Seven questions for Richard Burhouse

Richard Burhouse and Magic Rock have been raking in the accolades, winning Gold at the World Beer Cup for Salty Kiss this year. Plans to expand hit a snag in August, but Rich is undeterred and new, large premises for a bigger brew house will be found. Here’s what Rich had to say:

Where are you right now?

In the brewery

Describe your brewery in just five words?

Where we make our beer

What does IMBC mean to you?

Independent Manchester Beer Convention

If you had chance to make one beer before you died, what would it be?

Whatever was on the brew plan that week

Best beer you had at a beer festival in the past six months, where and when?

Palate Wrecker, Green Flash. Copenhagen Beer Festival

On a scale of one to 10, how excited are you about IMBC 2014?

10

Final question, have you ever swam in a Victorian Bath and what’s your preferred choice of swimwear?

No, but I believe Morrissey used to swim in these ones.

 

Thanks Rich! – Join Magic Rock in Room Three across ALL IMBC sessions!

Posted on 22nd September 2014

Hitting the North: Collaborations No. 8, 9, 10, and 11

We’ve been a little bit slow to post our collaboration progress here, mainly because the last few weeks have been very busy indeed. So, to recap, we went to Liverpool, to visit our friends at Mad Hatter Brewing Co in late August. We brewed a beer that we’re calling Manchester Tart, a slightly sour beer with fruit additions of raspberry and coconut, and dry hopped with Sorachi Ace — a beery homage to the lovely and delicious dessert. Should be a treat!

August also saw us visit Leeds and our beery brothers at Northern Monk. We teamed up with Tom Bolland and Hali Santamas from the superb Grove Inn in Huddersfield, as well as our wonderful IndyMan volunteers Amanda and Peter Gaunt. The result of the brew day is a Kiwi Saison, aged in white wine barrels Woody and Buzz! We had a sneaky little non-barrel aged preview at Leeds International Beer Festival — very subtle kiwi flavour that complimented the spicy saison yeast.

Continuing our tour of Yorkshire, we also brewed at Summer Wine Brewery in Holmfirth. Twiggy, an all English-hopped IPA was born and by all accounts the Burton yeast is giving the beer a hugely jammy character. It’ll be dry hopped with East Kent Goldings to give that extra little homegrown kick.

We returned to Manchester, more precisely Salford, to team up with Rik Garner at First Chop. We’ve brewed a small, dark beer with figs and molasses — a nice little palate cleanser. It’s been a full couple of weeks, and now there’s less than four weeks till the main event!

Here are a few snaps from the brew days…

 

Posted on 15th September 2014

Seven Questions for… James Farran

Continuing with our short little interviews, over now to James Farran. James is undoubtedly one of the busiest brewers in the land, pushing production and quality at Summer Wine Brewery to the highest degree.

Where are you right now?

At the brewery, brewers aren’t allowed home, right?

Describe your brewery in just five words?

Relentless x 5

What does IMBC mean to you?

THE seminal beer event of the decade. Incredible Brewers. Incredible Beers. Incredible People. Incredible Surroundings.

If you had chance to make one beer before you died, what would it be?

A REALLY good Pilsner, one that becomes iconic & stands the test of time.

Best beer you had at a beer festival in the past six months, where and when?

Haven’t been to one in the last 6 months, they don’t let me out much.

On a scale of one to 10, how excited are you about IMBC 2014?

12! I get to go to a beer festival for the 1st time in 6 months! :D

Final question, have you ever swam in a Victorian Baths and what’s your preferred choice of swimwear?

Nope, but it would definitely be a gents bathing suit with orange, black & red stripes!

Thanks to James, we’re looking forward to seeing you in Victoria Baths!

Posted on 15th September 2014

Seven questions for… Logan Plant

In the four week lead up to this year’s festival, we thought it’d be fun to sling our partner breweries a few questions… Over to Logan Plant (Beavertown):

Where are you right now?

Sitting on my couch at 6.30am drinking a fresh Russian River Blind Pig IPA, actually half of that was back in my dreams but I am catching up on e-mails before I leave home for the brewery, reality strikes…hard!

Describe your brewery in just five words?

Yeast, Malt, hops, water…crazyfun!

What does IMBC mean to you?

A pain in the ass when I try to remember what it stands for ;-). The perfect platform and environment to drink some of the best beer known to man.

If you had chance to make one beer before you died, what would it be?

A Best Bitter a la ‘Bathams’. It’s the beer that got my taste buds going for everything malt and hops. Simple but definitive. Then I’d barrel age it in a Marc 1983 barrel and spike with some Brett L. Haha.

Best beer you had at a beer festival in the past six months, where and when?

Well other than Tuborg at Glasto….I was lucky enough to serve our beers at the Firestone Walker Invitational in Paso Robles, the beer I kept going back to was Pivo Pils by FW. Awesome for its style!

On a scale of one to 10, how excited are you about IMBC 2014?

Always beyond, like Spinal Tap….11!

Final question, have you ever swam in a Victorian Baths and what’s your preferred choice of swimwear?

I don’t know anybody called Victoria who has a bath but when I swim it’s mainly in my monkey loin cloth. Maximal tanning, minimal friction.

 

Thanks Logan for some err, insightful answers… Catch Beavertown in the Turkish Baths  from Thursday – Sunday.

Posted on 8th September 2014

London Calling: Collaboration No. 7 and other beery shenanigans

What a beery week in the nation’s capital: GBBF, London Beer City and London Craft Beer Festival. Naturally, we had to go south to see lots of friendly faces, brew another collaboration for IndyMan, and take in some of the special beer events. It was a tough mission, but someone had to do it!

First, we stopped at Olympia and GBBF, next we visited Beavertown’s new, shiny brewery in Tottenham. The goal: to make an Iced Tea beer! To achieve this, we mashed in with pale, wheat, and oats, and produced a wort that was then soured in the kettle for three days. We then did some trials with Lemon Phantom and Earl Grey Tea… to determine how much tea would be added in the secondary. Can’t wait to try this little refreshing number! It was a busy day at Beavertown, with brewers from Brazil and Jamil Zainasheff from Heretic in California stopping by. After the brew day, it was time to unwind at The Kernel’s open brewery event, and round out the evening with a visit to Mother Kelly’s in Hackney (apologies for the lack of photos, too busy chatting and tasting beers). A lovely beery place indeed.

After a little bit of a tour around central London’s public houses, we stopped to visit Redchurch, during the busy workday as well as for the chill session in the evening. Well worth visiting on a Thursday evening, and keep an eye out for expanded opening times! Furthermore, we met up with Steve and Mark from Beer ‘O’ Clock Show — the podcast of our chat will be online in the near future, watch the respective Twitter feeds. Finally, it was time to visit the Oval Space, and London Craft Beer Festival, which was back for its second outing. More friendly faces, more excellent beer, and then it was time to leave that there London and head back North.

A huge thank you to Beavertown for hosting us and brewing a special for IMBC, and a further massive thanks to all the beery friends, old and new! We hope to see all of you in Manchester in October. Cheers!

Posted on 25th August 2014

Full brewery list for 2014 announced

Here is the line up in pretty much in it’s FULL glory, we have our events, pop up tasting sessions, beer lists and a few surprises to announce, but for now this is looking pretty BIG!

There are the last remaining tickets left for Thursday (Day), Friday (Day) and Sunday, but act quickly as there are about half the tickets left for each session.

 

Breweries : Against The Grain, Alechemy Brewing Co., Arbor, Beavertown, BlackJack Brewery, Brew By Numbers, BrewFist, Burning Sky, Buxton Brewery, Celt Experience, Cromarty Brewing Co., Evil Twin Brewing, First Chop, Hanging Bat Brewing Co, Harbour Brewing Co, Hawkshead, Hopcraft Brewing, Loverbeer, Mad Hatter Brewing Company, Magic Rock, Moor Beer Company, Northern Monk Brew Co., Quantum Brewing Co., Real Cider Co & Thistly Cross, Red Willow, Redchurch Brewery, Rooie Dop, Siren Craft Brew, Squawk Brewing Co, Stillwater Artisanal, Summer Wine Brewery, The Kernel, Thornbridge, Tiny Rebel, To Øl, Toccalmatto, Weird Beard Brew Co., Wildbeer Co., Wiper and True. Day by day breakdown is HERE

 

Food : Beer Matched Meal with Jackie Kearney (Hungry Gecko) MORE INFO HERE – there are just a few tickets left for the Thursday meal, you can purchase tickets HERE

 

Street food (every day) : Almost Famous, Diamond Dogs, Chaat Cart, Margo and Rita, Great North Pie Co., Honest Crust – MORE INFO HERE

 

Music : Thursday – Saturday curated by Hey! Manchester – The Part Time Heliocentric Cosmo Drama After School Club, Walk, Haiku Salut, Thugs On Wolves, Brown Brogues, PLANK! ///// Sunday curated by Aficionado – J-Walk, Horsebeach, Nev Cottee, DJs Moonboots and Jason Boardman – MORE INFO HERE

Posted on 21st August 2014

Andiamo, Italia: Collaboration No. 6 with Toccalmatto

No rest for the wicked, but all in the name of great beer! The pleasure of visiting Toccalmatto in Fidenza was all mine, as Bruno Carilli is one of the happiest, warmest, and friendliest guy in the brewing scene. And really excited about collaborations! In fact, he’s so excited about them, he’s doing four in the space of a month… and we kicked things off on Wednesday, 30th July. Plans are in motion for the brewery to move to a bigger site close by, with a bigger brewhouse and thus increase the output — especially to keep up with orders for the ever popular Zona Cesarini. There will also be more room for barrels, but Bruno is not in a rush to resume the aging programme, most importantly, the team will focus on settling in to working with the new brewhouse and bottling line.

This transitional period is therefore a great opportunity to work with other brewers, including home brewers. Bruno loves collaborations because, “I always learn something new, of course I enjoy visiting other brewers and breweries, and then coming up with a new beer, playing with flavours, aroma. There are so many great brewers out there and together, we can make something really special.” Truer words were never spoken.

With that philosophy in mind, we brewed an Imperial Red Ale, with six different hops, and the wonderful guys at Toccalmatto will continue to dry hop this beautiful liquid, and then it will be unveiled at IMBC! Opening the FV ever so briefly the next morning, the aromas were fruity, hoppy, resinous. So much promise and potential!

What a privilege to taste amazing beers like Bedda Matri (barley wine aged in Marsala barrels for two years) and so many other treasures that Bruno and his close-knit team have been patiently waiting on to develop in the barrel cellar. For the love of hops and all good beer, Toccalmatto exemplify what is exciting about the brewing scene today! Thanks to Bruno, head brewer Matteo, assistant brewers Marco and Davide, resident food pairing expert Massimo, brewery assistant Antonio, and administrative captain, Fabiana, for their hospitality and generosity!

 

Posted on 4th August 2014

2014 Music and food traders announced

There is more to life than beer?!? Shock, horror some may say! We are quite proud at IMBC to have an extensive family of food lovers, music buffs, top notch DJs and generally lovely people.

With pleasure we have announced the following food traders for this year’s festival : Almost Famous, Chaat Cart, Diamond Dogs, Margo and Rita, Great North Pie Co and Honest Crust you can read LOADS more here.

To accompany all the lovely food and drink you will be needing the perfect soundtrack, fear not, for we have teamed up with two Manchester stalwarts to help us curate the music. Thursday to Saturday will be orchestrated by Hey! Manchester, playing for them will be The Part Time Heliocentric Cosmo Drama After School Club, Haiku Salut, Thugs On Wolves, Brown Brogues and PLANK!

Sunday music selections are supplied by Aficionado, we are over the moon to have these guys on board for a bit of a live shindig across the sabbath. On stage will be J-Walk, Horsebeach and Nev Cottee, of course they will be accompanied by DJs Moonboots and Jason Boardman.

Read more about all the music happenings HERE.

Posted on 22nd July 2014