Andy Cullen – Page 112 – CAMRA Sheffield & District

Acorn Brewery

Posted on 10 Nov 201414 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

Another busy year coming to an end, expansion plans for 2015 are on the drawing board, watch this space!!! We welcome a new addition to the Acorn family tree, Paul Hicks whose role as Sales Executive will see him mainly focusing on South and West Yorkshire.

Seasonal beers are; 12th Noel, originally brewed at 4.8% now weighing in at a mighty 5.9% Rich ruby coloured ale, roasted malts and English Bramling Cross hops combine to release rich berry fruit flavours. Cracker 4.1% is brewed with Maris Otter Pale Ale malt and Vienna Malt to create a pale straw coloured seasonal ale. Lemon and grapefruit dominate the hop aromas. Winter Pale Ale 4.5% (available Jan 15) pale golden ale brewed with English Fuggle and Goldings hops for a citrus and grapefruit aroma with a lasting bitterness.

Beer House 623

Posted on 10 Nov 201415 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

Following the granting of planning permission, work has been taking place to convert a former e-cigarette shop at 623 Ecclesall Road (near Hunters Bar roundabout) into a micropub, with a target opening date of 10th December. The bar will feature 6 real ales, a premium lager and a selection of bottled beers.

Sportsman, Cambridge Street

Posted on 10 Nov 201411 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

December will see the reopening of the Sportsman on Cambridge Street in Sheffield City Centre following a refurbishment under the new management of Kelham Island Brewery and the new name of Tap & Tankard. It will be Sheffield themed and showcase beers from local breweries – including of course Kelham Island – on it’s 8 handpumps. There will also be a simple food offer. Those who were a fan of the Sportsman in it’s rock bar guise needn’t be too upset – this has been moved pretty much lock and stock around the corner to the premises more recently known as Lion’s Lair which is to go back to the old days of the Yorkshireman rock pub!

Steel City Brewing

Posted on 10 Nov 201414 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

Steel City are back from yet another 3-month gap! Dave is his usual festive self, with Christmas is Cancelled being available by the time you read this. The name is inspired by the long-standing tradition of Xmas beers being not only brown and malty, but full of spices that have absolutely no place in beer. As the pumpclip states, ‘To hell with the forced cheer. Screw the once-a-year drinkers. But most of all, stuff your spiced beers up your…’ – if that’s not enough of a clue, CiC is a very pale, very bitter, very hoppy brew with 100+ IBU of Magnum followed by Centennial and Pacific Jade for flavour, topped off with Green Bullet in the fermenter. Remember, a hop is not just for Christmas…

In other news, Steel City have acquired a few 5-litre minikegs for home sales, and if a trial run is successful will be making these available more readily in the new year. Some readers may remember way back in March Dave and Shazz travelled to Hebden Bridge to brew with Dan at Bridestones. Well, ever since then the beer, a 6% Oatmeal Stout, has been maturing in 18-year-old Highland Park barrels. And now it’s been unleashed! On tapping the two barrels, Dan couldn’t believe just how different from each other they tasted! One then received a tree’s-worth of cherries, while the other received vanilla pods, before maturing a further month. Both will be available side-by-side at the Shakespeare autumn festival, as well as at Craft Beer Co in That London. Hopefully bottles will also be available. Truly, these beers are So Craft It Hurts…

Sheffield Brewery

Posted on 10 Nov 201414 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

Launch of The Last Friday of the Month Sheffield Brewery Beer Club – Grand Opening Event– 29^th November 2014

As we’ve done every year we are open again during the Kelham Island Museum Victorian Christmas Market weekend. Only this time, not only are we celebrating everything which is great about Christmas and the Kelham/Neepsend area, we’re also launching our very own membership only Sheffield Brewery Beer Club – it’s free to join. In support of Kelham Island Museum we are planning on opening our doors in the afternoon of the 29^th Nov from 2pm right through until 11.00pm. Email us your details (to sales@sheffieldbrewery.com) to become one of our first members. There’ll be an eclectic mix of music, beer, BBQ food and a great atmosphere for everyone so please email us your details so we can add you to our membership list. Check out our website for further details. The Last Friday Sheffield Brewery Beer Club will be open every last Friday of the month (except December/January). The idea is to build on our great reputation for offering excellent tasting beers plus a few guest ale appearances. We are based Albyn Works a Victorian industrial polish works where you can enjoy a beer in our authentic real ale bar in the middle of an actual brewery. You’ll see the mash tun, copper and fermenters – smell the hops and soak up the essence of a fully operating real ale brewery. Bus 53 passes the brewery

Belfry, Beighton

Posted on 7 Nov 20147 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

The Belfry is holding a Cask Ale Festival on 6th December of 3 local breweries – Abbeydale, Fuggle Bunny and Bradfield – the three of them are hosting their own stands of which the proceeds from the sale is going to the Charity ‘Safe at Last’. There is going to be a Live Band, etc it is going to be a great day/evening of drinking and entertainment.

Fuggle Bunny Brew House

Posted on 7 Nov 201414 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

Fuggling Fantastic News – And the Winner Is…….

Well, well, well….. The winner goes to Fuggle Bunny Brew House Limited for their latest creation Imperial Black Russian Stout – Chapter 7 – Russian Rare-Bit 5% – scooped First Place in the Stout category at the CAMRA Sheffield 40^th Ruby Anniversary Beer & Cider Festival at the Kelham Island Museum. We would just like to thank all the people that voted for this little cracker, we are really made up………I thank you. We are proud as punch to have received our very first award since opening in April of this year and hope it is the first of many. Best Steak and Ale Pie at the Brewery Tour We would also like to thank CAMRA who turned up for our first brewery tour, Pie & Pea supper. The evening was a great success and everyone enjoyed themselves, the consensus according to the feedback regarding our Handmade Steak & Ale pies, were the best they had ever tasted. No fuggling wonder as our local Butchers Bextons who made the pies for us used our award winning Stout to macerate the steak with. A further compliment for us is that Bextons were so impressed with the finished product that they have asked if we can supply our stout for them to use in their own produce – negotiations are in progress, now that’s what I call a result. 2015 on the Horizon More New and Exciting Chapters in the adventures of FUGGLE – keep hopping in and out of our web site for his latest antics. Hope it is another good year for all concerned in keeping Real Ale at the forefront of the Beer Industry and remember ‘there’s a beer for that’ – Good Luck

Ruby anniversary festival a terrifying success

Posted on 7 Nov 20147 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

The 40^th Steel City Beer and Cider festival which was held over the Halloween weekend was a roaring success with over 13,000 pints of beer and 1000 pints of cider supped by 4500 discerning drinkers. This far exceeded the 2700 that attended Ponds Forge last year and required 25% more beer and cider to be brought in at short notice to satisfy the thirsty drinkers. In fact the festival was such a success that the number of attendees on the Saturday evening had to be limited to ensure there was still been left until the end for those already inside. Even that didn’t work as the festival closed an hour early. This year saw a new venue with the festival moving to Kelham Island Museum at the heart of the Valley of Beer, the Beer Capital’s spiritual home of real ale. The new venue provided an atmospheric setting to celebrate Sheffield and District Branch’s Ruby Anniversary festival. Over 150 different beers from over 50 breweries were available over the weekend along with a range of international bottled beer and traditional cider and perry. Full use of the industrial nature of the venue was made with the beer being split over three bars including the museums own pub, The Millowners, brought to life for the weekend as a proper boozer. In addition the upper hall and a marquee by the river each provided their own unique atmosphere to suit all tastes. Fittingly for the new venue the festival was opened on the Wednesday evening by the Master Cutler, Mr David Grey MBE, with the festival charity this year being Master Cutlers Challenger whose nomination is the Brathay Trust who have a mission to improve the life chances of children and young people. Evening entertainment during the week was provided by the Amelia Carter Band, Soulfaces and Do$ch. Loxley Silver Band brought Saturday afternoon to life going down a storm. Mopping up the beer was a range of food including hog roast, cheese, black pudding, hotdogs (up to 20”), jacket potatoes, chocolate and crisps. Fancy dress Friday this year was brought to life by a horrific range of costumes to celebrate Halloween. A charity quiz was also held to challenge the little grey cells. The first night saw an exhaustive beer tasting of all the beers on sale by brewers, landlords, seasoned drinkers and other hangers on. The final panel saw Cocoa Wonderland from Thornbridge Brewery declared overall champion of the festival. This wonderful ruby, brown 6.8% porter that oozes chocolate from every quarter really deserves the title. Thanks go to all the sponsors who have kindly supported the beer festival and to Sheffield Industrial Museums Trust, whose staff worked tirelessly alongside us, without who the festival would not have been the success it was. Thanks must also go to the brewers, many local, who are producing an amazing array of good quality beer. Some went out of their way to ensure that we still had beer available for sale on the Saturday. Thanks also to the customers who almost drank the festival dry, we hope you return next year to a bigger festival with much more beer. Final thanks must go to the volunteers without whose tireless work putting in up to 16 hour days there would be no festival. Some have been busy over the last 12 months organising the festival to ensure it was an amazing success. A very special thanks go to the volunteers who turned up on the Sunday and Monday to help with take down. 2015, a bigger and better festival Following the success of this year’s festival thoughts now turn to how to make next year’s even better. Obviously more beer is required but that is only the start. The organising committee will be meeting soon to reflect on what went well and what went wrong and work out how to improve the festival next year. Like all CAMRA beer festival the organisation is completely carried out by volunteers and yes we sometimes get things wrong but the feedback from this year’s beer festival has been overwhelmingly positive. Next year we promise it will be better. However we always need more help. If you think you may have skills that could be useful, either working or managing a bar, social media, health and safety, site, marketing, selling sponsorship or even if you don’t think you have anything special to offer but want to help please get in touch at festival@sheffieldcamra.org.uk, all help is much appreciated however small. If you feel like you could promote your business through sponsoring the beer festival then also please get in touch. We hope to announce dates for the 41^st Steel City Beer and Cider festival early in the New Year, so get it in your diary early. Cheers, Rob Carroll Chairman of the 40^th Steel City Beer and Cider Festival Organising Committee Beer of the Festival Winners Overall Champion 1st Thornbridge Cocoa Wonderland 2nd Fernandes Half Nelson 3rd Rat Ratweiller

Toolmakers Brewery

Posted on 7 Nov 201414 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

After our very successful first open day we will be holding further ones on the 6^th and 13^th December. Everyone is welcome to come and sample our beers as well as some guest ales. We will not be having an open day in January but will be back on the 7^th February 2015. Our Christmas ales will be available during December, which are Christmas Box 4.2%, a good hoppy blonde full of flavour and Nutcracker 4.2% which is a smooth hoppy blonde with citrus undertones. On our next brew will be a wheat beer so watch this space. We were very pleased that our Black Edge stout at 5.2% won 3^rd place in the last Imperial Brewery beer festival. Remember all our beers can be tried at the Forest adjacent to the brewery on Rutland Road.

Stancill Brewery

Posted on 7 Nov 201414 Nov 2014 by Andy Cullen

The story so far… It has been a year since the great move of the Brewing Equipment from the now demolished Oakwell Brewery in Barnsley to the world famous Real Ale city of Sheffield. This was no easy task! Over 10 tonnes of kit was dismantled, transported and reassembled in just 4 weeks! It was a race against time, with the demolition company on site at Oakwell, and the clock ticking with the 2 week “Get Out” deadline. Anything that was left behind, or not removed in time was to be flattened! Our saving grace was Tim Gill our Managing Director’s father. He has been an engineer all his life, working at another great South Yorkshire institution TATA steel. Tim and a small team of engineers conducted the decommission, transportation and reassemble with faultless precision and speed. Towards the end of the dismantle, the team was forced to work in the dark, without power. The demolition team had cut the electricity supply to the site. Daily we had to fight off the scrap metal merchants coming onto the site attempting to take the copper piping that we use to help cool the fermentation vessels. Things became very heated indeed! Working all through the night for the deadline week, our fantastic team of South Yorkshire engineers freed the last pipes from the condemned site and we left. This was end of an era for Barnsley Bitter brewed in Oakwell, Barnsley since the 1850s. From the ashes of Oakwell, two young lads born and bred in Barnsley, with all the passion and heart of their fellow townsfolk have brought back the Brew after just a 9 months absence from the market. With a hiss and a jeer from many a nay-sayer, we battled through and got our first firkin of Barnsley Bitter, brewed in Sheffield to the Market in February 2014. Two months later, it was crowned the Champion Bitter of Yorkshire 2014. So why did we do it? The same Brewery, the same brewer, the same yeast, the same recipe, but better water. More than that: if you believe you have a top quality brewer, producing the best beer in the country, with the best water in the country and the best ingredients in the country, why wouldn’t you want that real ale to be produced in the most famous real ale city in the world! Stancill Barnsley Bitter. Ingredients: two hearts forged in Barnsley. Made In: the most famous real ale city in the world. Champion Bitter of Yorkshire 2014. From all at Stancill Brewery, a massive thank you to every last one of you who have supported us either with your kind words, messages or just by buying a pint of Stancill. We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a very Happy 2015 – it’s going to be a big one!