All that glisters isn't gold, but Sunburst Bohemian Pilsner wins gold!

 

We're thrilled to bits as our beautiful Sunburst Bohemian Pilsner has struck gold at the SIBA North Craft Keg Competition 2014 in Nottingham.

A great testament to a wonderful beer.

Cheers & Na Zdravi!

Ken

Sunburst Bohemian Pilsner in bottle bursts on to the craft beer scene with elegance, panache and and a gloriously Bohemian taste!

I'm very excited today as we're launching our new range of beers today - the Inspiration Series. It's a brand new series of beers which have been inspired by the great beer styles of the world. There are some amazing classic beers out there in the wonderful world of beer and we thought it was about time we made our mark on this field. We asked everyone in the brewery to get together and make up a Beer Development Team to think about some new beers for us to brew and they came up with the Inspiration Series, a numbered list of deliciously diverse and exciting beers. We've got 4 in the pipeline, or grist-case I should say, at the moment, and Inspiration Series No.1 is Sunburst Bohemian Pilsner. You can see we've got a brand new designed look and those of you with excellent 3D vision can tell it's a 330ml long-necked bottle. 

As you know Sunburst on draught has been developing over the last 15 years from a cask-conditioned version originally to a filtered version in keg more recently. I've always wanted to get it into bottles but we just didn't have the maturation or lagering tank capacity. It takes 8 weeks icy cold maturation after its 10 day cool bottom fermentation to develop its exquisite and complex Saaz and Hallertau Hersbrucker hoppy aroma, its smooth malty palate and its soft lingering finish. This fermentation and lagering regime is only possible with our beautiful Czech lager yeast, which I get from my good friends at the Brevnovsky Brewery in Prague. One of my long-term plans has been to get more tank space and get a dedicated maturation cellar, which we now have and at last we can put Sunburst into bottle! Slava, Slava! Hooray, Hooray in Czech!

A happy brewer in his new maturation cellar

It's No.1 in the Inspiration Series because I've been inspired so much by my Beer and Brewery Hunting visits in the Czech Lands to brew this beer. I've had a very long association with Bohemia and the Czech Lands, first learning some Czech in 1968, year of the Prague Spring, so I could sing in the boy's chorus on the stage of my mother's opera company in Smetana's Bartered Bride. Years later I started to visit the country more often and since, as they say in Czech, Hospoda je nejlepsi ucitelka - the pub is the best teacher, my language skills improved along with my appreciation of their wonderful brewing traditions, sowing the seed for my desire to brew my version of the wonderful Pilsner style. Exacting to brew as it's such a delicate, yet exhilarating taste, with no margin for error, but oh, so exquisite to enjoy.
I hope you all enjoy as much as I do. Diky moc a Na Zdravi! Thank you very much and Slàinte, Ken

Three Cheers for today 1st March is Iceland's 25th Anniversary of Beer Day - Skál!

Today, the First Day of March, that amazing country of Ice and Fire, Volcanoes and Tectonic Plate-shifting, Iceland, celebrates that most exciting of days for a brewer and beer lover - Beer Day!

The Icelandic Flag at þingvellir, the site of the first Icelandic Parliament

Today is the 25th Annual Beer Day as beer was illegal in Iceland from 1915 right up to 1 March 1989, after the people felt it was time to embrace the joys of beer. And quite right too! Now it's proper and respectable to have a view like this in your cellar:

50 litre kegs in Reykjavik pub cellar

 I was lucky enough to have a short visit to this incredible island in May last year (corresponding blog to follow when I find the photos). Favourite bar/cafes were Cafe Babalu, Laundromat Cafe, Ölstofa Kormáks Og Skjaldar. Best eating by far was down at the docks in the Sea Baron. They are brewing some delicious beer of all types - from the palest of pilsners to the most imperial of stouts, with everything in between. Get over there if you can - you'll not be disappointed by the welcoming and friendly Icelanders, the out of this world volcanic scenery and the beautiful beer. 

Fagnið pivni daginn í dag! Celebrate Icelandic Beer Day today!

Skál & Slàinte, 

Ken

Snowdrops and sunlight

Cycling home from the brewery this afternoon, I watched a flight of oystercatchers head for their roost, for the first time in months in sunlight, as the days are drawing out with the Winter Solstice well behind us and Spring on its way. I was heading under the old bridge over the River Almond (as in Inveralmond) a couple of hundred yards from the brewery, when I suddenly saw beside me a host of ivory snowdrops which had flourished and blossomed this week.

I had to stop and take a picture as for me snowdrops represent the beginning of Spring, along with that most marvellous of birds (in my humble opinion), the Oystercatcher. These two Signifiers of Spring return to the banks of the Almond during the same week every year and it's a great filip to the soul hard-pressed by the extremes of Winter, bringing their lightness and brightness to the riverbank and meadow. The Snowdrop (Galanthus nivalis) comes through the soil by the river, where its bulb has been more often  than not (and weeks at a time!) deep under the winter rainwater and snowmelt, breaking out with bright alabaster white and vivid green on a background of washed out withered grass and heath.

The charming Oystercatcher (Haemotopus ostralegus), immacutely turned out in his exceedingly smart black and white plumage, brings his own colour to the drabness of the scene with his bright orange-rimmed red eyes, orange legs and beak. The high-pitched shrill cheep-cheep sounds out its cheeriness as the bird wings swiftly through the air looking for its mate, with whom it mates for life. We have two pairs who nest at the brewery every year - one pair at the front and the other at the back.

Spring is also the time for us in the brewery to get on with brewing this year's beers - our regular Duncan's IPA, a blond bitter beer tipping its head to the IPAs of the past, and our newly-vamped Tighthead Ale brewed specially for the 6 Nations Rugby tournament - scrum-ptious! As well as these two, brewed just today, our own brand-new offering to the Wetherspoon's Spring Beer Festival - Marzenfest - a malty deep golden ale with luscious, biscuity malty notes on the palate from the toasted Munich malt and hints of springtime buds and trees flushing with their newly unfurled leaves from the sweet Brewer' Gold hops on the nose. Prosit!

Just makes me want to have a beer right now writing about it, so I'll pour myself a glass of Homecoming...why don't you do the same? 

Cheers, Slàinte and welcome to Spring!

Ken 

Happy New Year to one and all this Year of Homecoming Scotland 2014!

Every New Year brings its own special joy and reflections on the previous twelve months and this one is no different. 2013 was a very interesting year for the brewery with three new people joining and new beers created and enjoyed, not to mention more fermenters, conditioning tanks, keg filler and cask cleaner together with solar panels on the roof (ok, where else?) and a new liquid CO2 bulk tank system. So I celebrated Hogmanay with some Santa's Swallie and some fine Scottish Tablet.

On top of all of this we brewed some fabulous beer and tried our best to improve the human condition through the medium of beer! I think we've succeeded and we'll strive to continue with this approach over the next twelvemonth.

2014 is the year of Homecoming Scotland and I'm proud to have brewed a delicious eponymous beer to celebrate this:

Here's a shot of Dave the Tanker Driver with me filling up Tanker T32 with the first batch of Homecoming Scotland 2014 beer which has now been packed into stylish and contemporary 330ml longneck bottles. Great for every occasion!

Jamey Bowers, the current Miss Scotland, gladly pouring the first glass of Homecoming Scotland 2014 beer 

Anyway back to wishing you all a super and fulfilling New Year. May it be prosperous and happy and accompanied by great-tasting beer!

Bliadhna Math Ur! Happy new Year!

Slainte,

Ken