IPA LOT 71- The Captains Tale

Here lies the legend of Captain Swurve.......

This tale begins in the late 1700's regarding the legend that is "Captain Swurve". This self proclaimed title was due to his world renowned ability to maneuver his ship with startling agility and guile. A hedonistic rascal of the high seas, he was contracted to the East India Company to ship fine pale ales to Calcutta. Setting sail from Moonfleet in his beloved Dorset, keeping the "land to the left" he would arrive in the east end of London to collect his load. The good captain strongly believed a happy ship is a safe ship and to this end he negotiated a deal for every 70 barrels loaded onto his vessel there shall be one for the crew, Hence LOT 71 came to fruition. The good captain paid special interest to the quality of the beers, as the years came to pass he became quite an expert on the noble art of secondary fermentation, as the beers would be "quality controlled" all along this perilous journey. Such was "Swurves" reputation as a crafty sailor and keeper of fine ales, he bacame associated with fellow gentlemen of the seas, preferring not to fly the skull and crossbones unless it was at the Portuguese or Dutch, he didn't care much for the title "Pirate" as this would invalidate his contract with "The company" but rest assured he was not a man to be trifled with, his cannons had the biggest balls and he wasn't shy of showing them. He chose not to have the de rigueur figurehead of a busty maiden, instead he chose the Cerne Abbas Giant with oversized phallus, depending where he would recount the tale, "it was made of the hardest iron and could crack an iceberg in half"

Legend has it that after a rather tiresome battle with some irritating French chaps that had dragged on for far too long and was going to make lunch rediculously late Swurve decided against the usual twists and turns and swashbucling swordfights and opted for the old favourite of ramming the belly of Jonny Forigners vessel thus sinking it in an instant, as the minutes ticked by half full barrels of brandy started popping up all around, after these were fished out by the men and drunk enthusiastically. Swurve decided to conduct a few experiments of his own. Not a man to be idle and having the eyes of a dreamer and the heart of an artist, he transferred some beer to the empty brandy cask and set it down for a few months to mature. This test was declared inconclusive and in later life he preferred the darkest of ales to be infused in a whole array of casks previously used for Whiskey, Rum, Brandy and the like. As life has a habit of immitating art, your good friends at Piddle Brewery have brewed a very special IPA to commemorate the bravery and admirably elegant style of this legend from days gone by. Some say he is laid to rest at St. Andrews churchyard on the East cliffs of Portland, but we may never know... So raise a glass to Captain Swurve, and enjoy this original 7.1% Proper IPA, Rest assured it's strong, heavily hopped and very tasty, Just as "The Captain" loved it...

Cheers Me Hearties, and Happy Piddling from Vic the Brewer p.s dark ale.. matured in oak whiskey, port, sherry, rum and brandy barrels....is there something secret going on under the stairs of the brewery?? shhhh you might wake them x

Hubble Bubble Toil and Trouble

So folks it's been a while since my last offerings in cyberworld. What's been happening you may well ask... So I'll tell you. Today I am brewing "Flying Low" this one-off special beer is to celebrate the imminent arrival of All Hallows Eve, or Halloween to the rest of us. This is what we have called the fruits of our freestyle method of brewing. Leaving the creative influences down to the beer gods and the availability of ingredients depending on our success at of the noble art of Forraging. Forraging is concidered an art form in these here parts of Dorset. I shall be blogging at different intervals throughout the day.

It is currently half past eleven. The wort has come to the boil and I have added the first offerings of hops to the copper known as the bittering hops. I don't usually disclose my recipes but today is different. I am using hallertau Aroma, an organic hop from New Zealand. These have been forraged from our hop store. I will be adding more of these "later" in the brew as late hops and then I have also forraged some Mount Hood hops from the Hallertau family from Portland, I will then blend the two for off boils. I have to go now as Henry from 3core pumps has arrived to do the pump juggle and change the seal on the final pump, the one that does the transfer to FV from the copper, This new pump not only has a SPECIAL sticker on the side but comes complete with "brewery seal" inside, so the pressure is on to get it back in time.... Elsewhere in the brewery today there has been a sporadic deafening din as Simon has been putting the second brew of the season of Pointing Percy to cask, this is a Munich style beer with a light mouth feel, delicately hopped with no lasting bitterness to the follow. A stunning crisp beer you could drink pints galore, given half a chance. We are coming to the end of the crazy season for outside events, so it's time to repack the mobile contents of the travelling beer bordello back in the shed for winter and Ian to have a day off. Marin Clunes Buckham Fair went remarkably well, and we helped raise over £40,000 for this years charity, Julias House Hospice, please take a moment to look at the link, these people are truly amazing, I cannot say anything that will give the magnitude of this http://www.juliashouse.org/Home.aspx The Dorset show once again was a blast,naughty behaviour was a credit to all our staff and bosses. We peaked at 3 events on one day, I was at Joseph Weld summer fair with Ian. Paul whizzed around everywhere and ended up at Stomping on the Quomps at Christchurch, Ashley started at the Food and Drink Festival at Weyouth Pavillion grazing on fine cheeses, chutneys and networking with the sausage men, he also ended up at Stomping with the rest of the gang, I slipped away into the evening to the 3rd Cerne Abbas Beer Festival with Simon for some intensive market research. Back to today... We're on the final leg of our beers journey, Henry has excelled himself again and with minutes to spare realigned my life and got all the pumps doing what they should, We've had a call from Paul who is out in the field with the "Hedgerow Harvest Team" This is the bit of the Halloween Brew i haven't mentioned yet, The freshest local blackberries, nedless to say our boss now has purple fingers, grass stains on his trousers and about an hour ago almost had the target amount of 2x 20lrt buckets full of wild blackberries, that was until a chance meeting with a lovely old swiss lady walking her dogs gave up much of his harvest to her, and she has promised to bring him back a blackberry and apple strudle later on this afternoon, as they say there's plenty more berrys on the bushes.

That's it for now folks, my transfer is nearly complete and then we are off to find the 2012 Fagin of the counrtyside and his band of merry pickers and what ever is left of their bounty. Cheerio for now. p.s. All done and looks like we're on target for 4.6% abv.

Return of The Leg

Hello Lovelies. So what's been happening in the cathederal of brewing known to many as that quirky brewery in the funny shaped building in Piddlehinton? Well quite alot really.

First and foremost is the long awaited arrival of this years' evolution of Legwarmer. In true Piddle style we did some constructive beer drinking, much pontification, a fair bit of head scratching, two arm wrestles and the best of 27 paper-scissors-stones and it was all agreed we would up the amount of ginger! Our noble leader was a bit sceptical about this dynamic move in direction as "you need to be able to go out and drink 8 pints of it" I took these bold words in their true literal meaning and at the first oportunity embarked on this thankless task at the Sydling Springs Pre-school fundraiser Barn Dance at Nether Cerne. I can faithfully report back that a gallon of this beautiful brew is no problem whatsoever to quaff. In fact I could have squeezed a few more pints in if I had some more time and didn't indulge quite so much on the Home made Pasties. All in a days work for Cheif Brewmeister at Piddle world. The thing that sets Legwarmer apart from many "Beers with Ginger" is the unique malt base. We have done that old chestnut of looking back at history to go forward and push the boundaries in current craft brewing. The secret to the magnificent straw like appearance that glows golden like a hallowed chalis is.... Now I'm playing with a double edges sword here, on one hand I want to shout from the roof tops about my extra special malt base and on the other hand I want to keep my cards close to my chest in case I am the victim of the ultimate flattery and that being immitation, and with the lack of a third hand (one that I am sure Rob thinks we have with our new cleaning regime) I am boldly going to put it out there... And the secret to my success is.... Maize. There you go I've gone and said it. Maize to brew with is simply a pleasure I can only begin to tell you. The colour is like magical gold, not that dull old antique gold you find on expensive oil paintings in the Louvre but brightest gold from cartoon pirates treasure chests. Looking over the malt sacks your face lights up like someone is holding a thousand buttercups under your chin. In the mash tun it doesnt lose much sparkle and what always startles me is the sheer appearance the first runnings into the underback. I add my hand processed ginger into the boil and then in true bisto kid style revel in the wafts of aroma eminating all over the surrounding area. This first brew was especially aromatic throughout the enitire brewery and office, as I had a slight blockage up the chimney. Not to worry, double gloves, safety hoody and some renegade chimney engineering Fred Dibnah would have been proud of, the blockage was cleared and the ginger mist subsided and the whole of enterprise park could once again share the enjoyment of the harmonious notes of aromatic beautifulness. Even the Crendons smoking posse gathered on the lawn remarked how lovely it was! You can now enjoy this unique ale in the surrounding pubs and bars on draught by the pint load, as the beer gods intended.

It was also Clare's birthday a few weeks back, not wanting this auspicious occassion to go unnoticed, I gave our friend James O Neill a call at Wessex FM. We had a quick chat and I told him Clare was 40! and could his listeners give the Piddle Van a flash and a wave to celebrate this monumental day with her. The thing is she isn't 40 infact she is only just in her 30's.... This whole gag was shaping up really well for me throughout the day, until that magical moment the sound clip of Me was played on the airwaves in the van to our birthday girl, I think the word most commonly used is "busted", lets just put it this way when she got back to the brewery I displayed a turn of speed more suited to a man younger than my 42 years. Happy Birthday Clare we don't know where we would be without you xx Finally the "Brewers Reserve" collection is shaping up well for up and coming festivals, "The Taste of Paradise" coconut thunderbox is coming on nicely. As is the hint of vanilla. I hope to experiment with some Elderflower in the next week or so as there is an abundance in the hedgerows and as we aren't a city center brewery and are nestled amongs the green rolling hills of deepest Dorset I feel it would be rude not to. Until next time folks Happy Piddling Vic the Brewer.

Flipping 'eck Tucker, The Giant climb and a coconut

Now that is a lot of beer!!! 266 to be precise. It has been over a month since my last blog, living the life of the brewer in Piddle world is pretty much all consuming this eagerly awaited installment has had to wait for a quite a while. At the SIBA (society of independent brewers) south west beer festival at Tuckers Malting last month I embarked on some of this consumption and consumed many wonderfull beers from my fellow brewers. We were hosts of table J on the judging day, with the exception of serving one beer with ants in, myself and Simon did a sterling job. I was the designated driver on this occasion as Simon doesn't do stick (that's drive a manual car on this side of the Atlantic)so spending a day watching people drink beer did feel a bit odd. But fear not faithfull blogees, I triumphantly returned the following evening with Ian to report for duty and after a short stint selling beer coupons we were despatched behind the bar to serve ale. We promptly made our way to the D's nestled between Dartmoor and Exeter and enthusiasticaly set about the job in hand, informative yet informal was my style. At this point I would like to tell you about my test of nerve and brewing "joie de vivre". One of the ales on offer from your favourite quirky and most talked about brewery was Leg Warmer, nothing unusual there I hear you say, but this was no ordinary Leggy this was a special one off with added ginger, I don't want to give my secrets away but lets just say it was "stunning" Infact it was the trip to see Lady Tesco this evening to harvest some fresh ginger for further experimentation with our leader that I met up with my good friend Johann, who insisted I update News of the Brews, he reminded me about many of the exploits we have been getting up to, I felt he had a valid point so here it is.

As we are now in the month of May we couldn't let the celebration of Beltane pass us by. Beltane being the mid point between the spring equinox and summer solstice, a celebration of saps rising and blossoming of spring, traditionally this is a time of focus on fertility and also on labour. With this in mind a plan started to emerge in the control tower of Piddleworld, this involved a Giant man on a hillside with an impressive phallus, a 9 gallon cask of Cocky Hop, an incredibly early start and of course The Wessex Morris men. All we needed now was to iron out the logistics of this plan. Firstly carrying a cask of beer up and incredibly steep hill in the dark we will have to have bright beer, as it will get shaken up a bit. Secondly we needed to ask the Morris men if they would like us to bring beer along to the dancing and merryment. With those two details quickly sorted it was just the small task of how we are going to actually do it. Paul at this point wished us well and hoped we have a good time. Rob was quite taken by the idea and needed to know exactly what time was sunrise was and how long did we think it would take to carry the beer up the hill and what time would i be able to get back down and get into the brewery for mashing in! As if by chance another good friend of mine happened to be "down our kneck of the woods kite surfing for 4 days" as an ex-serviceman serving for the royal engineers step forward Mr Edom, we have a challenge for you... Alarms were set for just after 4 am. Myself, John and the Cocky Hop made our way to the car park at the bottom of The Giant Hill under the cover of darkness. At this point I thought we had better phone Rob and see how far away he was, well you could have knocked me over with a feather when the phone was answered by Mr Goldsack himself. "Well i couldn't let you lot have all the fun could I" and "I thought i'd better help Rob with the dogs as Sophie has a bit if a thing with Morris men" So with the unexpected suprise of both my bosses, two dogs and an increasingly heavy barrel of beer we strolled up the hill in the direction of ringing bells and torchlights, I say stroll, this is a bit misleading, we puffed, panted, slipped a fair bit, John coughed alot and at one point we thought we'd lost her to the power of gravity we eventally beat the daylight to the top of the hill and when the tap went in, cheers rung out across the Cerne Valley in sheer jubilation, Songs were sung, dances were danced and overall merryment was the order of the day. Thank goodness for the thirst of those Morris Men and the hardy souls gathered for this amazing occasion in slightly adverse weather conditions.

The following day was our second "double brew" day, this time I had the help of Ian. Simon obviously did his assistant brewer thing and kept just ahead of me getting fermenters ready and such like and also following me picking up the pieces. We work together over 11 hours a day, so you have a tremendous understanding and get in a routine with stuff, so starting the second brew before you finish the first one shouldn't be too difficult should it? The small detail of using the hot water from the heat exchanger from the transfer to do the second sparge needing to be exactly 75 to 76 degrees, and this after I had mashed in the second set of malts, there is a point of no return. This is Ians second brew with me, so I tried to hide the concern and make it all look easy, trying my best to be like the proverbial swan and glide gracefully, except I was like that swan you see that has its bum up in the air or hissing alot and allegedly will break your arm if you get too close, Alas all the worry and carefull planning came to fruition, We hit all our timings and levels, and even after Ians initiation into the realms of brewdom and scrubbing the copper clean, we made it into The Oak at Dewlish for last orders. "That wasn't too bad was it" said Rob, "you seemed to have that nailed with no drama" and of course he was right, with no power disruption and a full complement of pumps it was plain sailing, and of course the following day felt like a half day. Before i sign off from these ramblings I need to mention a few people, Big shout going out to Chris aka Wurthers/Grandad our deep heat soaked elder statesman, now on facebook, Ashley from the chair in the office talking the talk, Princess Di and her incredible way with words in credit control,Alex Cosgrove our work experiencer who is due back after a year at university that was actually 9 months and of course our pole dancing queen of the road Clare who is having a few days off from working the drey. I never thought I would say this but I'm looking forward to the old bag coming back to work, i just hope she wears the helmet....

and finally....... The Coconut....You will have to wait until next time for that one, but put it this way, close your eyes, no not yet you wont be able to read this..take a few slow deep breaths in through your nose, imagine a dark rich smokey ale with a deep treacle texture with the unmistakable taste of coconut running through it and a subtle hint on the nose......if you like the sound of that you had better watch out for the unveilng of Vintage Caribean TBox, the taste of paradise.... Happy Piddling Vic the brewer

Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.

Those are the wise words of the great Benjamin Franklin. Never has such heart felt eloquence been declared since the great Stephen Tyler told us all that "life is a journey not a destination."
Putting all that aside, I have to tell you of the many milestones that have been laid down the last couple of weeks at Piddleworld

First on the list is The big guys third anniversary of working at Britains most quirky talked about brewery. This monumental day coincided with brew number 600. This naturally had to be our flagship ale...Piddle. As I have mentioned before, myself and our noble leader spend an admiral amount of time "flavour profiling" and with the assistance of Will the "yoda of hops" we made the slightest of tweeks to the bittering hops. You may already know that we add three stages of hops to every brew, the first lot added at the point of coming to the boil are the "bittering" hops these give the brew its bitterness (funny that) and its astringency, a slight replacement of a proportion of these have given us a smoother and more rounded mouth feel. the other two stages are the "lates" and when the boil has stopped bubbling the "off boils" these give the beer its flavour and aroma. There is something quite spiritual about adding the mighty hop to the brew, I have given the honour of this to two special people over the last few days, Andy Stevens the electrical wizzard the gets me out of trouble at the drop of a hat, or flash bang at the copper! and of course our OLD friend Wurthers. Making sure they both stuck to my strictest health and safety directive and stayed off the top step of my ladders, as we dont want a bright pink screaming man in the beer as it would sting a bit and obviously ruin the brew.

We also got our van back from the Automobile Hospital. Our pole dancing queen of the road had a slight altercation with an indecisive BMW and modified the front. As a momento we have been given the old hood (thats american for bonnet, The big guy is teaching me yankee talk at the moment). We really arent sure what to do with it. My plan is to polish it up with wax and then wait until it snows and then set the west dorset land speed record for a 4 man/3 blokes and a bird, gravity powered machine down the side of the Piddle Valley. Ive picked my spot, but feel it may be quite a while until weather conditions suit.

The sheer mention of snow seems a distant memory in light of the recent weather. Spring is definitely upon us post Vernal Equinox. I have just completed a mini tour of "meet the brewer" in conjunction with wetherspoons Great British Real Ale Festival and the launch of this seasons ale "Cocky Hop". No two events were the same and I have met lots of lovely people, many of whom I will see again when they come to visit the brewery. A special mention has to go to the boys based at Bovington that I met on the sunny patio at The Swan in Weymouth, these brave and spirited men are off to Afghan in the next few weeks, and I wish them a safe and speedy return. Also the two "likely lads" at The Sir Percy Florence Shelley, with a combined age of nearly 150 years with hilarious tales of when man met machine at the automated checkouts in Sainsburys and general chaos and living proof that beer is good for you. Interestingly the local knowledge of an abundance of wild hops growning in a couple of hedgerows got me quite excited. So watch this space for one of the Piddle specials coming out in the autumn, any suggestions of a name for this wild ale will be gratefully received at vic@dorsetpiddlebrewery.co.uk or posted on the comments page here.Until next my happy piddlers, be nice to each other and drink great beer.
Cheers
Vic the brewer

The Vernal Equinox and a Spring in your Cocky

It's that time of year again, when the sun crosses the equator, night is as long as day, everyone gets a bit frisky and we brew Cocky Hop with that certain spring to our step.

Ahh the Cocky fella.. a cheeky number, light and zingy and at 4.7% a heady brew that will add a bit of rosieness to your cheeks. This really does mean those cold dark winter mornings are well and truly behind us. I leave the mill in the morning and I can actually see the van before I get in it, It's a race between me and the sun to see who can be over the top of the hill 1st as i drive up and over from the Cerne Valley into The Piddle Valley. The sun seems to have the advantage over me at the moment. So whats been happening in Piddle world I hear you all ask...Well, (he takes a deep breath and exhales thoughtfully,) I have finally bitten the bullet and had my Hot Liquor Tank repaired, the slight drip......drip.........drip.... progressed onto DRIPDRIPDRIP then a fully blown leak, A tiny leak you may well scoff, tis no more than a tiny repair man, what's the matter with you, get on with it and all that, in reality it was another venture into the world of Heath Robinson egineering skills and complex lateral thinking. All is now well and we can brew again without the slding scale of water mathmatics and temperature stabily to compensate for all of the above. Life is now a breeze again in the brewhouse, my furrowed brow has gone back to normal without the aid of botox. Henry from Three Core Pumps we salute you, and we are forever in your debt. As you can see from the above photograph, we used the gap in the brew schedule to get creative in celebration of imminent launch of"The Cocky One"

Not wishing to be left out of all this artistic behaviour the Big Fella got busy with the brush too, bodly stepping up to the plate, well cold room walls to be totally accurate, he cast aside his gloves and went in bare fisted, as you can see from the photo this hasn't dampened his spirit, and when Clare gets back in the new sprinter I'm sure she will be swooning at the sheer beautifulness of her beloved cold store. "The Bird" as she is politically correctly referred to has been away with her boyfriend to sunny Yorkshire for the week, this meant we had the pleasure of the more experienced knight of the road Wurthers,

He took charge of his kingdom and the slightly modified van with great vigour, showing no signs of his advancing years and without that familiar whiff of deep heat, this is a sure sign the retirement from regular 5 a side football is suiting him well, he did get his footy fix this week when dropping off some Piddle to Wimbourne Town F.C. This weekend sees another local derby against the mighty Gosport. apparently Steve Claridge plays for them from time to time. When Paul heard this he got all excited and proudly declared that he had been there for afternoon tea, upon finding out that this was a different Claridges he swanned off to carry on administering some more direct career guidance to our spirited apprentice.

So in the coming week I will be brewing Cocky, Piddle, Jimmy and of course Slasher. I will keep you up to date on this blog page, If you want to meet me in person I have been ingratiated into the fold of Wetherspoons Beer festivals, I will be taking "The meet the brewer" show on the road and will be at "The Moon in the Square" in Bournemouth on Monday 19th March in the evening and then again on Saturday 24th at "The Swan" in weymouth at 2 o'clock in the afternoon.
Happy Spring Piddling folks

Vic

Big Wednesday and IPA LOT

So February is upon us, the days are getting longer since the passing of Imbolc (google it) and spring is just over the horizon. My blogging hasn't been as regular as I had intended but thats the way I roll.
So whats been happing since my last ramblings, well quite a bit has been going on at the worlds quirkiest brewery. We had the Beerex in Dorchester, I got to the afternoon session on the saturday with our 18 year old apprentice and then again with the rest of the Piddle gang on the evening session.

Our IPA LOT 7.1 was one of the 1st beers to sell out, at a mere 7.1% abv I'm guessing it was enjoyed by many and not one hollow legged legend. It was a game of two halves for me, no pun intended there, the first half was the afternoon, and as i had to drive back afterwards this was a sober affair. The evening was a different story altogether, many beers samples and pontificated over, loud music, Jim from the farm and his crazy dancing, a quick bunk up to the Colliton Club and back before anyone noticed we had gone,and a special mention has to go to my good friend and brewing assistant Simon and yet another expensive jacket on display that we had not seen before, swit swoo big guy! The evening ended in text book style with our bosses treating myself and the wife to tradition turkish supper of champions, before retiring to our taxi for the journey along the Blackmore Vale to home. I do think Empire Kebabs in Dorch should at least sponsor a barrel at next years event! We managed to raise over 10 thousand pounds for charity and the brave souls at Weymouth Lifeboat station can now have ALL their lifejackets replaced.

Back to the brewhouse, we have spent a lot of time evolving our beers, we take into account the tiniest changes in extract from our malts, alpha humulone variances and so on, we have many blind tastings, triangle tests and flavour profiling to keep our beer consistent but with the tiniest tweek here and there, brewing is a mix of art and science and the most rewarding and demanding job in the world, often descibed as a cruel mistress. This mistress had me out late on tuesday evening, helping Andy with the element in the copper and within a few hours I was back at the mash tun just before 7:30am on a day known now as "Big Wednesday" history was made on this day as we took on and completed our first double brew, yes that's two brews in one day with the 2nd one following on before the 1st one has finished, with genius usage of hot liqour and cunning mathmatics combined with confidence befitting a swagger like Mick Jagger, we managed to pull off this feat and be finished just after midnight, Rob had aspirations of being in the pub for last orders, even with his help on the clean down this was a bridge too far on this occasion. The bar has now been set and we will be drinking from the golden chalis on our next attempt!

I have to mention "Little Piddle World" before finishing off this literary masterpiece. Our Shed....a long time in the making, started by "Our Grandad" Christopher Wurthers this thankless task took us over a month to complete, a stolen hour here and there, Young Cosgrove was sent under the roof with a torch and cordless drill and the instruction book that would rival war and peace, we completed this complex structure and the joy and relief was worth it to see the smile on Clares face as she realised her ambition to reclaim the coldstore to house beer only and not a whole load of worthless junk that makes up our outside bars and Robs selection of bar stools.

And finally.. The next seasonal on my schedule is Cocky Hop, a fragrant brew to make, a cornucopia of hops that give a light zingy abundace of taste with a following on of slight bitterness in the aftertaste that keeps you going back for more, available now in bottles and in the cask before the spring equinox.
Happy Piddling folks, until next time...
Cheers
Vic

2012- More than just a number..

So here we are, one week into the new year. Before I start on this years intentions and aspirations, I would like to fleetingly glance back over last year. Two awards for Legwarmer, one courtesy of myself and the other from my predecessor Simon.
I started working for Britain's quirkiest and most talked about brewery the day after my 41st birthday. I have just completed my 100th Piddle brew, this was Silent Slasher. This was a beautiful thing in itself, as the very first brew i made after strolling nervously through the doors of Piddle world was Slasher, and the day my good friend and previous brewer left, the delivery returned from cold filterers and bottling plant with our inaugural batch of you guessed it Silent Slasher. I will never forget that moment of sitting outside the back of the old building with Ginger Simon and Big Simon bathed in glorious sunshine and drinking our very first "bright" Slashers straight from the bottle and toasting the dawn of a new era in Piddle bottled ales.

Moving it along a few months brings me to the great Dorset County Show, this was my first taste of the reactions of the great British public on mass to my Piddle creations. Rob and Paul were on cracking form as usual, ensuring the Piddle Bar was THE place to be, complete with chandeliers, red velvet stools and guilt framed paintings all inside a tent! I would also like to mention the hand crafted bar itself, this resembles a large butchers block complete with coach bolts and constructed by my good self with the cabinet makers tool of choice the 16 inch chainsaw, i recall it was late into one summers evening Rob was in the old office wading through a huge pile of paperwork, Clare had just returned from another hard days cruising round the South West dropping of lots of beer and suntanning her right arm, and i was covered in sawdust, yeast and sweat trying to work out how all these pieces of precision cut timber was going to be assembled into a bar, when our leader emerged from the brewhouse muttered the immortal words " mmm smells like you've been scrambling out here Vic, i think i'd like three of those bars made for the show, and by the way this Leg Warmer that got back today is bloody lovely!"

Of course the big news of the year was our long awaited move to the new brewery, it was always "in three weeks time" until one day Rob told us it will be in the next "two weeks" Simon and I looked at each other, then the open door Rob had disappeared through, then back at each other, did he just say two weeks dude? We better start getting things together, ordering skips and sorting what stays, what goes, and where are we going to put it all, and how are we going to move it all and not lose any brewing days. Luckily enough Big Simon had been hiding his talents for fork lift driving under a bushel, as the day got nearer, he got quieter, had nightmares of our copper breaking loose from the forklift and rolling down the hill and smashing to a million pieces. All of this was unfounded as the move went seamlessly and we were brewing on Bank Holiday Monday.

Our efficiency has got a helluva lot tighter since the move, we lose no hot water on the transfer, and we are the pride of Wessex water for our effluent treatment, so much so that myself and Rob have been invited to the sewage and water treatment works as special privileged guests for a behind the scenes tour by the Water Chief herself, unfortunately Paul said he can't make it that day as he has a very important meeting at exactly that time that he has yet to arrange. All joking aside we are committed to sustainability and will strive to do the right thing to protect and look after our environment. I guess this comes from creating our beers from 4 key natural ingredients, malts, hops, yeast and of course water. I am getting a bit bored of all the high nitrogen talk/cloudy beer being jibber jabbered at the moment, I would like to make my point very clear, never being one to shy away from sticking my head above the parapet I can tell you this, The South West of England has had the "pick of the crop" this year, nitrogen levels are on average 1.51% compared to 1.92% in the east, we had more sunshine and rain when we needed it and less rain at harvest time and I do have the official crop report backing all this up with lots more interesting facts and figures, for sure there is going to be less malting barley available as a nation, so we are very lucky to have our very good friends and best maltsters in the country working closely with us in geographicaly the best part of the country.

Rant over, so what will this year bring us? I have IPA Lot 71 on my brew schedule, this will be ready for the beer festival in Dorchester on the first weekend in February at the corn exchange, www.beerex.co.uk oh how our forefathers would be proud of us using this historic building for such an event. And of course Little Willy is to go into cask too, i have learned a lot from last time i lovingly crafted this hefty brew, i intend to brew a little bit less per batch, as capacity was my issue on the mash tun last time, and the Heath Robinson approach to sparging was fun but not necessary.
It's Saturday night now and I'm sat in front of my laptop with an empty glass, So i will sign off now and go and have a Pint of this Slasher I've been going on about. Please Piddle responsibly, and as my Uncle Paul would say..."away you go laughing"
Cheers
Vic the brewer