Winter 2014 Issue 24 |www.soxoncamra.org.uk

Your FREE guide to real ale and pubs in South Oxfordshire

Tutts Clump – the award-winning local cider maker

SOX out drinking in London, againSOX members sampling beer in Belgium, againChristmas drinks down the agesLocal and national news

Also Inside:

Published every threemonths by the SouthOxfordshire branch ofthe Campaign for RealAle © CAMRA 2014SoxonAle is producedand distributed by

members of the branch in their own time. Views expressed in SoxonAle are not necessarily those of the editor, publisher orof CAMRA.

Edited by:Paul DixonEmail: contact@soxoncamra.org.uk.

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Got a short pint? If you believe that you have been treated unfairly in a pub, club or bar, you should contact the Trading Standards service by writing to them at Oxfordshire Trading Standards, Graham Hill House, Electric Avenue, Ferry Hinksey Rd, Oxford OX2 0BYor call them on 0845 051 0845.

A wide range of consumer information andadvice is also available online from the Consumer Direct website at www.consumerdirect.gov.uk

LOCAL NEWS

Running a pub is hardwork and it’s not gettingany easier; as a result, licensees tend to moveon more quickly thanthey used to. So it’s greatto see a team like Curlyand Jean Chandler recently celebrating 20

successful years running the Rainbow at Middle Assendon.Curly originally worked selling agricultural machinery, but heswapped that for the licensed trade when he and Jean tookover the (long-since closed) Coach and Horses at BinfieldHeath which they ran for five years before moving into theRainbow. They’ve now completed a quarter of a century asBrakspear tenants. Only a few weeks ago the Rainbow wonBrakspear’s pub garden of the year award so it gave the SOXBranch great pleasure to present them with a CAMRA certificate to mark their 20-year achievement. www.rainbowinnhenley.co.uk

Four times a year the SOXBranch makes a Pub of the Sea-son award. This is often, thoughnot exclusively, to recognise licensees who have been makingan effort to improve pubs thatpreviously may have been under-performing a bit. The 2014 Autumn Pub of the Season wentto the Reformation, Gallowstree Common. The award wasmade on 24th October at the party to celebrate the first yearanniversary at the pub for Samantha Murray and RichardGrant. Sam and Rich had previously run the Crown at Nuffieldfor a few months. This was not easy for them: the pub hadbeen in decline for some years and Brakspear would only givethem very short leases. After a few months Brakspear calledtime on the Crown, but was sufficiently impressed with Samand Rich to offer them a proper tenancy at the Reformation.Both have worked around pubs for some time. Rich is an experienced chef and grew up in a pub environment (his parents used to run the Red Lion, Rotherfield Peppard) and

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CAMRA, the Campaign forReal Ale is an independent,voluntary organisation campaigning for real ale,community pubs and consumer rights.

Sam had worked in the Crown since she was a 13-year old. The Reformation is now a livelythriving pub, as evidenced by the enthusiastic crowd who turned out on 24th. A pub spe-ciality is tractor-runs which feature through the summer. http://www.therefpub.

The visit to the Reformation was a good chance for the SOXBranch to meet with some of the Woodcote Rally committeeagain. The Branch provides the beer tent at the Rally every year,and a large chunk of the surplus takings goes to the Rally’s char-ities. (The remainder goes into CAMRA’s campaigning funds.)The photo shows our Festival Treasurer, Derek Graham (left),handing a cheque to Rally stalwart Peter Solomons. The WoodcoteRally will run again in 2015, and SOX will be supplying the usual

range of excellent ales. A note for the diary: the 52nd Woodcote Rally will be held over theweekend 11th and 12th July 2015.

On a sadder note, the demise of the Sprat, Didcot, looms ever closer. South OxfordshireDistrict Council (SODC) has approved a planning application from Wantage-based buildingcompany BJP to demolish the pub and build six single-storey homes. As we’ve remarkedpreviously, the Sprat has seen little investment for years and became badly run-down.

The Four Horseshoes, Checkendon, has also gone for good; though not in quite such anemphatic style. SODC has approved a planning application from Brakspear for change ofuse to a combined cafe and post office.

The Henley Brew House has featured several times on these pages in the past. It wasopened in November 2012 in what used to be the police station and served some rathergood ale from the in-house micro-brewery as well as a number of guest beers. As a conse-quence it was entered into this year’s Good Beer Guide. The owners, the City Pub Company,recently sold it to Brakspear. Unfortunately, the brewery does not feature in Brakspear’splans and at the time of writing it is being removed.

In the previous edition of SoxonAle we gave a detailed account of the long-running saga ofattempts by the current owner of the White Lion, Cray’s Pond, to get planning permissionto change it to a house. At the time of going to press we await the outcome of his appeal toSODC. Both the original planning application and the appeal have been vigorously opposedby local residents, and we remain hopeful that the appeal will be turned down too.

Last year, Brakspear sold the Sun, Whitchurch Hill, to businessman Richard Hazell but hungon to the adjacent plot of land. Brakspear then submitted a planning application to SODCto build a five- bedroom detached house on it. The locals objected on the grounds that thearea is regularly used for community events. SODC turned down the application on thegrounds that it would spoil the rural feel of the area and the company’s appeal was rejectedon the same grounds. The locals plan to approach Brakspear with a view to restoring thegarden to its original use.

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Local News - continued

A recent report in the Didcot Herald claimed that SODC has approached Green King with theintention of buying and then demolishing the Prince of Wales, Didcot, in order to make wayfor planned development of the land opposite the railway station. Greene King denies that thishas happened and says it has no plans to sell what is undeniably a popular and thriving pub.

Hook Norton brewery is restoring its Grade II-listed chimney aspart of a £200,000 project to make the brewery and museum avail-able for brewery tours. This has been part-funded to the tune of£90,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The building has twochimneys which were made redundant in the 1970s when an oil-fired boiler was installed. MD James Clarke said: “The brewerycomplex is one of the finest examples in the country of a Victoriantower brewery still being used for its original purpose. The towerhas a high-cost maintenance. It hadn’t been used and was becomingunstable.”

The SOX Branch holds a meeting on the first Wednesday of each month and a social eveningon the third Thursday. We vary the venues to cover as much of the Branch’s (quite extensive)territory. For news and events take a look at the Branch website:www.soxoncamra.org.uk. Alternatively email us at contact@soxoncamra.org.uk.

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Local News - continued

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NATIONAL NEWS

Cask Report – the popularity of real ale continues to climb Cask Report is an annual review of the UK’s beer market that is supported by Cask Marque,CAMRA, SIBA and real ale producers. The 2014 edition was released a few weeks ago, and someof the key points are:

•Sales of cask beer, the number of people who drink it, breweries which make it and festivalsthat celebrate it - are all increasing.

• Cask ale, in volume growth, is outperforming the on-trade beer market by 4.5%

• We are drinking 634 million pints of it every year, with one in six pints of beer served in pubsnow being real ale.

The report notes that while people may be going to the pub less often, when they do go they’relooking for something different and better than discounted supermarket lager brands. In mostparts of the country and most places where beer is sold, the outdated image of the real aledrinker is steadily fading. In particular, women and younger drinkers continue to convert to caskbeer. Keg sales are declining sharply, whereas more than 60% of beer sold in pubs is now cask.

The research does not try to define “craft beer”, but does say its most meaningful characteristicsare not related to format, style or origin – it’s more about beer brewed by small brewers orbeer brewed in small batches. The report says that some pubs are failing to take full advantageof the public’s increasing understanding of real ale as a crafted product. But it also warns that ifpublicans want to continue to grow sales they must train their staff so they know how to lookafter beer and can talk knowledgably about it.

Steady growth for new breweriesThe 2015 Good Beer Guide was published in September, just as the previous SoxonAle went toprint. It includes the amazing news, taken up by the mainstream news media, that the UK nowhas more breweries per head than any other country!

The GBG lists 1,285 breweries in Britain – one for every 50,000 people and the largest numbersince the 1930s and 1940s. During the previous year 170 breweries opened in the UK, main-taining an annual growth of more than 10%. Nearly all these new breweries are producing caskales as their core products. Once, when there was still manufacturing industry there and beforevarious property booms priced many people out, London was one of the world’s great brewingcentres. Now it’s starting to pick up again as last year the number of London breweries doubled.This growth has been maintained in the first half of this year with seven start-ups so far.

GBG editor Roger Protz notes: “Real ale is the only success story in a declining beer market.New breweries continue to come on stream while many long-standing regional and family brew-eries are expanding with new equipment and brands. Real ale has almost doubled its marketshare over the past decade.”

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Greene King sells off a large part of its pub estateJust under a year ago, in a curiously low-key process, Greene King sold 275 of its pubs toHawthorn Leisure for £75.6m. This leaves around 890 pubs remaining in the Greene King estate.Hawthorne Leisure was created in November 2013 as a private limited company: it’s backed bytwo investment companies and run by ex-Punch Taverns MD Gerry Carroll. Hawthorne’s aim isto pick off so-called non-core wet-led pubs from pubcos and to run them in a more “flexible”way. Hopefully this will mean a wider selection of beers will be available, though the sale did in-clude a three-year deal for Greene King to continue supplying drinks so changes may not be im-mediately apparent. South Oxfordshire of course has a high proportion of Greene King pubs inits western half – a consequence of the Morland years. How many of these pubs were part ofthe sale is unclear, but it will be very interesting to see how this rearrangement plays out.

Cuts in beer duty create jobs and boost beer salesRegular SoxonAle readers will remember the articles deploring the “Beer Duty Escalator” – theyear-on-year increases that lead to duty rising by 40% between 2008 and 2012. CAMRA’s cam-paign was one of the main reasons for it being scrapped in 2013. Evidence is now appearing thatshows the campaign is reaping results. Research carried out by Oxford Economics, and reportedin Cheers 2014, shows that the duty cuts resulted in 6,987 new jobs in 2013-14. This climbed to14,410 the next year, with 16,783 predicted by 2015/2016. None of this would have happenedif the Escalator had remained in place.

Beer sales have been given a boost with an extra £44 million in capital investment into the brewingand pub sector, and more than £400 million planned. This includes increasing brewing capacity,buying new equipment, employing new staff, opening pubs and moving into export.

The hope now is that the Chancellor will keep his sensible head on and cut duty for the thirdyear running.

Dark delights lined up for winter warmer celebrationWith two months to go, preparations are well under way for that celebration of all strong, darkbrews: the National Winter Ales Festival (NWAF). This is one of the country’s biggest festivalsand a showcase of styles favoured in the winter months: barley wine, old ales, porters and stoutsfeaturing a huge selection of British and foreign beers, real ale in a bottle, mead, ciders and perries.

This year the festival returns to the Roundhouse, Derby close to the Pride Park exit of the cityrailway station. NWAF opens its doors Wednesday 11th February and runs until Saturday 14th.There are no advanced tickets: just pay on the door.

The journey to find the 2015 Champion Beer of Britain starts at NWAF, with the Champion Winter Beer of Britain. The Winter Beer finalists go forward to compete in the finals of the mainevent in the summer at the Great British Beer Festival. Just because that’s held in summerdoesn’t mean that winter beers can’t hold their own. Both Coniston’s No. 9 Barley Wine (2012)and Elland’s 1872 Porter (2013) won both crowns.

For event details go to www.nwaf.org.uk, which includes details on how to get there.

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National News - continued

Christmas beers have started to appear now – they are typically darker and stronger than atother times of the year. And not surprisingly, this tradition has been going on for centuries.

The winter solstice is the shortest, darkest day of the year and there is evidence that this hasbeen known and marked by people for thousands of years. In ancient Rome it was known as Saturnalia and friends exchanged gifts, schools were closed and quarrels suspended. The solsticeitself, on December 21st, is the turning point to longer, brighter days and was celebrated as theBirthday of the Unconquered Sun, the return of light to the world.

The Romans weren’t noted beer drinkers (they still aren’t really). But the Vikings were and theyenjoyed a strong, malty beer during their jul (or Yule) celebrations. This involved them drinkingjul, with drafts offered up to the Norse gods. In 597, Pope Gregory sent Augustine to England tore-establish Christianity following the collapse of the Roman Empire. Because sacred feasts were(understandably) popular among these worshipers of Odin, Gregory advised Augustine to incor-porate pagan traditions rather than suppress them. In particular, Yuletide feastings were to bere-hallowed as ‘Christ Mass’ and Yule beers became Christmas beers.

In the Saxon villages of England, strong ale was reserved for holidays because people didn't haveto work and could devote themselves to drinking and its less enjoyable consequences. Alesbrewed during colder weather were brewed to a higher alcohol content as ‘winter warmers’.

In the Middle Ages, monasteries did much to encourage the brewing of special beers for specialoccasions. Outside of the monasteries, most beer was made in the home and it was natural tomake a special brew for the holidays, just as we would bake a birthday cake today.

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TraditionalChristmas Drinks

A drink with a particular Christmas resonance is ‘wassail’. This word comes from the MiddleEnglish expression wæs hæl or ‘be healthy’. It was a Saxon custom that during the festivities atthe start of each year the lord of the manor would shout ‘waes hail’, and the assembled crowdwould reply ‘drinc hail’, ‘drink and be healthy’.

The drink wassail is essentially an alcoholic punch flavoured with spices, sugar, toast and roastedapples. (Most European countries have a similar warmed spiced drink; for example the Germanglühwein.) The toast component is quite interesting since it is the origin of the use of the wordto ‘toast’ a person or event. In England the drink would use ale, mead or, frequently in the south,cider. Drinking wassail made you a wassailer, and off you went wassailing: that is, singing Christmassongs from house to house.

There are aspects of wassailing that are clearly much older and of pagan origin. In the cider-producingcounties in the south-west and south-east wassailing also includes a ceremony that involves singingand drinking the health of trees on the Twelfth Night, hoping that they will be encouraged to fruitwell in the coming year. The intention is to wake up the cider apple trees and to scare away evilspirits. The ceremonies of each wassail vary but have some common features. Typically, the wassailking and queen lead the singing and procession from one orchard to the next. The biggest and besttree has cider poured over its roots. The wassail queen is lifted into the boughs of a tree where sheplaces toast soaked in wassail as a gift to the tree spirits and to show off the fruits created the previousyear. Whistles, drums and sometimes guns are used to frighten away evil spirits.

Lamb's wool or lambswool is a variety of wassail made from ale, baked apples, sugar and spices –so-called because of the frothy appearance of the apples on the surface. Actually, wassail is easyto make – there’s no set recipe and you can pretty much invent your own. The following one istypical and serves 4-6 people:

6 small apples, washed, cores removed1 litre beer or cider2 crushed cinnamon sticks2 pinches ground clovesFreshly grated nutmeg, to taste1 lemon, slicedTo sweeten it, add up to 500g of sugar before heating.

Score each apple around the middle using a sharp knife. Roast them in a preheated oven to190°C/Gas 5 for 45-50 minutes, or until they have softened and the skins begin to split. Mean-while, heat the beer or cider in a saucepan over a low heat. Add the spices, stir well, and continueto heat through until the surface of the liquid starts to foam. Add the lemon slices and roastedapples and serve hot in a large bowl.

Wassailing is alive and well in South Oxfordshire – notably in Brightwell cum Sotwell. On 5th January the wassailers will meet at 3.30pm by the War Memorial. Five orchards will be visitedwhere trees will be blessed, good spirits welcomed and evil spirits driven away. The processionwill finish at the Red Lion for lambswool mulled cider and more music, singing and dancing. Entertainment will be provided by Armaleggan – previously seen at the Wallingford Bunk Fest.

Paul Dixon

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Traditional Christmas Drinks

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Serving fine ales and homecooked food for 250 years.

The ArgyllPub & Kitchen

Come and visit our famous pubwhere two episodes of the tv series‘Midsomer Murders’ have beenfilmed. Join our friendly locals for adrink or enjoy a fantastic meal.

On offer is top quality home cookedfood, including fillet, rib eye and

sirloin steaks, old English sausage andmash along with homemade

vegetarian options, sea bass, salmonand traditional fish and chips.

Sunday roasts are a specialty.

Open every day throughXmas and New Year

The Argyll Public House 15 Market Place, Henley-on-Thames, RG9 2AA.

For bookings call: 01491 573 400www.theargyllhenley.co.uk The Argyll Pub & Kitchen

Traditional Family Run Village PubFour Cask Marque Beers

Award Winning Restaurant7 Station Road, Lower Shiplake,

Henley on Thames, Oxon. RG9 3NYTel: 01189 403332

enquiries@thebaskerville.com www.thebaskerville.com

“A popular town centre establishment witha range of keenly priced ales. Food pricesare extremely reasonable as well.”

- Whatpub.com

Opening Hours10am - 11pm (1am Thu; 3am Fri & Sat);

11am-10pm Sunday

BROADWAYS

103 Broadway, Didcot OX11 8RGTel: 01235 814924

In October, local cider-maker Tutts Clump held its first open-day. The occasion was markedwith the presentation of two certificates by our colleagues in Reading CAMRA. These wereawarded following CAMRA’s South of England regional cider competition: first place forFarmhouse Perry, and second place for the Farmhouse Cider. This marks another milestonealong a road that has seen Tutts rise from producing a couple of gallons of home-made ciderin 2006 to a remarkable 65,000 litres in 2014. All this is testament to Tutts’ owner TimWale’s skill and hard work – and is more remarkable still, because he is self-taught.

Before it achieved fame as a centre for cider-making, Tutts Clump was a hamlet near Brad-field, West Berkshire, roughly halfway between Reading and Newbury. Tim was born andgrew up there, and it’s where he started his original motor repair business. That’s still goingbut now shares the site with the production and storage facilities where Tim, assisted byhis wife and five daughters, make their award-winning cider.

The crowd that turned up for the open-day were treatedto a demonstration of the cider-making process. Tutts usesa combination mill and press, made by Voran. The washedapples are loaded into a small hopper on the side of theunit where the mincer rapidly reduces them to pulp. Thisis picked up manually in a plastic scoop and placed underthe press between layers of thick polyester cloth. The lay-ers start off around 40 mm thick, but the fruit is so juicy

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Tutts Clump Ciderlocal, and popular

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that it starts to run off without any pressure being applied.When about eight layers have been built up the press isstarted and applies a steady pressure to the pulp. Thisforces out 70-80% of the juice which runs off into a smallopen tank before being pumped into the fermenters.These are vertical cylinders whose lids are fitted with S-shaped bubble airlocks similar to those used by homewine-makers. The apple juice ferments to cider inaround five weeks, but Tim stores it for a year to ma-ture it properly. The de-juiced pulp, now resembling asoggy doormat, is mostly used as pig-feed.

Milling and pressing require a lot of manual effort. When in full swing Tim expects to process2000 kg of apples a day, which will result in around 1500 litres of juice. In his early days Timwould add yeast to get the fermentation going. This isn’t needed any more: enough yeasthas accumulated around the place for the juice to ferment spontaneously.

This year’s apple crop wasn’t as abundant as 2013. Tim usually sources them locally, but thisyear has had to buy some in from Kent. Hopefully this will be less of a problem in futuresince he planted a small orchard of his own in 2009. On the open-day there were largewooden crates in the yard: some filled with Bramley cooking apples and others with Gala,which are eaters. Because of the dissolved natural sugars the freshly-pressed juice is denserthan water, but its specific gravity drops as the sugar is fermented into alcohol. This year’scrop is, on the open day at least, also a little light on sugar; an original gravity with 1040 was

measured. This will ferment out to give a cider witharound 5%ABV. Generally one would expect an originalgravity of nearer 1050, giving 6%ABV. Tim does pro-duce a cider that is a little less of a heavy-hitter, withan ABV of 3.5%. This is called Repress. As the nameimplies, it’s made by taking squeezed pulp, soaking itin water for 24 hours and putting it through the pressagain. Less sugar comes out, resulting in a lighter,lower-alcohol cider.

Tutts Clump cider is becoming steadily more widely-available, and can now be found in pubs,local stores and farmers’ markets, and even Waitrose. It is also available from the farm shopin various quantities from 500 ml bottles to five gallon barrels. For details seewww.tuttsclumpcider.co.uk.

It was particularly reassuring to see all the tanks of fresh and fermenting juice around becauseTutts Clump is the main supplier of cider to the SOX beer tent at the Woodcote Festival,held each July. This year we sold 800 pints of Tim’s cider – and hope to so the same againin 2015!

Paul Dixon

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Tutts Clump cider - continued

A smooth journey: just 35 minutes with the car on the Eurotunnel at Folkestone, an hour’sdrive and there we were - parked up, checked-in and relaxing in our hotel bar with a glassor four of Hommelbier van t’ vat [from the tap] from the Van Eecke brewery round the cor-ner! For this trip, our group of Mike and Lesley Scott (recently relocated to North OxonBranch) and yours truly and Julia decided to stay in the small town of Watou, just over theFrench border into the West Flanders region of Belgium.

Watou, population around 2,000, is a smaller version of our favourite town in the region,Poperinge – but it’s still in the middle of Belgium’s main hop growing territory with a pleasantcobbled square dotted with bars, cafes and restaurants plus, of course, a couple of outstand-ing breweries nearby. During the First World War Watou and its surroundings were a quietresting area behind the British lines and it was fortunate that no armed conflicts took placehere; hence the 12th century St. Bavo church only saw a few war funerals between April1915 (Second Battle of Ypres) and the end of the war. Today, one of Watou’s principal claimsto fame is the famous gastronomic restaurant ‘t Hommelhof (www.hommelhof.be) wherecuisine a là biere originated. Here you can still delight in a feast in which each course is prepared with a different local beer and served with the same beer – well worth treatingyourself every once in a while!

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Another BeerTour in Flanders

Even though this was early October it was a scorching Friday af-ternoon - perfect for sitting outside soaking up the rays and thedeceptively strong and hoppy pale ale that is Hommelbier (7.5%ABV). This was enjoyed together with an excellent late lunch ofthe house speciality, hop galets - delicious beer-infused savourypancakes. Then we headed around the corner to the Van Eeckebrewery where head brewer Peter Craeymeersch had offeredto give us a short unofficial tour. To be honest, although acknowledged by the experts as one of the best breweries inBelgium, we’ve been to others that appear more interestingand attractive-looking. However, the brewing kit was impres-

sive and the abbey-style beer Tripel Abt (a full bodied, dark golddessert beer that comes in at a whopping 10% ABV) was busy fermenting and evolving hugevolumes of carbon dioxide that you certainly noticed when you sniffed too closely! Unfortunately, the cask and bottling lines are rusting relics, last used 20 or so years ago. Thebeers are now shipped off to the nearby Leroy brewery in Boezinge for the final packaging.The brewery is also noted for its Watou’s Witbier, a 5% ABV lemony and cloudy refreshingwheat beer. Compared to the ubiquitous Hoegaarden this is a more superior brew andmuch preferred by the locals in this part of the world. (Since falling under the umbrella ofAB-InBev Hoegaarden is now a pale shadow of its former self.) Also look out for the Kapittelrange of abbey-style beers, including the Pater, Blond, Dubbel, Prior and the above mentioned Tripel Abt. Following the visit around the brewery it was into the brewery tap,the Brouwershof, for a further sampling of Van Eecke’s finest.

A short distance outside Watou lies the Sint BernadousBrewery (www.sintbernardous.be), a more modern andextensive brewery founded in 1946. It came to promi-nence in 1962 when it was granted a licence to brew theTrappist beer from the nearby St. Sixtus abbey. Thesewere sold under the St. Sixtus name until 1992, whenlegislation dictated that the name Trappistenbier couldonly be applied to beer brewed inside the walls of aTrappist Monastery. Thus since 1992 the brewery hassold its abbey-style beers under the brand name of St.Bernardous. The beers (particularly the Pater 6, Prior8, Abt 12 and Tripel) are rated amongst the best brews inFlanders and are still considered a close match in recipe and style to the St Sixtus beers,which are themselves nearly impossible to obtain outside the Monastery. The brewery hostswell-organised trips for €12.50, including a gift pack of the four beers noted above and theauthentic badged glass.

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Flanders Beer Tour

Continued on page 19

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Award-winning, family Cider makers since 2006

sales@tuttsclumpcider.co.ukwww.tuttsclumpcider.co.uk

Tel: 0118 974 4649or 07836 296996

Touring around the area took us to the famous St. Sixtus abbey itself, at Westvleteren, wherethe sprawling modern café opposite the monastery remains the only bar in the world thatthe blond (5.8%ABV), the 8 (8% ABV) and the 12 (10.2% ABV) are routinely sold. Detailsof this wonderful beer-drinking temple were provided in a previous issue of SoxonAle fromspring 2014. This time, however, there were no six-packs available to purchase at the shop.Clearly the monks can’t keep up with demand; but then I think that as long as they haveenough for themselves, they are fine with that! A mile or so up the road in Krombeke we paid our usual visit to the Nevjan Drankcentralle(www.drankcentralenevejan.be), a beer wholesaler accustomed to visits from UK enthusi-asts to purchase their favourite tipple to take home. If you can stretch to buying by the 24-bottle crate, the prices are pretty good. For example, the world-famous Duvel will only setyou back 97p a bottle compared to £5-plus in a trendy craft beer bar in London.

There are many fascinating, unique and often very quirkybars scattered around the Flanders countryside. This tripwe discovered Het Mysterie on the road from Watou almost into Poperinge. A weird spooky bar absolutelycrammed with all manner of witchy and ghoulish para-phernalia. The landlady and the locals (the ones stillbreathing anyway) were nonetheless very welcoming andthe beer menu had a satisfying array of our favouritebeers plus a couple of local abbey-style beers on tap. Avery atmospheric bar and a great place to spend an houror so gawping at the walls whilst supping another ale.

The final day brought us a few miles east to the famous WW1 frontline town of Ypres. Thehorticulturists amongst us were keen to have an hour or so away from the beers to visitFloralux (www.floralux.be). This is probably the largest home and garden centre you’ll everset foot in; but such a wide range of very high quality plants and again very keen prices compared to the UK. So with a few packs of bulbs and evergreen shrubs wedged into theremaining space between the crates in the car we found ourselves back in the Grote Marktin Ypres, a lovely market town with a population of 35,000 and entirely rebuilt after beingtotally destroyed in the First World War. Famous of course for the daily 8.00pm Last Postceremony at the Menin Gate and the In Flanders Fields Museum, the town has become evermore popular for visitors in recent years. With a long line of cafes next to each other alongthe north side of the square, we plumped for De Kollebloeme (www.kollebloeme.be), or“The Poppy” in Flemish. This is a stylish, contemporarily-furnished restaurant where weenjoyed the local speciality of beef carbonnade washed down with a final draught Hommel-bier. Then we set off for the short journey home, clinging on to fond memories of anothergreat trip as the next working week loomed just around the corner.

Graham Hards

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Flanders Beer Tour - continued

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The SOX Branch has a lengthy tradition of pub-crawling around London. We always put in a goodshowing at the CAMRA Central Southern Region London crawl in mid-January, which is attendedby upwards of 50 people. But we also like to run a Branch one in the autumn. This year’s washeld in mid-November and had been carefully designed by SOX veteran beer-hound Roy Denisonto make the most use of a one-day Travel Card and to visit some unusual pubs with very differentbeers. This time the route would avoid central London, circling it instead in a clockwise directionfrom Richmond to Liverpool Street Station and taking in seven pubs. (Incidentally, three of thepubs have the word ‘tap’ in their name. I think this reflects modern marketing fashion ratherthan any conscious or unconscious selection policy on Roy’s part.) We had a good turn out too– around a dozen SOX members were joined for most of the day by five representatives of theBrewery History Society.

We began by taking an unbelievably crammed train from Readingto Richmond. (England was playing the Springboks at Twickenham.)Then few minutes’ walk took us to the first pub: the Triple Crown[TW9 2SS]. This is a friendly free-house tucked away in a quiet backstreet across the road from Richmond Rugby Ground, and a verygood start to a pub-crawl. There were four ales on handpump. Ithought I’d go local and had Autumn Red (4.4%ABV) from Twick-enham Fine Ales. The Twickenham was founded in 2004 and claimsto be London’s oldest micro. They’ve got a good reputation fortheir beers – their Sundancer won silver in the 2007 CAMRAChampion beer of Britain. The Autumn Red was excellent – ahearty, malty beer, just right for a chillier day.http://www.thetriplecrownrichmond.co.uk

Then it was back to Richmond to catch the London Over-ground and go one stop to Kew Gardens. The Tap onthe Line [TW9 3PZ] is actually in Kew Gardens stationand is the only remaining pub to be situated on a LondonUnderground platform, though you do have to exitthrough the barrier to get to it. The buffet has had amakeover and now sells upmarket food as well as drink.It retains plenty of period charm with white wall tiles anda small atrium. The beers are predominantly from

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Fullers: on this occasion I tried one of their seasonal beers, Gales Firecracker (4.8%ABV). This is very good indeed: it’s rich and spicey and very much a winter ale. http://www.tapontheline.co.uk

No effort then to get back on the London Overground and take therather longer trip to Gospel Oak. The Southampton Arms [NW5 1LE]claims to be the only pub in London to sell exclusively from small UKindependents and there are an impressive 18 handpumps dispensing aleand cider. This is an absolutely first-rate pub and I could have happilystayed there for the rest of the day. Long and narrow, it has the relaxedcomfortable feel of a proper town boozer. I started with Tottenhambrewery Redemption’s Fellowship Porter (5.1%ABV). This was superb– for me, the best beer of the day. I followed it up with something a bitlower strength – Hobson’s Mild (3.2%ABV). Another excellent beerand in fact Champion Beer of Britain in 2007. I finished off with a dropof Dark Star’s Winter Meltdown (5%ABV), which I hated. This was abig disappointment because normally I’m quite a fan of Dark Star, butthis really didn’t do it for me; just a big hit of ginger and not much else. http://www.thesouthamptonarms.co.uk

The London Overground took us from Gospel Oak to Hackney Central and the Cock Tavern[E8 1EJ]. The Cock Tavern has to be seen to be believed - it’s like a film set for an East Europeancold war bar! It is in fact a fine old Truman’s pub. The 16 small handpumps sell draught beers at£3.40 a pint each; the 12 keg craft beers are £3.90 and cider £3.60 a pint. A fantastic pub whichproclaims on the front door ‘ONLY REAL MONEY TAKEN’. This is home to Howlin Hops

brewery, which apparently lives somewhere in the basement.The Howlin Hops Pale XX (5%ABV) is, not surprisingly,packed with a lot of hops that give it a very strong floweryflavour. Not a bad drop, but I found it hard work towards theend of the pint. http://www.thecocktavern.co.uk

Some exercise now as we walked half a mile to the LondonFields Brewery Tap [E8 3RR]. The pub frontage is in mini-malist black and white and leads into the large open bar which

Continued on page 22

Below: Interior of the Cock Tavern

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is very much in the modern shabby-chic style with six handpumps and 12 keg taps for craft beers.The in-house microbrewery is visible off to one side behind glass screens. This is a popular venueand was very crowded, which partly accounts for me losing this page of my notes and being unable to report on the beers. Pretty poor show I know, but these things happen when you’rereporting from the front-line. http://londonfieldsbrewery.co.uk

A brisk walk back to Hackney Central stationand then the Overground to Stratford. The TapEast [E20 1EE] is located opposite Stratford In-ternational station, in the Great Eastern Marketat Westfield. The Tap East is a specialist beer barand yet another microbrewery, with six hand-pumps. It has a regularly changing range of 16Tap East and guest draught beers as well as over100 bottled beers from around the world. Again,its decor is very modern though, compared withthe London Fields, rather less shabby and morechic. A current special is their Ubique porter at4.7%ABV. The name comes from the Royal Artillery’s regimental motto and 40p from every pint sold goes to the RA benevolent fund. An ok porter, but not a great one. http://www.tapeast.co.uk

On the home straight now, the remainingrevellers took the Underground to LiverpoolStreet and the nearby Williams Ale andCider House [E1 7LS]. Part of a small chainof similar pubs owned by the MetropolitanPub Company it has 14 handpumps or grav-ity-dispensed ale and cider. Signature Brew isyet another new London micro, dating from2011, which somehow hatched out of theyoung owners’ contacts in the music industry.Their Black Vinyl Stout (4.2%ABV) is not at allbad.

http://www.metropolitanpubcompany.com/our-pubs/the-williams

At the end of a tough pub-crawl you need some food to keep your energy levels up. The Williamsis within easy striking distance of Brick Lane and its huge selection of curry houses, and we didn’ttry to resist the temptation. But with an excellent two-course meal and complementary winefor only £15 why would we?

Roy DenisonPaul Dixon

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