Well the York Beer & Cider Festival is well and truly in session. We had a great time judging the best beer of the festival before the trade session started on Wednesday. It’s tougher than you think to taste so many beers with a clean pallet each time, which is why I think the stouts did better in the scores. It was also great to put a few faces to the names of York’s infamous twitterers, hopefully we’ll see a few more of you back at the festival when we return for a good session on Friday.
For your information to maybe help you choose out of the 350+ beers here are the winning beers in each catagory and the overall LocAle winners as judged by us and the specialist panel:
- Knaresborough American Style Milk Stout
- Brass Castle Burnout
- Rudgate York Chocolate Stout
- Standard Bitters: Hop Studio White Rose
- Best Bitters: Collingham Artisan’s Choice
- Premium Bitters: Kirkstall Dissolution IPA
- Porters & Stouts: Brass Castle Burnout
- Strong Beers: Knaresborough American Style Milk Stout
- Speciality Beers: Rudgate York Chocolate Stout
York CAMRA Beer & Cider Festival is running from Wed 18th to Sat 22nd on the Knavesmire (Racecourse) off Tadcaster Road, I fully recommend you get down and sample some of the superb real ales on offer from our region!
York Beer & Cider Festival 2012
Unless you’ve been living under a rock sat on by an obese toad you should know that the 4th Knavesmire CAMRA Beer & Cider Festival is starting on Wednesday right through till Saturday 22nd. Myself and Mark, who do most of the reviews for Within the Walls, are very proud to have been asked to be on the judging panel to decide on the best LocAle. From looking at the beer list I’m wondering just how many we’ll need to taste, especially seen as I have to work on Thursday, lol. Either way when you’re down the Festival look out for the winning LocAle as judged by us! Sure it’ll be all over twitter too. LocAle by the way referes to any locally brewed beer within about 25miles of York I do believe.
Check out their website to view the newly released beer list, well over 300 beers and 100 ciders, too many to mention here. http://www.yorkbeerfestival.org.uk/2012/
York Beer Census 2012 - The Stats
Check out CAMRA York’s website for all the statistics from the York Beer Census 2012, if you’re into that kind of thing! I found it rather interesting anyway.
The York Beer Census Prologue
Well tomorrow is the first great York Beer Census and me and the Within the Walls crew are down to cover all the pubs in Goodramgate. For those that don’t know that’s The Old White Swan, The Snickleway Inn, The Habit, Vahe Bar, The Cross Keys, The Golden Slipper and The Royal Oak. Bit of a mission that’s become slightly more of a mission when I found out they want the forms back to The Waggon & Horses by 8:30pm, eeek! But it’s nothing us hardened pub reviewers can’t handle!
Well we’re meeting for some food at The Cross Keys first at 4pm, so all being well have about 30mins(ish) to cover each one. Don’t worry people of CAMRA, if we start to run out of time we’ll split up or (god forbid) not have a drink in one of the pubs…. well maybe only a half… Could I just suggest to give us till closing time next time, lot of our lot work Saturdays, lol.
Anyway, I’m really looking forward to it, should be a grand day out and although we’ve reviewed every pub in Goodramgate bar The Habit, the fact that we’ll have got the forms in before closing means we might be able to hit a few unreviewed pubs and get them sorted for Within the Walls! Quite liking that my 1.5yr old will be out for a bit with us too, until my other half takes her home, don’t worry she’s not staying out boozing. Seren will give her toddler scores on family friendlyness of each pub and whether they have blackcurrent fruitshoots will be added to the cenus forms!
So good luck to everyone involved and well done for Gav, Lucy and all the others that have been sorting it out preliminary, hard work fuelled by beer is always a good thing! See you tomorrow!
Sign up for the York Beer Census Now!
Well hopefully the Within the Walls Crew will be looking after Goodramgate for this as we’re already signed up, but with well over 100 pubs to survey CAMRA need your support, a perfectly good reason for a pub crawl in your beautiful City! Details from CAMRA follow….
York is one of the best real ale cities in the country. We have so many wonderful pubs, selling a wide range of beers, most within easy walk around our historic city centre. In this celebration year of York 800 we at York CAMRA want to spotlight our city pubs and celebrate the fantastic work of the publicans and local brewers who bring us great beer each week.
So on 30th June, members of York CAMRA in conjunction with Pints of View writer, Gavin Aitchison will be organising an army of volunteers to perform the York Beer Census to survey the beers and ciders in all the pubs of York. As you an imagine, this is no easy task so we need your help!
If you would like to be involved then please complete the form below. Tell us what area(s) of the city and/or pubs in the city centre you would like to survey, or if you are happy for us to allocate some for you. We’ll provide survey forms and confirm the pubs to survey. Then, on the day, you need to visit the pubs, have a beer (or not, its up to you!), write down the beers and ciders they have on sale and bring the results to the Waggon & Horses. We’ll be there all day from midday, so you can do your surveys and bring your results at any time during the day of Saturday 30 June. We’ve got refreshments for all who take part and the chance to win some quite nice prizes!
If you want any more info then please email us at beercensus@yorkcamra.org.uk
