Category: UK

For those who haven’t had the excitement of reading about day one at Beer Con, do that first. I started off with visiting Lucy and the CAMRA stand upstairs at the event, filling in a survey about beer festivals which gave me the chance to spin the wheel to get a prize. I won a glass. As Roy and I, being the glasses & tokens ‘management’ team from Norwich Beer Festival, were both there we didn’t think that was very exciting so Lucy kindly let me have a cellarmanship book which Ivan had written.

I was volunteering on the first and third day of Beer Con, but they gave me multiple free tickets and lots of beer for the second day where I attended as a visitor in the evening. There was always a positive and inviting atmosphere at the event, being busy but never overly crowded.

Back downstairs, Julian was at the priority seating. This was not so much the decadent private seating for VIPs that Richard would book, but for those who needed a little sit down. Whilst I’m commenting on this photo, I have to note that’s one of the best beers of the festival, the BA Brownie Empress Tonkoko from Brew York, a sweet, punchy, chocolately and decadent little number.

Whilst I’m here I should mention the very delicious Tropical Sundae from Yonder which had a decent mouthfeel, was creamy and fruity. Oh, and the Sticky Toffee Puddin’ which was sweet with a nice toffee flavour, verging on decadent.

And, the best beer of the festival for me was the BA Interceptor Fiji Rum from Emperor’s Brewery. This was smooth, chocolatey, maple flavoured and not too boozy for its 14.3% ABV. The brewery is from Leicestershire and the only other beer I’ve had from them in the past is Too Much Moon Pie, a smooth and decadent stout, which I had the Artichoke last year. But, I will look out for them in the future.

I gave Gordon one of my tickets as I’m friendly like that. Ivan was floating about for a while as well, but he had a Friday Five event to go and manage, something which I will actually go on at some point in the near future;

Julian looking excited to see my selection of Beyond the Firmament from Electric Bear Brewing, which was hazy, hoppy, slightly dank and rather decent. And that’s the exceptional Roy as well. Jen went off dancing, which we all thought was far too vibrant and animated for us so we ignored it and pretended that we didn’t know about it.

And also a delight to see Ben and Chris from Pastore and they had two delicious sours, the Roulade – Blueberry Lemon and the Doom II. The former was my favourite, gently tart and lots of lemon, but the Doom II was also very agreeable, tart, fruity and certainly wild…

After a very enjoyable evening at Beer Con I thought it might be sensible to go home at a sensible time, but then I got muddled up again and went to the White Lion. After a quick bit of interfering with their team’s bar billiards arrangements, it felt only polite to meander to the Artichoke as well.

After the excitement of Warsaw Beer Festival, I thought I’d do something different for a change and so I went to help at Beer Con in Norwich. I accept that it’s quite similar, but it’s a different country so that’s enough variety. Lucy from Norwich CAMRA had recommended a few talented volunteers from the beer festival to help out, as well as me although I come with just slightly less talent. But inclusion is important.

The event, organised by Boom Towers, was held at St. Mary’s Works in Norwich which was formerly a shoe factory operated by Sexton, Son & Everard.

More on the volunteering arrangement on my third day post (yes, it is going to be that exciting I’m stretching this to three posts, so that’s both blog readers already besides themselves with excitement), but just to note now that Bailey and Leanne offered a very friendly welcome and were supportive, visible and positive for the whole event. I’d add that the other Boom Towers staff were also friendly, but I’ve forgotten their names and two is enough to mention otherwise it looks less sincere anyway.

The keg wall.

The cask and cider bar where I was located for the trade session.

The cask selection. There was a really decent selection of over thirty cask beers between this and another bar at the event, covering a range of beer styles. I won’t meander on with stories of individual beers from this section, but it would be wrong not to mention Chubbles from Cloudwater and the All Calls Diverted to Answer Phone from Pomona Island. Always a delight to see beers from Deya, Verdant, Burnt Mill and Ampersand to name just a few. If anyone wants more details, they can pop to https://untappd.com/user/julwhite and unpick things from there.

I thought that this looked like my friend Richard’s parking, but I didn’t message him anything as I don’t like to cause offence.

Bar snacks for when I had a little rest. I was, by chance, put on the cask beer bar in the morning with Terri, one of the Artichoke Hearts bar billiards team, so that was a bonus. Always good to get (well, share) some gossip and the above average Jen was around to assist with that further.

In the evening I moved to the wine selection. I was able to show off my knowledge of white, red and rose wine to an impressed audience. Although that is the limit of my knowledge, that there are three types of wine and an orange one. Being able to enthuse about the four primary colours of the vineyard is probably as far as I’m ever going to go, despite attending countless wine tastings where its discovered I only really like dessert wine or barley wine (which isn’t a wine).

Ivan proved very useful with a little incident, so he was very much in my good books all evening. Ivan is a cellar expert with no qualifications but an ability to do things in the cellar, whereas I’m a cellar expert with qualifications and little ability to do much in the cellar of use. Well, I can rearrange casks and keg in order before they go on, but that’s of limited use to a cellarman (or cellarwoman).

Actually, there’s probably a debate to be about the contrast between a qualified expert with no ability and an unqualified expert with all the ability as I sometimes wonder whether that’s the very foundation upon which the British hospitality industry is built.

And a reward for my efforts. The pork pie was delicious but I picked the jelly out. I ignore those who say that it’s the best bit as it evidently isn’t.

I was going to go home after my busy day, but then I got muddled up and walked to the White Lion. I thought that was a nice treat for landlord Oscar though and he recommended this little number from Ampersand, which I was prepared to try as I’m good like that. And with that, I got muddled up again and went to the Artichoke which was a nice treat for landlord Julian (wiser one).

This line in a newspaper article in the Norwich Mercury 200 years ago this week doesn’t really suggest the significance of this marriage.

Joseph Pease (1799-1892) was a railway pioneer and one of the supporters of the Stockport and Darlington Railway Company. He also later became the first Quaker MP and was one of the advocates for increased animal rights. He was also the son of Edward Pease, who is known as the ‘Father of the Railways’ which seems a nice title to have.

Emma Gurney (1800-1860) was the youngest daughter of Joseph Gurney, a banker from the Gurney family whose operations were subsumed into Barclays Bank later in the nineteenth century.

This is a statue commemorating Joseph Pease, a photo I took in Darlington in 2022 where I managed to explore a fair amount of railway history.

This was a proper political power couple, their families bringing together wealth, railway experience and connections. The marriage would have taken place at the Friends Meeting House on Upper Goat Lane in the city. The current building was opened in 1826, on the site of the former meeting house, so I’m assuming that this might have been one of the first marriages there. Although this assumes that the Norwich Mercury was right, as some other sources are saying that they married in Darlington, which adds confusion to the mix.