Diving Straight In

I'm coming to you live from the Thornbridge brewhouse with the breaking news that I've just made my very first beer (with a little bit of help from my friends admittedly).

The reason I'm here is that I've decided that, for the next year, I'm going to try and brew at a different brewery every month - and head brewer Stefano very bravely offered his help for my first effort.

Called Heron, it will be a 3.8%ABV pale golden ale with four different types of hops - including two I've never come across before - and I can't tell you how excited I am!

The guys had already settled on a grist mix of low colour Maris Otter & Munich malts and it was my job to choose the hops to create a sessionable ale with interesting, but very drinkable, characteristics and, my god, did I have fun doing that.

Seriously, the Thornbridge hop store is like a beer-nerd's candy shop - and they gave me the key! (Possibly a bit like giving a monkey the key to the banana plantation but, hell, I wasn't complaining).

Early in boil we added equal measures of Bodicea and Vanguard and then later on we added Susan, which has a lovely fresh apple characteristic, and a smaller amount of Glacier, which has an amazing curly leaf parsley aroma with a real minerally/minty finish - which is a pretty exciting flavour combination to play around with.

We also added a tiny amount of the bittering hops after the boil had gone off just for an added extra bit of smooth bitterness and aroma which, if the green beer is anything to go by, will make for a really smooth, refreshing bitterness that doesn't linger at the back of the throat - fingers crossed anyway!

Much to everyone's amusement, except possibly mine by the time I'd finished cleaning the copper, I insisted on doing all donkey work as well as the sexy stuff - because it's just not brewing if there's not some blood, sweat and tears involved!

All right, no blood was involved but as you can see from the above photo there was a hell of a lot sweat, some tears and have I got some bruises in funny places from climbing in and out of the mash tun and copper?!

But, bruises on my bum aside, I've had an exceptional time at Thornbridge, the hospitality I've been shown has been outstanding and the team here are, quite simply, lovely to work with and it was also a momentous day to be brewing as I was there when the deal for the new brewhouse was signed - so congratulations guys.

And finally, special thanks go to hugely entertaining Kelly & his lovely girlfriend Cat who beered and dined me on my first night at the delightful Coach & Horses pub in Dronfield.

To Matt (pictured below right trying the hopped wort of our beer) - thanks for putting up with me getting over-enthusiastic with the shovel and throwing hot malt in your face and then adding insult to injury by spraying you with very hot water! But most of all thanks for sharing my novice's enthusiasm for the whole process and for looking after me all day.

And to Stefano - thanks for putting up with multiple date changes, allowing me to invade your brewery and for stopping the car to show me the herons on the lake, thus providing the inspiration for the beer's name.

I'm quite serious when I say it's been a remarkably fulfilling, and incredibly educational, experience, I can't wait for the next stop on my brewery tour - and if you get a chance to try the beer please do let me know what you think.

The gang's all here: Kelly, Dave, Matt, Stefano & me (just in case all the long hair fooled you!).

Feeling the Wood

Wood aged beer, it might not sound too revolutionary given Britain's history of cask conditioned beer.

But a recent event I attended raised a lot of interesting issues and innovations surrounding this subject, and it's a production method I believe will shape a whole new beer category in the UK over the years to come.

Now, interestingly, we are quite far behind the Americans in this - as they already have whole wood-aged beer festivals - but given their existing and thriving wine and bourbon industrythey have a few more old oak containers kicking around not doing much, apart from waiting for some enterprising spark to pick them up and age other booze in them. One of the reasons being that you can only use bourbon barrels once apparently.

But availability of old casks aside, what's really interesting is the difference you can impart into the same beer by the use of different barrels that have had spirit or fortified wine products in them.

This was demonstrated at this seminar, which was kindly hosted by Thornbridge Brewery at the beautiful Thornbridge Hall, not only by Fuller's but by the hosts themselves.

We had a taste of their St Peter's Imperial Russian Stout which had been finished in three different whisky barrels from Speyside (8.8%), the Highland (9.4%) and Islay (10.2%) - I'll avoid naming the whisky brands for now, as I think it's a potentially touchy subject, but suffice to say they were enormous in ABV and flavour, particularly the Islay one, which a bit too TCP for my tastes but the other two were absolutely superb!

Unfortunately I'm being a bit of a tease because Fuller's is having issues with Customs about this issue and Thornbridge may only release a limited number of their aged St Peter's - but if you can get your hands on some then for goodness sake do.