November, a new brewery, flooding, and new beer

Following four days of heavy rain last week, Bitter End Brewing Co's new brewery site to which we moved less than one month ago -Derwent Mills, in Cockermouth was surrounded by floodwater and inaccessible to those without water skis, or an ark.

We waded across on Friday, as the water level began to fall, in order to asses the extent of the damage, and I am relieved to report that the new premesis resisted the best attempts of the river to get in and very little damage occured -We're very fortunate that the brewery is housed a hundred yards upstream of the confluence of the Derwent and Cocker where the worst flooding took place. Had we been a few yards downstream it could have been a very different story.


We've been brewing fine beers again this week for bottle and for cask, and remain open for business. It's strange to be cut-off from the town -the only foot bridge washed away and the road bridge closed, pending structural assesment.


There have been some exciting developments at the brewery in recent weeks of which I will do my best to keep you abreast off...the development of our first ever India Pale Ale -Lakeland IPA -5.5%ABV -get down to the Round Table Beer festival in Cockermouth next weekend for a taste. Keep your eyes open for a special bottled version too!

In addition to IPA, there will also be two more additional brews available at your local farmers' market or foodhall -Visit www.bitterendbrewingco.com for detail and more of the latest news.

Hops, hops, hops.

The following news comes courtesy of our sometimes Herefordshire correspondant...



On the first day of September, Bitter End Brewery owner Mike and Brewer Steve, paid a visit to Pridewood Farm in Ashperton, Herefordshire at the invitation of hop merchants Charles Farhams. Farhams, based just the other side of the Malvern Hills were eager to show off the new state of the art hop kilns that have been installed at Pridewood after the old brick and timber kilns were badly damaged by fire during the 2007 season...The new kilns incorporate a greater degree of automation, reducing some of the manual work that was associated with the old kilns. The drying process itself too is computer controlled thus ensuring a better quality of end product although Pridewood's farmer Martin Powell-Tuck is still up to the early hours to keep a watchful eye over his hops -on this day, the first day of the 2009 harvest, it was Goldings that was being brought in.



It is a wonderful sight to see the bines being cut out in the field, brought by trailer to the picking shed where the hops are stripped from the bine ready to be conveyed to the kiln where they're spread over the large floors and dried such that moisture is reduced by as much as 90%.



Drying the hops increases their storage capacity, vaccum packed so that the characteristcs which make Humulus Lupulus prized to such a degree by brewers are preserved, so that they may be used the whole year round. Drying however is not nesescary for the hops to be used in a brew and we were able to obtain a quantity immediately after picking and before kilning -5kilos of the first Goldings of 2009. The hops were brought back to Cumbria and pitched to a very special brew within 24 hours of picking...keep your eye out in the Bitter End this week for G.H.B. (Green-hopped Beer) at 4% ABV -A very special beer available for a limited period of each year only.

'Special brew' and bottled beer

Firstly, may I say how good it is to be in touch and with excellent news after some period of time. The brewery has been operating at full steam for the better part of the last three months -mash tun full of the finest English malted barley Thomas Fawcetts can supply, copper boiling all steam and hops, fermenters fermenting, casks rolling. So now it is that I am able to grab a moment to let you know what has been going on.

Brewing through the heatwave last month was fun, and visitors to the pub will have sampled the thirst quenchingly pale 'Grasp the Nettle' all though June -a seasonal special back by popular demand after it was so well recieved last year. Also a brand new beer, Bitter End Wheat Beer has been available, and so good was the response from customers at the pub that we immediately brewed a second gyle of it. Here's a snap of the whole-flower hops in the hop back before running into the FV last week:



If you missed these beers however, do not dispair! After some months of pilot brewing I can present to you the first two bottled beers from our bottled beer portfolio -straight from the bottling line and 3 weeks conditioning, Lakeland Bitter and Lakeland Pale Ale ever popular at the Bitter End, and now also on your dinner table, infact anywhere you want for that matter....



...and keep your eyes peeled for very special one-off beers available only in the bottle. Something certainly to look forward to -keep an eye out at your local co-op...plans are also afoot for an online beer shop via www.bitterend.co.uk so fear not readers in the United States, but more on that later!

the hop harvest, 2008

I was fortunate enough lately, to have made a visit to Herefordshire -i could not resist stopping to visit a hop field, and assess the state of the crop. Hear, dear reader is the result. The bines were laden with their resinous cones, but some dry weather would help to make the ground a little easier for the tractors to move over. Marvel at the wonders of digital technology:

A handsome cone laden bine...



The height of the bines in this field suggests one of the dwarf 'hedgerow' varieties such as First Gold -Only attaining perhaps half the height of taller growing varieties, thus enabling easier maintainance of the crop, and use of a more efficient picking process...

A stiring in the hop gardens...

August bank holiday weekend, a chance to catch up with jobs on the allotment, perhaps welcome visiting relatives and gather with friends for a barbecue in the evening sunshine, the late summer air scented with the ripening of the season. Or, if you farm in one of the hop growing counties of England, in Kent perhaps, or close to the Welsh borders in Herefordshire or the Teme Valley of Worcestershire, then maybe a time to be busy -firing the hop kilns, housing pickers, and making ready for the culmination of a year’s hard work and patience, watching the hop bines with one eye on the weather, and that first morning rising with the dawn and with the mists, to bring in the bines from their ordered rows in the fields, laden with their fresh, green, resinous hop cones. To bring them into the bustle and disorder of the yard, to be picked and dried, weighed and packed in their enormous pockets ready to be shipped to the merchant, or straight off to the breweries, as apprehension and excitement of what this year’s harvest will bring, perceptibly fills the air –a bumper crop perhaps, not too much wilt affecting the Fuggles in the top field, or a repeat of the downy mildew that ruined so much of the crop five years ago...Well faithful reader, word has reached the Bitter End from our hop merchants that things are stirring in the first few hop gardens of Kent. Early indications are not for a bumper crop, with Challenger and Fuggles being somewhat weather affected, but with fingers crossed a better crop than last year which saw stocks of some varieties in limited supply. It will be a few weeks before the high-alpha varieties are harvested, and the crop safely in, but next time you sip a pint of hoppy ale, give a thought to the humble Humulus lupulus and the year upon year of bustle and life which has been brought by its harvest, to the hop gardens of England every August bank holiday.

Dark Mild in the month of May

Dark Mild was brewed recently to celebrate CAMRA's campaign for Mild in May. And what a pleasure to brew, and drink it. I couldn't resist throwing in a generous quantity of Chocolate malt alongside Maris Otter Pale, Dark Crystal and Roast Barley. And maybe a little heavily hopped for the purists, despite good body and sweetness, but i like my hops so there you go...It went down very well at the CAMRA AGM in the Green Dragon, Workington, and has proved equally popular at the Bitter End -down to the last firkin in the cellar...so get it while you can.

Suggestions for brews of other much maligned beer styles gratefully accepted, and you never know what might be the next special.

Hello folks, welcome to our humble site

Here it is...sirs, ladies...the Bitter End brewery is now online for one and all...raise a glass!