Magpie Brewery Night

A quick update mainly to let readers know about the Magpie Brewery night at the Globe on Wednesday, June 2nd. Please come along and say hello - and maybe sup a pint or two of Magpie while you are there!

As well as a couple of our regulars, there will be our World Cup beer (well everyone else is making one so ….) called Winging It (to SA), one of our summer beers, Magpie Gold (this is a cross between our previous Magpie Gold and Mapperley Gold that we made last year) and the last chance to try Midnight Mild before 2011. We will be making a second summer beer, First Gold, but it won't be ready in time for the Globe event.

As well as the Newark Festival, there are also a couple of local Beer Festivals coming up this weekend at the Bread and Bitter and the Gladstone and we are pleased to have supplied ales to all of these events.

Only one eye works?

We've been Cyclops'd! Not sure if this is grammatically correct, but our beers have been assessed for the Cyclops system which means that our published tasting notes will change as soon as Ken gets round to it. The idea of this system is to give drinkers more idea in advance of what they are thinking of ordering, by colour, smell, taste, bitterness, etc - this would have been useful to Bob last weekend when, having ordered a "bitter" he was presented with a porter style beer - or maybe the wrong lines were linked up in the cellar ….. Anyway, here's what the Cyclops system tells us:

This year we are making a St George's beer called MidKnight St George, which is a 4.1% copper coloured bitter, slightly paler than Snowdrop, our last occasional beer. We are also making two milds, Dark Secret and a second, following the theme, called Midnight Mild, which will be 4.4% with (we hope) a slightly nuttier finish than Dark Secret.

Running into the summer, we are still deciding which of our previous summer beers to make this year - probably Mapperley Gold, but with a less local name. We are also trying to decide whether to adjust the Svendemonium recipe and make something similar as we quite liked that be. Otherwise we are looking forward to a bit of summer weather (actually spring would do) so that we can get our gardens and allotments under way and so that the hops can get going in time for the next batch of Hedgehopper.

Stop Press: Listen out for our interview on Radio Nottingham (early May?) about the ancient art of brewing - or was it, the art of ancients brewing? ……

Cheers!

Bob, Nick and Ken

March 2010

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Magpie and the Woodland Trust

Anyone who has attended functions will know that instead of charging for the privilege, we invite contributions to be handed to the Woodland Trust. Well, the picture shows Nick handing over a cheque for £2,000 to Andy Shields, their fundraising manager. The money will pay for the upkeep of Springdale Wood in East Bridgford for the next 4 years. Bob and his wife had previously contributed towards the planting of this new wood to mark their silver wedding, so it seemed the obvious place for the brewery to support.

More New Beers

The Treble 20 went so well that we have made a second batch - and this is now sold out while the Navigation Bitter was launched over the Easter holiday and has also been well received. You'll have to go to the Trent Navigation if you want to try it, unless you find it during a rare Beer Festival appearance. Although it isn't a new brew, we have also made our seasonal mild, dark secret, to a slightly revised recipe. It can be found in the Trent Navigation and will be on at the Globe and a few other local pubs fairly soon. We have also sold a load of this to a wholesaler, so it may even turn up in a few pubs outside Nottingham!

First some new beers to tell you about: Midnight Porter was made for the Notts Camra Porter Stroll and was so well received we have made a second batch; Wiggy Bitter celebrated Bob's mate Tony's nth birthday and sold out very rapidly to be followed by another gold beer, Treble 20.

This latter was made to Spyke Golding's recipe and marked a birthday milestone for Spyke. A special version, called Bus Pass Bitter, was dry hopped with goldings and lasted about an hour at Spyke's birthday do at the brewery.

We have just been commissioned by the Trent Navigation to make a bitter exclusively for them. This is a 3.8% copper coloured bitter which will be launched over the Easter weekend. The launch will coincide with an Easter w/e mini Magpie festival, with 5 of our beers set up on the stillage.