The Great British Beer Festival opens its doors in three weeks' time at Earls Court in London.
Adrian Tierney-Jones previews the event and examines the progress of premium cask ale
Last year more than 65,000 drinkers visited the Great British Beer Festival, the flagship ale celebration of the Campaign for Real Ale (Camra). This year even more are expected to make the trek to West London, where hundreds of different cask beers from across the nation will be on sale, along with a selection of foreign beers and ciders and perries.
This is cask beer's big moment, where both small and large brewers show off their products to the consumer; it's also a positive statement on the state of the ale family, something that in these troubled times is needed more than ever.
"The festival continues to be the main celebration of cask ale in the UK," enthuses Justin Way, Marston's on-trade category manager. "It also provides a focal point for the industry to introduce and test new initiatives that seek to drive the category forward."
Innovation is what Suffolk brewers Greene King will be bringing to the festival with their new golden ale, St Edmunds. This has already been piloted at pubs throughout the country, but attendees at Earls Court will be able to sample the much-acclaimed beer for themselves.
"St Edmunds is brewed to be served cooler than traditional cask ales," says Justin Adams, Greene King's managing director, "delivering the refreshment factor of colder drinks while retaining all the depth of character, taste and aroma you would expect from a real beer. It also features a unique on-bar beer engine, which enables drinkers to choose how their pint is served — in 'northern' or 'southern' style." Northern has a creamy head and southern has no head.
Education is also part of the event: tutored tastings are organised with the likes of the MA's Roger Protz and bottle-conditioned beer guru Jeff Evans. Meanwhile, the Society of Independent Brewers (Siba) returns with a bar dedicated to the winners of their regional beer competitions.
"At our stand we think we will
have the best selection of beers
from Siba members," says chairman Peter Amor.
Brewers such as St Austell, Fuller's and Woodforde's have their own stands as well.
The Bières Sans Frontières bar will feature such delights as Budvar's Yeast Beer and many an American microbrew. The whole event is very much heaven for the beer-lover. It should also be essential for the licensee looking to discover more about cask beer, which is in the throes of a modest growth.
This is when Tuesday's trade day comes into its own, where licensees are encouraged to turn up alongside members of the industry and journalists. This is a great networking occasion and a chance to find out more on cask ale from the people who make it.
It's the opening session of the event and the time when the Champion Beer of Great Britain is announced (though given the cavernous state of Earls Court, most of those present will find out by looking at the printed sheets posted at the information stall).
"If you are serious about stocking cask ale then this is a great opportunity to try as many beers as possible," says Paul Nunny, Cask Marque's chief executive.
"It's important that licensees stock a range of gravities and styles, and attending on this day is part of a learning process."
Time has moved on for the festival since its birth 31 years ago. True, some sessions feature the kind of real-ale drinkers that newspapers like to take photos of to run with witty captions, but go to a Friday-night session and it's humming and jumping with the sort of young consumers that brewers all over the country are desperate to attract. Camra's partnership with other industry initiatives such as Cask Marque, Cyclops, Cask Ale Week and the Intelligent Choice project has also shown that the organisation is happy to move beyond its traditional hinterland. There's a buzz about the event that didn't always occur a few years ago.
Invariably there have been criticisms. Fuller's managing director John Roberts believes that real-ale festivals are a "good thing, and can show off the wonderful variety of cask beers", but press him on specifics and he admits he has had issues in the past. "I would say that some of the quality and temperature of the beers is different to how brewers would specify it be served," he says.
"For instance, for the first couple of years they would not chill our
Discovery down to 8°C, which is
how we specify it. However, after a lot of negotiation with them it was pushed through and that is how it is served now."
On the other hand, there is a wealth of great beers to try and the third-pint glasses allow more sampling and also look very elegant. "The festival is a unique event,' says Mike Benner, Camra's chief executive, "it is the biggest real-beer festival in the world and it gives visitors the opportunity to try beers they wouldn't usually be able to find in pubs local to them.
"It is a real celebration of British beer. It's not the only thing to
promote the sector, obviously, but
it is the flagship event for the
real-beer sector and I think it does a fine job in promoting it to all those who come."