Goatee Phil's Beer Blog

 I'd rather (not) be picking up bottles and cans The Foghorn, Portslade - where else? It's the morning when Lockdown 3.0 ends and people the length and breadth of the country are, like me, in a state of suppressed excitement at the thought that, in just a few hours, we'll all be able, finally, to go to the pub. It's not quite back to normal, of course, because we won't be able to go indoors yet. We'll be huddled against walls, cowering under awnings, braving the crappy English weather and all for what? For a pint of cask ale. Let's be clear - apart from being able to talk to other people outside of the house without risking the frowns of passers-by, the thing that we've been deprived of these many months, is cask. Bottles and cans, from a bewildering array of breweries, both UK and beyond, have been easy to come by, and takeaway containers of keg beer don't taste markedly different from the same brew served in a pub. But cask is different. Even takea...

Life goes on, innit Faith, what else? Sometimes it takes an extreme event to make you appreciate what you have.   Here we are, in the middle of a worldwide pandemic, with most of us confined to our homes, and understandably people are complaining. They are also ignoring instructions to stay home and instead are carrying on as if nothing is wrong. But that’s enough about Dominic Cummings. Let’s just think for a moment about this world we live in. We now have 24/7 news coverage as well as an information platform called the internet where you can find anything you want - and sometimes buy it - and on it folks have developed networks of social gatherings where you can hook up with friends, family, even total strangers and talk to them any time you damn well please. And with a beer in your hand you could almost be in the pub! How have you all been coping with the lockdown? I've been surprised at how little I have missed the outside world. I realise that I am luckier than many. ...

The battle for CAMRA's soul If you take any interest in the social history of beer in the UK then you'll be aware of CAMRA. One of the most successful consumer-led campaigns of modern times, it was set up in 1971. Its creators were four disgruntled Northern beer drinkers who were fed up with the quality of the beer in their local pubs and decided to do something about it. They discovered that the main reason for the decline in quality had to do with two things. The first was the change from most beer being allowed to continue to ferment in the pub cellar, to beer being pasteurised before it even left the brewery. The second was the growing inability of landlords whose beer did mature in the cellar to look after it properly. Beer either tasted dull and fizzy - the keg version - or rank and sour - the badly kept cask version. I was brought up on the dull and fizzy kind. I was a teenager in the late1960s and when I started sneaking into pubs, and going to parties...