DIGITAL
CAMRA
The On-line version of the Cornwall CAMRA
Branch Newsletter
ONE & ALE ON LINE
Winter 2006/2007 (archived)
BREWERIES COME,
BREWERIES GO
There
is a new arrival on the brewing scene in Cornwall. Alan Hinde,
former pub landlord and brewer from the Crewe area in Cheshire, has set up
shop in an industrial unit on Redruth's Cardrew Industrial Estate, barely
a stone's throw from the current site of the Keltek Brewery.
Called the Coastal Brewery, it first
produced a trial brew on 21 November. The beer has since been spotted in
the Star Inn at Crowlas, believed to be the first outlet for the brew, and
then just before Christmas at the Seven Stars in Falmouth. A very
hoppy bitter called Genesis-2 was spotted (and tasted) recently in the
Star. The
brewery plant itself is of a reasonable size for a micro, being of 5
barrel capacity (1440 pints), so the intention is obviously to be a
serious player at least in west Cornwall.
Meanwhile, Ring
O'Bells has reappeared in a slightly unexpected form.
Proprietor Adrian Carter, looking for a new way forward after the alleged
sabotage at the Launceston plant last summer, has approached some of the
existing Cornish micros with a view to using spare capacity to brew his
recipes in order to get back into the market. Recently producing three
trial brews at the Doghouse Brewery at Scorrier, Mr Carter has decided to
scale back from his former 25-barrel capacity to a more manageable 5, and
hopes to sell direct to licensees. Whether this will be using the
original Ring O'Bells name or a new one is as yet undecided. In a
related move, a small consortium of Cornish micro-brewers including
Blackawton, Doghouse, Organic and Lizard appears likely to be formed with
a view to mutual self-help in distributing their respective products
around our rather large county.
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Over
in Stithians, the surprise announcement by landlord Phil Preen that he
intends to sell the Seven Stars Inn puts the future of the tiny Bathtub
Brewery in some doubt. While coping with only a
one-firkin (50litre) plant, minute by anybody's standards, brewer
Pete Martin managed to sweep the pool at Falmouth Beer Festival in October
with his Pete's Porter, winning Champion Beer awards both as a Cornish
brew and as best overall beer of the festival. As brewery part-owner
as well as pub landlord, Phil admits that the small capacity has led
to consistency problems at times, whilst the Porter and the lighter 3.8%
Stithians Golden Ale have not sold well in the Seven Stars, being
apparently not quite to the taste of the local drinkers. The plan
now is to take the brewery back to its original farmhouse home at Four
Lanes near Redruth, while looking to acquire a bigger and better plant
(probably of 5-barrel capacity) or even brew on someone else's equipment -
see Adrian Carter, above - until the new plant and suitable premises are
found.
The current Cornish
brewery saga is not over yet, either. In a similar disposal, the
Driftwood Spars is also on the market, and of course that has also been a
brew-pub for the past few years. So the future of Gordon Treleaven's
only brew, Cuckoo Ale, is also looking shaky. But one goes down,
another arises: Peter Elvin of the Star Inn at Crowlas has finally turned
to developing his own brewhouse at the back of the pub. This former
Cotleigh brewer has long expressed his ambition to turn the Star into a
brewpub, and although on past form it is unlikely to happen quickly,
happen it will. Judging by the quality of the draught ales always
available at the Star, the first brew should be one worth waiting for.
Next
Story
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CORNISH
FREE HOUSES IN DECLINE?
The
slow erosion of Cornwall's free trade stock continues with the surprise
announcement that the
Seven
Stars Inn, Stithians, GBG entry for the
last five years, is to be sold in the new year - to St. Austell Brewery.
Once
a tied house belonging to the old Devenish Brewery and subsequently by
Greenall Inns, the pub was bought as a free house by landlord Phil Preen
when Greenall's decided they no longer wanted it. Since the bad old
days of Bass or Courage Best (or, if you were really lucky, Wadworth
6X) as the only draught beers made available to the landlord, Phil has never
looked back, and his handpumps feature at least one of each from Skinner and
Sharp, plus another Cornish brew and maybe a fourth from out of
county. As well as Weston's Old Rosie cider. Even, occasionally,
brews from the little Bathtub brew house round the back of the pub.
Now Phil has had enough for the time being, and wants to move on to develop
the Bathtub Brewery into something more substantial. Advertising the
pub for half a million pounds, he has now been offered something close by St
Austell. Pubs Director Adam Luck has assured Phil that it must remain
as a community pub, which will be somewhat reassuring for the locals who
treat it a the social centre of the village, although the beer drinkers will
be less than excited by the loss of an ever-changing menu of real ales.
The
latest shock has been the announcement by Peter Featherstone, landlord of
the Alexandra Inn in Penzance,
that he and Rosemary are selling the lease and getting out of the pub
trade at least for a while. This has been another great performer
and Good Beer Guide regular entry for several years. This follows
the news that yet another GBG stalwart in the same area, the Queen's
Arms in Botallack, is on the market following a reappraisal
of the lifestyle they want by licensees Peter Beech and partner
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Sharon,
who have run the pub for 10 years or so. CAMRA has been assured that
it will be sold only to a suitably safe pair of hands - we'll have to see,
but there is no rush to sell until the right buyer comes along.
There
has been a succession of free house sales or even closures in the county
over the past year or two, including CAMRA favourite the Mason's Arms in
Bodmin (taken by Punch Taverns) and the St. Aubyn
Arms, Praze-an-Beeble
(also Punch). The Coach and Horses at Rosudgeon closed when the
licensees got into financial difficulties last summer and has not
reopened, its future as a pub in doubt, while St. Austell recently offloaded
the Old Inn at Crowlas into the free trade, whereupon it promptly set
about getting outline planning permission for 'change of use' - and we
know what that usually means!
It may be of course that the total free
trade outlets remains roughly steady in the longer term, since St. Austell
are not just buying pubs; they are also selling the ones it feels don't
make enough money or fit their business profile - the George & Dragon
in Bodmin, the Commercial Inn, St. Dennis, and the
Kings Arms,
Lostwithiel, all community locals, being current cases in point. And
whither the Mason's Arms in
Falmouth (yet another GBG pub)? This is being offered on the market
again by St Austell Brewery, at a reputed price which would preclude it
ever making a living as a pub but might be worth the investment to someone
wanting a cottage-style property right in the centre of town. In
other words, de-licensed. Still, the likes of Punch Taverns and Enterprise Inns remain the most aggressive
predators and can be relied on to come sniffing around the estate agents
when they think they might be able to make lots of money out of a free
house which happens to come on the market. And of course, they are
worth a lot more as private dwellings.....
Next
Story
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SKINNER'S
IN SWEDEN
Local
brewery Skinner's of Truro have found one of their most distant outlets
yet - the Oliver Twist and Akkurat pubs in Stockholm, Sweden's capital
city. Our foreign correspondent Gunnar Erikson reports that the pub
held a beer festival throughout December with a Christmas/Winter beer
theme. There are no fewer than 13 cask ales available. 3 of them
Swedish and the rest from the UK of which two - Jingle Knockers and
Christmas Fairy - are from Truro. For the record, the other British
ales which made it over there were Fuller's Vintage 2005, Mauldon's Black Adder, Bah Humbug and Dickens,
Batemans' Rosey Nosey, Burton Bridge Festival Ale, Top Dog Stout and Stairway to
Heaven. Akkurat lists 151 beers in total, although the rest are keg
and bottled from Belgium, Germany (Franconia), Sweden and the USA, with vintages going back
to 1991 (St Feuillien Cuvée de Noël).
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(above)
Skinner's on the line-up at the Oliver Twist
(left)
Gunner and Kirsten Erikson enjoying a pint of Jingle
(photos:
Gunnar Erikson)
Next
Story
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EXETER WINTER BEER
FESTIVAL
13 January 2007
Coaver Club, County Hall |
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BODMIN BEER
FESTIVAL
2 - 3 March 2007
Public Rooms |
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ST. IVES BEER
FESTIVAL
1-3 June 2007
Concert Hall, Street-an-Pol |
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Cornish
Pub News
West Cornwall
The Fountain Inn at Newbridge near
Penzance changed tenants in January. Saved from a closure attempt by
St. Austell Brewery in 2001, the pub enjoyed a rapid rise in its fortunes as new
landlords James Roberts and Daphne Pounder worked hard to recover it from the
near-fatal decline it has suffered in the hands of the previous incumbent.
The pub rapidly gained a Good Beer Guide listing and was declared Pub of the
Year by Cornwall CAMRA for its remarkable turn-around into a well-run community
local. Now James and Daphne want to try something else, albeit in the pub
business, and have moved west to the First & Last at Sennen. Although
they are in effect managers (the pub is owned by a local company), they have a
stake in the enterprise and an apparent free hand in the choice of beers, which
James is keen to expand. A visit by CAMRA spies in February reported that
he has introduced St Austell Black Prince as well as beer from Skinner's .......
Shorts.....
The 'churn' in pub ownership/leaseholding.tenancy rolls on unabated. In
addition to the stories above, local specialist agents Scott
Burridge Chick have announced a number of licensed premises for sale in the
county. In Helston, the leasehold of the historic Grade II listed
Angel Hotel is up for grabs, at around £200,000 for a 25-year
lease from enterprise Inns. Vever known as a particular real ale favourite
(it has offered little more than Courage Directors and Sharp's Doom Bar in
recent years), it could be much improved in this particular in the right
hands. Further west another old pub is for sale, this time in Newlyn and
owned by another big pub group, Punch Taverns. The Dolphin
Inn lease is being offered at around £140,000, and is for sale
due to the current landlord's wish to retire. Unlike the Angel Hotel, this
is a local boozer, and is not a real ale outlet, preferring instead to entertain
its clientele with fizzy chemical beers..... The same group are offering another
historic pub for sale, this time on the Lizard peninsula. The Cadgwith
Cove Inn is yours at a quarter of a million quid for the
lease. The pub was recently the centre of a row between the landlord who
wanted to convert it to function mainly as a restaurant, and locals who want it
left alone as a proper pub. In the end a compromise seems to have been
reached, with work limited to some internal redecoration. Not far from
here, the beach-side but
remote Five Pilchards out on the Lizard at Porthallow is on the market for
£600,000. A very under-rated and under-visited free house, it really is
worth the effort of getting there and usually offers up to three local real ales
(although check the opening times before setting out, as they are a bit
eccentric). The Old Inn at Crowlas
is being sold. This is another of St.
Austell's tied houses which is now being set free in an apparent programme of
selling small village boozers in favour of bigger operations where food is the
primary purpose. However, it is being offerd as a 'possible residential
redevelopment', which at the price being asked, £450,000, could be an
ill-disguise attempt to turn
it into a dwelling. With the Star Inn just around the corner as
competition, this is one move that could possibly succeed. Way out west,
the Wellington Hotel in St. Just-in-Penwith
is being offered for sale on a new 25-year lease. At £250,000 it is not
cheap, especially coming with an annual rent of £24,000 rising every three
years. Meanwhile in another part of the pub property thicket, a historical Grade II listed thatched free house has come on the market. The
Shipwright's Arms, tucked away in the difficult-to-get-to village
of Helford, enjoys a superb riverside location and normally manages to sell a
decent real ale or two. However, it is very much food-led these days,
although admittedly is very popular for that reason (especially in summer), and
arguably would have closed long since had it not pursued the dining market......
Elsewhere, the Duke of Leeds at Leedstown on the
Hayle-Helston road is up for grabs. This pub has not been known for real
ale, alleging that not enough locals drink it, and only recently dipped a toe in
the water with a single handpump installed and nothing unusual available.
It does have 6 B&B rooms, though. A snip at £350,000..... The Royal
Oak at Perranwell is still on offer for £600,000; it
is supposed to be a 'confidential sale' (it was advertised 'up country' before
being coyly and anonymously listed locally).......
Mid-Cornwall
At Philleigh on the Roseland peninsula, the
Roseland Inn at Philleigh is listed for sale by Scott Burridge Chick. This
is more of a pub than a restaurant but is the only real ale outlet in a fairly
wide area so has little competition in this regard. The asking price for
the lease is £175,000. Elsewhere, St. Austell Brewery continues to target more of
their traditional village boozers for possible sale into the free trade . The latest
swath of offerings are the George & Dragon
in Bodmin, for instance, is on the market for an asking price of around
£300,000. Also on the lists are the Commercial
Inn, St. Dennis (same price), and the King's
Arms in the centre of Lostwithiel.
East Cornwall
Awaiting reports.
North Cornwall
The Hole in
the Wall in Bodmin is up for sale again. Once a regular in
CAMRA's Good Beer Guide, it has not featured for a while owing to a decline in
the quality of the beer in the glass (with a lack of imagination in beer choice
not helping).
(Sources: CAMRA members, Beer Today, Packet Newspapers, the West Briton and allied
publications,
pub gossip, Scilly locals and Lizard's beer-stained notebook. And One
& Ale!)
News of the Brews
The Lizard Brewery,
which started brewing barely two years ago, has added a new ale to its
portfolio. A light quaffing ale called Helford River Bitter, it has a
strength of 3.6% abv and was given its first outing at the Crown Inn, Crowntown
to coincide with a CAMRA branch meeting there in March 2006. The brewery has three other ales available in limited outlets in the Lizard area, although the number of
pubs taking the beer is slowly expanding. Kernow Gold and Lizard
Bitter, both around 4%abv, were the first two brews. They were then
accompanied by a third brew, a strong Cornish ale called An Gof (5.2%). Named after the smith who led
the 1497 rebellion, it is appropriately dark and smoky. A further addition
made its appearance during last summer, called Frenchman's Creek. This
replaces the Kernow Gold as a draught brew, but the latter is still available in
bottle-conditioned form.
In Stithians, the tiny Bathtub Brewery
('nano-brewery' according to its head brewer) is now effectively out of action
for the foreseeable future, as the Seven Stars pub which is its home looks like
being sold to St Austell Brewery. Vague plans exist to produce Bathtub
ales on other peoples' brewing plants, partly to see if increased volume
improves consistency, and to this end agreement has apparently been reached with
the Driftwood Spars to use their equipment in St. Agnes. Beyond that,
brewer peter Martin may be looking at acquiring a 5-barrel plant of his own,
once premises and the kit have been identified, but that seems to be way down
the line at present.
The Wooden Hand Brewery at Grampound Road goes from
strength to strength, with four beers in their portfolio. The most recent
addition, called Cornish Buccaneer, is a 4.3% abv brew. The other three beers produced by ex-Redruth Brewery employees Kevin Frantham and Mel Hill
are Cornish Mutiny (4.8%abv, their first brew), Smugglers' Gold, a lighter
beer at 3.6%abv that has sold well in spite of limited fine weather; and Black
Pearl (4.3%), not a dark beer as its name implies but a best bitter aimed at the
likes of Doom Bar and Betty Stogs drinkers.
The brewery's premises, the original Ventonwyn Brewery site, was too cramped for
everything that Kev and Mel want to do, so they recently acquired two other industrial
units close by where they can store beer for maturing and bottling.
Sharp's Brewery has been going all
out recently to cover its operation both within the county and beyond. Sales
are now being made all over the
south-west, as far up as Swindon so far. The brewery recently installed 6 new fermenters, and
were planning to have doubled
plant capacity to 100 barrels by now, although reports suggest that further
expansion has been put on hold for the moment.
Skinner's
Brewery in Truro moved into keg lager to satisfy the demands of the surfing
fraternity. It is reportedly knocking sales of the 'nationals' such as Stella
into a cocked hat in the pubs on the north coast. Another addition to the real ale portfolio is Davy Jones Knocker at
5%abv, appearing in various pubs as a summer seasonal; the brewery is donating 5p for each pint sold towards training of beach
lifeguards. Meanwhile, another seasonal brew
called Hunny Bunny (4.5% abv) is available at many pubs over the Easter
holiday.
St.
Austell Brewery Proper
Job IPA, brewed as a 5.5%abv special for the Celtic Beer Festival in December
2005, looks like being available permanently on handpump in selected pubs,
albeit at a reduced strength of 4.5%. The
original stronger version is still available in bottled form. Meanwhile,
brewing overall remains very healthy, with an 11% increase in annual sales
recently announced which takes the total volume produced to 26,000 barrels.
Keltek Brewery has apparently started cask ale production
again, with several of its range appearing at the Lizard 2000 beer festival in
Helston including a new one called 'Pork Pie Stout', believed to be the one they
have been making for Tesco to put in one of their pie products. The range
advertised includes King and Magick as well as several other brands, and the
brewery is offering the beer for sale in firkins, pins etc as well as bottles.
Since moving its 20-barrel plant to Redruth last October, however, Keltek ales
have been noticeably absent from the pubs, although they have been producing
brews for Jolly's-LWC since their Ring O'Bells operations in Launceston ceased
last August.
The Organic
Brewhouse is still brewing steadily but suffered a slowdown
over the winter months with operations just barely ticking over. New sources of organic ingredients (malt and hops) have been
identified which brewer Andy Hamer plans to use to widen the scope of his
production of real ales.
The
Driftwood Spars Brewery stopped dry-hopping its Cuckoo Ale,
which has reportedly improved the flavour. Blackawton Brewery in Saltash is continuing production of the beers
developed before being sold 18 months or so ago, and the new proprietor/brewer Steve Horn
has now developed a brew of his own - Peninsula Ale. The Scorrier-based micro-brewery,
Doghouse, has broken with its tradition of doggy-themed beer
names with a brew celebrating the birth of railway engineer Isambard Kingdom
Brunel. It is called Brunel's Bridge Builder.
Finally, the small-scale Wheal Ale brewery based at Paradise Park
in Hayle appears to have stopped brewing after around 20 years of operations
behind the Bird In Hand pub. Domestic problems rather than financial are
thought to be the reason.
Pubs
Diary
Welcome to our feature, the
Cornish Pubs Diary. The idea is that anything to do with the promotion
of real ale by our local landlords will warrant an entry here. Events will
mostly take the form of beer festivals no doubt, but with a growing fund of
experience in this field and their growing popularity, we feel that some central
listing is useful - which also helps landlords to avoid clashes! Do let us know
of any planned real ale events at your local boozer.
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Event |
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Awaiting any notifications |
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(all events subject to confirmation -
check if in doubt)
In
common with the other branches of CAMRA, the Cornwall branch produces its
own hard-copy newsletter, One & Ale.
It appears about 5 times a year, at slightly irregular intervals because it may
be timed to coincide with the major events such as the local beer festivals. It
is aimed both at the branch membership, who are widely scattered around the
county and each get a copy through the post, and non-members who may pick it up
to read in selected pubs.
One
& Ale contains news of breweries, brews and pubs in the
county, as well as views and reports of pub crawls and the like written by the
branch members. As a free publication, its only source of funding is its
advertising income, which is of course to an extent dependent on how interesting
the contents are. We are always looking for reports or articles from CAMRA
members, and new contributors are especially welcome. Copy should be submitted
to Steve Willmott, who is also the Editor and Distribution Manager (see Contacts
page). If it is a word processor file and sent on a floppy disk, it's even more
welcome!
Some
earlier
editions of One & Ale On-line can be seen in our archive. Just
click on the one you want to see:
January-February 2004
March-April 2004
May-June 2004
July-August 2004
September-October 2004
November-December 2004
January-February 2005
March-April 2005
May-June 2005
July-August 2005
September-October 2005
November-December 2005
Spring 2006
Summer 2006
Autumn 2006
The
views expressed in these pages are of course those of the authors, and not
necessarily of CAMRA Ltd or the Cornwall Branch of CAMRA.