The polls have now closed! Thanks to everyone who voted, and stand by for the results! The third annual Irish Craft Brewer Beer of the Year awards will be announced in April. In 2009, for the first time, we are opening the selection process to all members of ICB and every beer brewed and available […]
The world is a very small and lonely place when there’s just you, the pub table, five small glasses of beer and a blank piece of paper. Those flavour characteristics you were sure would stand out a mile in each beer have inexplicably fled, and your confidence and bravado have gone with them. You’ve had […]
Craft brewing was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of company assets showed industrial machinery and chemical apparatus far beyond what any craft brewery would reasonably possess. Groogan compiled it and Groogan’s name was known and respected wherever large scale brewers met and discussed their trade. Groogan knew […]
There are probably dozens of guides out there on the World Wide Web describing various ways to build a mash tun out of a cooler box and copper pipe. This is another one, but with as simple a combination of fittings as possible to build a cost effective mash tun as good as, if not […]
The Cantillon brewery stands in one of the less salubrious parts of the city of Brussels. I approached it from the city centre along run-down streets and through a pretty ethnically diverse part of the city. It sits opposite a disused lot where I guess once stood warehouses or apartments but now is home […]
Every brewer knows that the quality of the water used in the production of beer is of paramount importance. Water can provide direct flavour effects and also indirect effects upon mash, wort boiling and fermentation. The water we use for brewing is a mix of various inorganic ions which stem from the environment the water […]
Having read a couple of nightmare accounts of the Great British Beer Festival I hadn’t been planning on going any time soon. CAMRA’s headline event is held in the vast Earl’s Court exhibition hall and the sessions closer to the weekend are famous for being packed full of sweaty-beardy-farty Real Ale aficionados mixed with loud […]
When I spend the extra few quid on liquid yeast I like to think I get a little more for my money and hope that I coax the best from the yeast during the propagation stage. There is much debate about the merits of various forms of yeast and what they bring to a beer, […]
Thursday 10th July saw the third Irish Craft Brewer homebrew tasting event in the Bull & Castle Beerhall, Dublin. A record number of brewers — almost twenty — brought a variety of beers (and two ciders) to the party, which called for a more free-form format than previous tastings. With the admission that not everyone […]
A solid rolling boil is essential in the brewing of good beer. It is energy intensive and potentially dangerous but a brewer skimps on boil time or intensity at his/her own peril. The boil must be vigorous and rapid, generally not longer than an hour. The intensity of the boil can be judged by the […]
