Cheers! Beer drinking it'll never catch on you know

In the spirit of punk when Pete Brown couldn't get on the tv to tell us all that drinking beer is a good idea  he and some mates went out and made their own. Have a look it's not too bad for their first go.


Pete Brown's British Beer Blog from Ian Hudson Films on Vimeo.

Not making a Pigs Ear of it!

Hackney Beer festival
Well that was fun: on Friday we wandered along to Hackney mare St for the “Pigs Ear beer festival” all part of the celebrations of PB’s beer writer of the year award. The Pigs Ear bit is rhyming slang for erm beer (yeah me neither). It was being held at the Ocean (I’ve not been there since it first opened and we went to see Godspeed You Black Emperor) and it looks a bit tired and knackered after only a few years.  Oh and don't let the \m/  sub Motorhead Logo put you off it's not that way at all.


I am always slightly wary about beer festivals mainly because they are organised by Camra a worthy organisation in many ways but they do rate pubs mainly on the beer they sell which isn’t my main deciding factor by a long chalk. Also as our friend JP pointed out the festival bit tends to get a bit lost often. My other main gripe about Beer festivals is the lack of seats, I’ve always hated drinking standing up. Thankfully we got a seat fairly quickly and a near perfect time was had by all.

Amongst the many good things were as follows: my jolly & funny friends, PB and JP wandering off and coming back with excellent beers and the friendly atmosphere. Curiously because we were sat near the “foreign”* beer bar we had a lot of lagers etc from German, Danish which were all in good condition and nicely chilled. Fraid I can’t remember their names I’m not that bothered about that sort of thing also many of them you are unlikely to see again in a hurry. We did have some nice British stouts and milds too. The odd thing about beer festivals is that unless you really want to its quite easy not to drink too much if like us you stick to tasty halves.

Another good thing was the mix of people there, they weren’t a complete mix of Hackney types but it was one of the more diverse beer festivals I’ve been to. There was an inclusive mix of young and old, black and Asian people etc and most surprisingly lots of women of all kinds! The air was filled with the hubbub of people chatting and laughing and apart from the odd ticker** most were probably talking about their works Xmas do, X-factor you know anything but beer. Anyway if you in the area next year at this time I would wander along to Pig ear it’s a very jolly and tasty night out.

* Camra attitude towards lager is a bit tedious and technical and lost on the lay person they claim to want to attract. They are not keen on fizzy beers basically and can’t see the difference between a fine Bavarian craft lager and Hoffmeister.

**”Tickers” are beer obsessive similar to train spotters and twitchers who have lists of beer they taste and tick off, there is general feeling that their hobby may get in the way of them just enjoying you know drinking beer!

Fantastic Breaking News:

Pete Brown Beer Writer of Year

Top news just winged it's way via twitter the writer formerly know as Britain's Leading Beer Writer is now officially the Best Beer writer in Britain (which Belgium Czech and Germany aside ) is really in the world! He won the Guild of beer writers award , To say it;s well deserved is on understatement!
Anyway Pete bloody well done.
Oh and if you want to know what the fuss is about you can buy one of his books.
a Man walks in to a Pub (history of British pubs)
or 3 sheets to the wind (exotic booze) and his magnum opus (so far) Hops and Glory the lunatic tale of taking a barrel of beer to India by sea.
Oh and here's his beer blog.