart to help please email me at emilbkeller@gmail.com

Anticipating to hear from you soon.
Thanks and God Bless.
Best regards.
Mr Emil Keller

PLEASE FOR PRIVATE AND SECURITY REASONS,REPLY ME VIA EMAIL:
emilbkeller@gmail.com

Bracia Yourself

Its been a long time coming and ive been waiting till i got a third vintage, and with picking up Batch 4 earlier this month i seemed time to get stuck in.

All look deep darkest black looking almost identical with the middle vintage (batch 2 or 3) having a little more head.

The aroma varies quite a lot with Batch 1 being dark treacle and plums, with a little germoline in there, Batch 4 is a sweet honey woody with light licorice and treacle nose ... and the middle batch is very big honey.. soft chocolate treacle .. much drier and much more intense than the other 2.

Mouthfell wise the first and fourth are a little thiner and a little fizzier than the middle one, with batch one being the fizziest of them all. The Middle batch is rich oily body, softer carbonation and much fuller mouth feel.

Flavour wise theres no mistaking that these are the same beer, but their are none the less noticible differences. Batch 1 seems to have faded and thined out flavour wise, its clearly the less intense of the three.
Its a soft roast with the lighest chocolate hints, sweet honey malts with a bitter woody  nutty tones ... the flavours and deep and rich, very mellow and rounded. The differences Batch 1 is more bitter up front, and bacth 4 is very berry fruits and it clearly the more fruity of the three. The middle has the bitter honey tones i associate with many meads.


So which is my favourite, thats like choosing your favourite Child but here goes, It think its batch 4, but its followed so close by batch 1 its a difficult call. But the fruityness wins out, the middle ones honey bitterness in the linger just drags it down a  bit for me and makes it a little to OTT.


and Because its what he would have wanted

Oddly having it through straws adds a little spicyness to the rich deem nutty malts.

The Fynest Festival on Earth

I thought with Beer Cast Rich not being able to make Fynefest I was in with a chance to cover the festival in my own way without looking second rate but sadly for me Rich has managed to write a better piece (with I'm sure no spelling mistakes) without being there, than I could manage in a thousand years.

 

But having set my mind to covering this FYNE festival it seemed silly of me not to put the effort in.

 

This Years Trip started way back in 2012 when I had to cancel our planned trip to Fyne fest, I'm my ever present Beer/Family balance.

But having to Sacrifice 2012 Fynefest and hearing the great reports, I resolved to fit it into my 2013 Beer calendar.

 

On arrival at the field we were left to set-up our pitch in a nice big flat open field only a short hop from the Stage, bar and food stalls. Then checking in we swapped out tickets for our wrist bands and were handed a couple of bottle of water(given that we had forgotten to bring water this was superb and a nice touch) and wandered off to find the bar. The Bar was set up in a HUGE marquee with the Bar at one end and the Stage at the other. Which worked very well on the whole but at time the music was too loud and this made conversation tricky. Now this wouldn’t have been a problem if it had been sunny but giving the Typical Scottish weather we had there wasn’t really anywhere to retreat to.

 

 Just outside the marque was six or seven food stalls offering a decent variety, with Venison burgers, all sorts of smelly fish(im not a fish fan), haggis, stew, veggie curry and even a few nice and sticky pudding (that pleased my kids no end). Behind the food were more than enough toilets, and well maintained they were as well(which if you’ve seen bad festival toilets full above the rim!!! you really appreciate well maintained toilet facilities)

 

But back to the reason I was there. The Beer. It appeared that there was some cooled cellar  for the Cask beer, but however it was managed it was some of the Best quality festival ale I've had, there were a few beers that I didn’t enjoy but not a single beer was served in poor condition. The beer I drank most of should come as no surprise to anyone was the De Molen Rasputin (well it ticks all my boxes), the Beer that most surprised me was Marble Earl Grey IPA, I hadn't really thought much of this when I tried it from the Bottle, but on Cask it was stunning and it may have been my most drunk beer if any had lasted to the Saturday. The Beer that no one but me seemed to like was again De Molen this time De Molen Raad & Daad which was a strange balsamic vinegar toned Barrel aged sour that had a fair bite in back of throat. Now I couldn’t drink much of it but I did really enjoy what I had. The Fynest beer of the weekend was the Bell Rock in Hop which just failed to make my top10 IPA list sitting 11th equal. But the Best Beer of the weekend VERY SADLY wasn’t on tap, it was a bottle of Home Brew. But not just any home Brew, I just happened to visit the Brewery at the right time when Jake Griffin from Fyne had opened a Bottle of home brew Zombier, that he had coco-nutted to the Max,  im a little hazy though he did kindly tell me what he had done and I remember whole coconuts at one stage, coconut milk some other point and I think even some creamed coconut at yet another. This was Superb, But given what he had to do, I cant see him ever being allowed or even able to do it on the Real kit. Which is a shame.

 

Music wise there was nobody I didn’t like but only one really stood out for me, and I've no idea of their name but they were on First on the Friday night, and I really wouldn’t mind a CD for a better listen.

 

Theres really only 1 change I would like to see to the festival and that’s the option to be able to park beside your tent. There was a field between the car park and the main Arena that seemed perfect for this, and being used to doing this at the Cropredy festival, we really missed the convenience of having everything to hand. Travelling with a family always seems to involve too much stuff and Having to drag the MASSIVELY heave tent back to the car in a hung over state is not one im Keen to Repeat.

 

 

But all told the only thing that wasn’t Fyne about the festival was the weather.

 

 

PS. Lookout for a MEGA collaboration brew coming out in the next few month, There were at least Seven Top UK brewers involved in this beer. So my simple maths this beer should be seven times as good as most beers and Three and a half times better than normal collaboration brews. I for one cant wait.

 

 

Bash Your Haggis

Now not much has inspired me to write of late, but this forthcoming event has got me excited, and those that know me will know just how big a "FanBoy" i am when it comes to Brodies.

In discussion James from Brodies said he wondered how he was going to make next years Bunny Basher better than last years, to which i quicky replied "Thats easy, just hold it in Edinburgh"

Not particularly funny or clever but i was more puzzled by his reply. "You might be closer than you think but cant say more just yet"  But less than TWO hours later it broke that Brodies were to hold a multi pub event in Edinburgh.

If i knew all James needed was 2 hours to arrange a Brodies Event in Edinburgh id have asked him years ago.

So first off, if you don't know anything about the Brodies home pub you should go read  this

But for those of you in the know, you will no doubt be as excited as i am over the thought of Brodies Haggis Basher.

From the Information ive gleamed from twitter (and i will update as i get more info) It would appear to be a multi pub event held in Edinburgh on the 10th of July 2013, with the Pubs looking to be "The Cask and Barrel Southside", "Brewdog Edinburgh" and "The Hanging Bat"

There will be a mixture of cask and keg with likly upwards of 20 NEW brodies beers, Top amonst these is a Blueberry Version of their Sour, Now all the Brodies sours have been pretty cool, but the small taste i had of the Blueberry was out of this world and  will clearly be, one not to be missed.

Also mentioned is the intriguing  White Chocolate, White pepper, White Stout but their are no real details on this one. While fans of the Big Mofo Stout and Red wine will no doubt be drooling over the Rioja barrel version of this collaboration.

So while details may be thin on the ground at this stage there is no doubt in my mind that this could well be the unmissable Edinburgh Beer event this year.

Has CAMRA Lost its Way

It broke today on Twitter that Cromarty  had a beer order cancelled from a CAMRA festival beacuse they sell the same beer in Cask in Keg.



Now many of my friends know im  an Ardent CAMRA Supporter.

But i was horrified to think that CAMRA’s policy might be to  not support or buy beer from Brewers that Produce the same beer in cask and keg (using the same name) and while not wanting to call Cromarty  liars i just couldnt believe this was policy so i phoned CAMRA HQ

And  bloody Hell it appears to be true, i was told

Policy is
"4.33 Beer festivals are not to stock or admit for any award, any beer brand which is produced in both cask and keg versions that mislead the drinker into believing that there is little or no difference between the versions."

The wording of the policy is such that beer festival organisers are able to determine whether or not drinkers are likely to be misled. If drinkers are not likely to be misled then the festival organisers may stock a beer that is brewed both in cask and keg versions.

Now maybe this one Beer festival is interpreting the rule very tightly but its ridiculous.

Sad to say but i cant see this causing anything but harm to CAMRA reputation, when even i (probably the most PRO CAMRA person i know find this to be nothing but stupid.

And i dont want to be the person answering people at the festival about why a brewery is missing from festival, there bound to get fed up of being laughed at.

In fact looking at
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champion_Beer_of_Scotland

All three top beers in Scotland last year were produced by Brewers who will be selling there produce in both Cask and Keg, and while i will always prefer to see them in cask rather than keg, thats my personal choice.
I dont think the Battle for Cask beer is won, and i think CAMRA has a cause still to fight for, for moves like this do more to harm there cause and make them look stupid. Sadly despite argueing for the Last 2 years that CAMRA are still relevant, it does in fact look like they have lost their way.

You can Read here more about why one of these 2 breweries has Chosen to go down the Keg and Cask route.

As last year looking at my Golden Half pints blog it was clear that I love Big Dark Beers. Ok this is nothing new to me or people who know me, But i dont just love these beers, so i thought i would cover the same ground with other styles, working with an arbitrary maximum abv of 5.5.  In  know ive had several good bottles and Cask(all of which id happily drink again) at under 5.5% but i have found this much more difficult to write than the original piece, on the whole these beers while good just dont WOW me, in the same way. Where there is no winner, that is because no beers meeting that criteria didnt make it into my Ratebeer top 100 of the year.

Best UK draught (Cask or Keg) beer(stout):
Winner:  Tinpot Game Spice Stout  
Runner Up: Adkin Alfred’s Jaypee’s Stout

Best UK draught (Cask or Keg) beer(other):
Winner:  Thornbridge Wye
Runner Up: Magic Rock High Wire NZ

Best UK bottle or canned beer (stout)
Winner:Buxton Dark Nights 

Best UK bottle or canned beer (other)
Winner: No winner This year
 
Best Overseas bottle or canned beer
Winner: Crombe Oud Kriekenbier


Best Overseas Draught beer
Winner: No winner this year


Best Overall beer
Winner:  Tinpot Game Spice Stout  

The Most interesting thing about this years results is to find a sour beer in my lists as i really am not a Lambic fan, but some of the Flemish red styles are nice and the Crombe was a stunner.

How ever this year brought about the nicest thing to ever pass my lips. Its not a beer (though it is on Ratebeer) hence does not feature in this post or my main post, So what is it i hear you ask... dont I,  i could have sworn i heard you ask. Oh well im going to tell you anyway, its an ice cider La Face Cachée de la Pomme Neige Recolte D’Hiver to be precise. It truely was stunning, very sweet but ive always been partial to the sweet end of beer. Never have i come closer to taste bud heaven. Now dont get me wrong i still love beer, and i could not drink ice cider all the time (especially given the price) but if your gonna offer me a beer or that ice cider chances are the beers not got a look in.
 

Golden Half Pints 2002

Still to come is my Bitters for 2012 but a Tweet from @BoakandBailey  made me think what would my Golden pints look like 10 years ago. So this is all very airy fairy based on roughly what my memory is saying i loved

Best UK draught (Cask or Keg) beer:
Winner:  Cairngorm Witches Cauldron

Best UK bottle or canned beer
Joint Winner:Manns Brown Ale    
 
Best Overseas bottle or canned beer
Winner: Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout

Best Overseas Draught beer
Winner: I doubt id tried anything, id get excited by

Best Overall beer
Winner:  Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout

Best UK brewery
Winner: Badger

Best Overseas Brewery
Winner: On the Strength of Black Chocolate, it would be Brooklyn
 
Pub/Bar of the Year
Winner: This is Tricky, i suspect it might be the Bow Bar, but maybe Holmes Bar in Leith

Beer Festival of the Year
Winner: I probably only knew Medowbank in Edinburgh

 

Best beer twitterer
Winner: Whats Twitter


In 2003, I'd most not have any beer aims as i wasnt as beer driven. But im most likly want to bo back diving in Micronesia