Pecan Pie

It is approaching that time of year, in the preamble to Christmas, when our overgrown colony across the pond celebrates Thanksgiving. It is a time that seems as an ungrateful outsider an excuse to eat food and drink, but I am sure there is more to it than that. Still, never really in need of an excuse anyway to fill myself with copious amounts of pudding, here we go...

One of the traditional things that is consumed for Thanksgiving is the Pecan Pie, a shortcrust pie base with a caramel style nut filling. We made a version to take to a potluck dinner and it went down sufficiently well to warrant sharing the recipe!

Ingredients:

500g pack sweet shortcrust pastry
75g butter
150g golden caster sugar
300g golden syrup
1 tsp salt
3 eggs, beaten
½ tsp vanilla extract
300g pecan halves
Splash of rum (optional)

Method:

To start, line a pie dish with shortcrust pastry - either a home-made pie crust if you really want to make one, or a ready roll packeted one (which is what I use, if it's good enough for Nigella etc etc) will work. It needs blind baking for the first 15 minutes, then 5 minutes to colour. So, begin by covering the pastry with a layer of baking paper or tin foil, and add baking beans (whether ceramic or dried chickpeas it matters not). Pop in a preheated 180°C oven for 20 minutes, and then remove the beans for a final 5 minutes.

During this time you can begin work on the filling. For this I use golden caster sugar, golden syrup, unsalted butter and a teaspoon of salt - although optional, the savoury edge that comes from the salt lifts the pudding no end. Heat the ingredients together slowly in a large heavy bottomed pan. As the butter starts to melt keep stirring the mixture, so that it doesn't burn. As the mixture starts to boil it will rise up the pan... keep stirring and allow to boil for a minute or so, then turn the heat off and leave to cool slightly. While you are waiting for it cool, mix together the eggs, vanilla extract, and pecans (keeping some aside to adorn the top prior to baking) and the rum, if using. I like to use a demerara rum that adds a lovely alcoholic sweetness to the pie, but any rum will work.

When you have all three elements ready, pour the still warm caramel into the eggs, stirring continuously to avoid curdling. At this point a waft of delightfully warm rumminess will fill the kitchen if you've chosen to take the boozy path. When everything is combined, pour the heady, sticky-sweet filling into the pastry case. Decorate the top with some pecans (these will toast lightly during the cooking time) and return to the oven for 35-40 minutes, until the pie has set. Leave to cool and the whole lot will further solidify. You can eat the pie straight away, or if you are so inclined store it in an airtight tin and eat within a couple of days. The pie should serve about twelve, with a helping of cream or dollop of ice cream.

Enjoy!

Jim

Gin Festival Sheffield - A Review

The splendidly luxurious underground ballroom of the City Hall held host last month to the Sheffield leg of the Gin Festival. We first became aware of the Gin Festival team last year, when we tried out their excellent Gin Explorer box (you can read our review of that here), and so were really excited to be invited along to one of their hugely successful and highly regarded festivals. The Explorer subscription service itself has since been replaced by the "Gin Festival in a Box" concept, which has created a larger range of drink-at-home choices and brought the two brands much closer together.

We arrived to a truly bustling atmosphere, with the sold out hall packed to the rafters with hundreds of gin quaffers. Upon entry, we were provided with a copa style glass and a comprehensive booklet detailing all of the gins available, as well as handy hints for pairings, guides to garnishes and interviews with distillers - a resource which will prove useful in future as well as being a helpful tool on the evening itself.

The layout was well thought through - around the outside of the room, a quartet of bars each served from a pair of gin stations, which allowed queues to be kept to a minimum and the turn around of service to be swift. All of them were dispensing an dizzying array of gins from around the world, all accompanied with a carefully selected garnish. In addition, another handful of stalls showcased individual gin producers, who were dotted around the outside of the room serving samples of their gin along with a chat from a friendly face from the company.

Our first stop was the Tinker stall. Brought to life thanks to a crowdfunding campaign headed up by the Gin Festival team last year, this gin represents a move away from traditional juniper led gins. Drank neat, this stood out for us as a distinctively Spanish style of gin. With bold citrus, reminiscent of salted lemons and orchard fruit. An elderberry finish rounded the whole thing off beautifully. With tonic, it danced across the tongue - beautifully soft and light and a perfect one to start our night with.

Onto the bars themselves and we went straight for a Jaggi Citrus Blend, which was served with a slice of pink grapefruit. Hailing from Perthshire in Scotland. Citrus blend edition. Sweet, almost sherbetty lemon came through in absolute abundance first off, but this gin was more complex than the name perhaps suggests. Nutmeg, bay leaf and thistle are also included in the botanicals list, which gave really interesting notes of spice and a warming, herbal finish.

St Giles, based in Norwich, was our next pick. Another citrus led gin, our Gin Explorer book told us that the distillery is named after an infamous area of London where many gin shops were situated in the 18th century. Laura wasn't too keen on this neat, finding an odd almost vanilla character that was a little cloying, but the flavours really opened up and the juiciness was unleased with tonic and an orange garnish. Would love to try this in a cocktail, and we think it'd work well in other long drinks, especially a Tom Collins.

We moved on to try a couple of slightly more adventurously flavoured gins, and Orkney Johnsmas Gin was our next port of call. Named after and inspired by the midsummer period, with ingredients gathered from the islands themselves. Local heather is included amongst the botanicals and was definitely apparent on the palate, providing a floral yet earthy backbone to the flavour. We also picked up on notes of liquorice root which gave a great depth to the gin. A classic bitter finish.

Next we moved on to a gin from our beautiful home county of Yorkshire, sampling Raisthorpe Manor's Oak Aged edition. A light, almost tropical, oakiness, was instantly apparent and enhanced by a wonderful spruce resonance - bold and earthy. This was served with a slice of lemon which enhanced and brightened the base gin.


Finally, we headed over to try a couple of Belgian gins at the PJ's stand. These guys have an interesting offering of flavoured gins - we tried the raspberry, an initially sweet drink reminiscent of a sticky homemade jam, that dried out on the palette toward the end of the drink. Apple and elderflower varieties were also available. We finished off with their dry gin which was traditional yet potent, with a great hit of juniper that provided a lasting finish. Tasty and straightforward, a good one to end on by taking us back to basics!

Overall, we found this a well organised festival with attention paid to every detail. We really enjoyed the evening and wish we could have made it to another session, as there was so much to choose from we barely scratched the surface of what was on offer. We'll be back next year!

Cheers,

Laura and Jim

Torrside Brewery: 2nd Birthday Open Day

Since its opening two years ago, Torrside Brewing have produced some of the best beers from a new brewery we've ever had. Operating in a unit by a private marina in New Mills, they brew an excellent mix of cask, keg and bottle, nailing classic best bitters and pale ales alongside a dizzying array of high ABV small batch brews - the Monsters series.

We first met the team - Peter, Nick and Chris - at a homebrew competition that Jim was asked to judge at Brewdog Manchester, about two and half years ago during his time working at Blue Monkey. The competition was entered by numerous brewers who have since gained a foothold in the industry. Amongst over 100 entries of astonishingly high quality, all three now-Torrside brewers won an award. Whilst producing excellent homebrew in itself doesn't necessarily mean you can run a brewery, it does imply you know what you are doing... and it seems that once these three teamed up and pooled their skills and experience, there was no stopping them (not to mention that they're all some of the loveliest people you'll ever meet in the beer world).

Anyway, onto the brewery. We first visited almost exactly two years ago - the tanks were in place, and the first beer was days away from being brewed. The unit seemed cavernous at the time but they've had no problem creating a welcoming space, with plenty of seating surrounding the brewplant and an inviting bar area. 

We launched into a sunny afternoon's drinking with Route 366 - a 4% Columbus, Cascade and Ekuanot hopped pale, which instantly flung itself into contender for cask beer of the year. Reminiscent of what makes the ever popular Sonoma by Track Brewery (their brewer Matt being yet another success story of Brewdog Manchester's homebrew competition - Jim still has dreams about that brett stout!) so special. Pale in colour with a gentle malt sweetness, tempered by soft bitterness and ending with a tangerine-grapefruit character from the Ekuanot hops that absolutely dances on the tongue. Stunning, crisp, and delightfully sessionable. The Yellow Peak pale, 4.2%, was similarly quaffable with the combination of Amarillo, Summit and Mosaic providing a fresh and zesty character with a delicate herbal backbone.

At the other end of the spectrum were two collaboration beers with Elusive Brewing. The first, Creature of Havoc, is a 4.6% cherrywood smoked red, fermented at Elusive. The second forms part of the Monsters series - Coalition of Chaos, weighing in at 9% and taken from the first runnings of the bigger batch brew. Strangely, the stronger beast was the more drinkable of the two (although both were delicious), with a rich malt backbone easily carrying the smokiness of the brew.

We ended the afternoon on a peat smoked barley wine, Hopscotch, which we quaffed on whilst the frankly adorable Kami (Chris's Shiba Inu, and undisputed queen of the brewery) had a little sit on our feet and gazed wistfully upon our bowls of chilli.

Currently the brewery mainly operates at weekends, as the chaps still all have full time jobs not related to brewing. However, the guys make this work to their advantage - this shows through in the beer selection, which oozes a total attitude of care and consideration, and a massive emphasis on quality of flavour. Each and every beer is so carefully thought through, and it's clear that the team really want to create something stunning and aren't willing to compromise by making average brews.

What Torrside have created in New Mills with their brewery open days is a space which is open, inclusive and welcoming to everyone. The brewery was full all afternoon, with the crowd formed of walkers off the hills, families including children, beer industry folk, dog owners, and men and women clearly ready to hop on the train for a night out in Manchester. It reminded us of our time last year in Colorado, where there was no culture of stereotyping the beer drinker and where an industrial warehouse becomes a vibrant atmosphere.

In case it isn't clear from the above, we had an EXCELLENT afternoon. Congratulations Torrside on your first two years of brewing, and here's to many, many more.

Cheers!

EatNorth at North Brewing Co

Recently established by the Leeds Indie Food team, EatNorth is a weekly street food fair held at North Brewing Co, a short walk outside of Leeds city centre. The line up of traders changes every week, always backed up by a beer selection from North Brewing themselves.

We headed over to Leeds on a sunny Saturday afternoon, and spotting that the food traders were pretty much all new to us (whilst Sheffield has a thriving street food scene, it's generally the same names cropping up event after event) we decided to pay EatNorth a visit.

First up, the venue. North Brewing Co is a brilliant set up for events such as this. Having recently added a second unit to their production facility which provides much needed storage, the taproom is spacious without being unwelcomingly cavernous, there's a nice shiny brew kit to drool over and a good amount of outdoor space.

We grabbed a couple of beers to start with - Piñata pale ale (4.5), which with mango and guava was delicately fruity without being overwhelmingly perfumed, and North's recent charity collaboration with Denmark's Dry & Bitter, #NB20, a slightly hazy 7% IPA with a decent whack of tropical flavours and an upfront hop bitterness (read more about North's charity project to celebrate their 20th anniversary here).

Onto the food! We went for the classic halloumi fries from East Midlands based Dukkah, who provide an entirely vegetarian menu. Now I guess halloumi fries are a bit of a trendy concept at the moment but these guys are clearly working for flavour rather than fashion. The fries themselves were nice (it's deep fried cheese at the end of the day, what's not to like?) but it was the toppings that made this dish special - fresh pomegranate seeds, a mint tzatziki sauce and a chilli and pistachio dukkha spice mix coating worked together in fragrant harmony.

We also sampled the crispy king prawns coated in panko breadcrumbs from Tikk's Thai Kitchen, which were served with sriracha fries and a sweet chilli dipping sauce. We've had the satay from these guys before and it's superb, and the prawns did not disappoint given our high expectations. Plump and juicy with just the right amount of crispy coating, and the fries were eye-wateringly spicy in a good way (we had also added extra chilli).

As well as a couple more street food traders, Smak! serving Polish sausages and Oh My Glaze providing chicken wraps and wings, there was a vegan cake stall from Nicely Kitchen and Rabbit Coffee serving hot drinks and espresso martinis, which looked and smelled amazing. So a good selection all round we reckon.

The atmosphere as a whole was brilliant; relaxed, bustling without being packed, and with a DJ playing dub tunes which completely befitted the sunny afternoon. A table outside was stocked with all manner of useful things from suncream to doggy treats, totally indicative of the thought and effort that's clearly gone into arranging this weekly event. Good vibes all round and an event we'd definitely recommend.

Cheers,

Laura & Jim

Mashtuns on Tour - Exploring Barcelona

In a city that oozes history from each and every rambling street, a new and exciting modern beer scene is beginning to emerge. Our hosts for the week, the team from Instituto de la Cerveza Artesana (ICA) in the south of the city, informed us that just a few years ago craft beer was almost unseen in Barcelona (their own bar, Abirradero, opened in 2015), yet today – if you know where to look – there are numerous hidden gems and a real underground culture just waiting to be discovered by the discerning beer drinker.

Here are just a few that we visited, all of which we would hugely recommend:

Abirradero

A short walk outside the main city centre, in the area of Poble Sec, and an absolutely incredible bar. 40 taps showcase a huge array of some of the most innovative beers we've ever come across, mostly brewed at ICA, ranging from ice cream stouts to berry berliners via Belgian New England IPAs and everything in between. Literally every beer we tried of ICA's massive range completely hit the mark - we really can't recommend this bar highly enough.

The food menu was just as varied, and in the few days we spent in Barcelona we were lucky enough to work our way through most of it, much of which incorporates beer into the dishes. Particular highlights for us were the rich and luxurious oxtail, braised for hours in Belgian Quadrupel, the “Fisherman’s Rice” with mussels, clams and enormous, juicy prawns, and the stout infused “Birramisu”.

The “Musico cervecero” was a wonderful Catalan experience – nuts, fruits and raisins served alongside a “porron” (a drinking vessel we’ve never encountered before!) filled with ICA's delicious Belgian Quad, which was passed around the group and shared in a celebration of friendship. The absolute perfect way to end an evening!

Garage Beer Co

Two venues in one here! Garage started life as a brewpub in central Barcelona, but has recently made the move to a larger production brewery in the Sant Andreu suburb of the city. Known for their American-style brewing, and producing mostly hop-forward pale ales, they are a popular choice in Barcelona with locals and tourists alike.

We visited the new brewery first, at an exciting time for the team as they've recently started canning, and have just installed their own (very shiny) canning line - we tried some fresh cans of Middle Child (5%), an Ekuanot single hopped IPA, which was incredibly vibrant and a fantastic fruity thirst quencher. The new facility has enabled them to up production substantially already, but they still have plenty of space to expand into in future, a good sign given the inevitable growth of Spanish craft beer. A bar on the premises currently only opens for special events, but is a great space - modern and spacious, with a feature window looking through onto their barrel store and foeder (which was due to be filled for the first time the week after our visit).

The brewpub is still open as a bar, with the small kit currently not in use, although brewer Joe informed us that they do hope to use this for more experimental brews in the future. As a bar, it's fantastic - a laid back, relaxed atmosphere, with quirky artwork adorning the walls and ten of their own beers on tap.

Black Lab

Let's face it, we were always going to have a nice time in a bar named after a pet! The black lab in question, Lola, sadly wasn't present when we popped by but we enjoyed a tour around the brewkit with owner and head brewer Matt, who hails originally from America. All beer made on the premises in sold on the premises, quite out of choice to ensure that the beer is always looked after and served in exactly the way Matt and the team intend.

Their core range is relatively small without being limiting, led by their flagship IPA Claudia (7%). To keep things that bit more exciting, they also have an entire menu dedicated to beer cocktails and "beer with a surprise" - Laura loved the raspberry Berliner Weisse Sour Lady (4.3%) served with a shot of white chocolate syrup!

The bar itself is down by the harbour in a trendy part of the city - a great place to relax and enjoy some beers, and beer infused food (try the nachos with beer cheese sauce!) after a few hours on the beach.

NaparBCN

With a post-industrial, "diesel punk" feel, and serving modern and progressive beers from around the globe, we felt more like we were in an American rock bar than in the centre of Barcelona. NaparBCN is a brewpub branch of the larger NaparBier, with around half of the beers on the menu brewed on site - our favourite was the Breakfast of Champions Pancake IPA (7%). The guest selection was impressive, with beers from renowned breweries such as Hill Farmstead, Jolly Pumpkin and Alesmith.

We didn't have chance to try the food during our trip, but discovered the kitchen is run by Michelin-starred chef Miquel Aldana. One we've bookmarked for our next visit!

Brewpub le Sec

Tucked away up a side street, this rustic brewpub was a complete polar opposite to the industrial sheen of the other breweries we've mentioned in this post, but it had a charm all of it's very own.

Despite it's small size, the beers brewed on site packed a mighty punch - the MegaSeth Session IPA (3.4%), hopped with Magnum and Simcoe, had bags of flavour and the IPAtti Smith (5.5%) was a lemony Sorachi Ace dream. Well worth seeking out.

Homo Sibaris

Run by the charismatic and very knowledgeable Guillem, Homo Sibaris is a small but bustling bar located a short walk from the Sants train station.

The beer range is impressive, with a wide selection of local brews showcased alongside a few carefully chosen international beers. The bar does food despite having an absolutely tiny kitchen - we had one of the best cheese boards we've ever eaten, comprised entirely of locally sourced produce.

This seemed to be a real "regulars" pub, with everyone in there chatting to each other, sharing drinks, and Guillem behind the bar boosting an already brilliant atmosphere. We were quickly invited to join in the beery chat and treated to a bottle of Reptilian's Apokalypse Imperial Stout to share around our group. We were made to feel so welcome, and it was just a great bar to while away an evening - it knows it's strengths, sticks to them, and does a bloody good job of it.


Obviously this isn't an exhaustive list - other bars we enjoyed included Kaelderkold, Mikkeller BCN, El Drapaire and Bier Cab, but we feel the selection above gives a good indication of the whole spectrum of the Barcelona beer scene.

We visited Barcelona on a business trip - an enormous thank you to Abbeydale Brewery for the opporunity, and for trusting us with the company's first ever international event (you can read more about that here!) and to Dani, Ivo, Nacho and the rest of the team at ICA and Abirradero for being so welcoming and looking after us so well. We had an absolute blast, built some wonderful friendships, and it's definitely a city we plan on heading back to as soon as we can!

Cheers,

Jim and Laura

Can Conditioning - What's the Point?

As canning continues its near meteoric rise as the medium of choice for small pack dispense for many small independent modern breweries in the UK, it is no surprise that developments and targeted improvements to the process are continually being worked upon.

Currently, the majority of canned beer is done through packaging a force carbonated product rather than one that naturally carbonates through residual yeast continuing to ferment the beer, creating CO2 as it does so, as is often seen in bottled beer. We are however now starting to see breweries using can conditioning instead - Moor Brewery in Bristol are one of the pioneers of the process in the UK and are the first to be granted real ale status by CAMRA for their cans.

Having briefly met Paddy of Windsor & Eton Brewery, and Kieran of their offshoot project, Uprising Craft Brewing, at a breakfast organised by The Can Makers at SIBA Beer X earlier in the year, we were invited to taste their test run of can conditioned Treason - West Coast IPA prior to them being launched fully to compare against the filtered, force carbonated version. Here's what we made of them...

Appearance: Due to the residual yeast present in the can conditioned version, it requires a slightly more careful pour than the filtered beer. For research purposes, we were sure to give the same care to the filtered version. The naturally carbonated can gave a firmer head to the beer, more like you'd see on a well poured pint in a pub, compared to the filtered which looked "gassier" with larger bubbles. The clarity of both beers was the same with a little bit of chill haze present in both.

Aroma: Much punchier in the can conditioned version. The residual yeast helps to clear up any dissolved oxygen in the beer, in theory enabling the beer to remain as intended for longer. We did detect a slight oxygenation to the filtered beer, although it's worth pointing out that had we not had the can conditioned for contrast, we probably wouldn't have picked up on it as the hop character was still present... just a lot more overtly fruity for the can conditioned version.

Flavour: Again, we preferred the can conditioned version, although there was nothing wrong with the filtered! The can conditioned had a fresher quality to it with a more vibrant hop character, and we felt that the force carbed version had a somewhat more cloying sweetness to it, perhaps due to the filtration process removing some of the hop flavour which provides a balancing bitterness. It's also worth noting that due to the continuation of fermentation, the ABV of the can conditioned beer comes in slightly higher than it's force carbed counterpart (6.0% compared to 5.8%).

Overall: An interesting experiment! We did think that the can conditioned version triumphed on all counts, however, for smaller operations lacking the space and time to invest in can conditioning, this is by no means a death knell for force carbonated beer in cans (provided the beer is well looked after throughout the brewing and canning process), as both cans were tasty and of good quality. Treason, winner of a Gold IBC award in 2015 and the 2016 Indie Beer Can festival, is currently available in Wetherspoons outlets, and it's good to see that Uprising are keen to go about things in a non-macro way and strive to improve the quality of their product.

Canning in general can be a great way for beer producers to dip their toe into smallpack, particularly with companies offering mobile canning becoming more prevalent, making canning more affordable without the need to invest in infrastructure and equipment. Although across the board the quality of canned beer has been variable, it's definitely continually improving, with breweries progressively honing their technique. Cans are also better for the environment when compared to bottles, being cheaper to transport and more easily recyclable, and also take away the chance of a beer becoming lightstruck. Whilst we didn't intend to write this post to look at the potential advantages of cans over bottles, suffice to say we believe the can is here to stay!

Cheers,

Jim and Laura

Yamazaki Sherry Cask 2013

Named by Jim Murray as the "World Whisky of the Year" in his 2015 Whisky Bible and subsequently reaching massively lofty heights in the £££ stakes at auction, we pretty much anticipated this was a whisky we would never taste. And then a chance retweet meant we won a bottle from the kind folks at The Whisky Exchange. A couple of weeks of do-we-drink-it-or-do-we-cash-in followed, before we realised that was a stupid argument, we'd paid nothing for it, we didn't need the money and besides, we actually wanted to know what it tasted like. Also, CHRISTMAS YOLO. Christmas 2014 was a good day...

We've since savoured this dram, always treating it as a "special occasion" kinda whisky, and so World Whisky Day seemed like the perfect time to polish it off. Here are our thoughts.

Colour: Indulgent mahogany.

Nose: Walnuts, raisins, plum pudding, deep dark wood and bags of demerara sugar, with some allspice and cinnamon thrown in for good measure. The sherry influence is hugely apparent and creates an opulent and enticing aroma.

Palate: Rounded and robust. Hints of black forest gateau with cherry liqueur and dark chocolate both identifiable. Dried fruits and rich sugars follow through from the nose. It's suffered somewhat from being open for such a long time, gaining a slight astringency, and in hindsight we should have just got on with it and drank it quicker as the flavours (although definitely still apparent) have diminished slightly. That said, it's still a great drink and in it's heyday was truly magnificent.

Finish: Long, tannic and warming, the chocolate notes in particular lingering along with the wood. Delicious.

To conclude - it's a very fucking lovely dram indeed, we have absolutely no regrets about drinking rather than selling, and we reckon it's well worth the initial £80-100 pricetag. But over a grand? We'd rather have 20 bottles of Uigedail thanks.

Cheers, and a very happy World Whisky Day!