Down south for MooR beer

I set off Friday morning for a couple of business meetings down south with the expectation of meeting new business contacts, and the hope of making new friends and the promise of good beer and good company.

After a 3 hour drive I picked up Ed at Bristol Parkway and we headed (after a productive meeting in the welsh borders) south to meet Justin Hawke from Moor beer company. I'd met Justin at the SIBA conference and we'd got on well, a passionate brewer he has a unique view point on the British real ale scene having brewed both in his native US and in the UK. I'd agreed in Stratford that we would come down and see his brewery and taste his beer at the 'source'.

We picked Justin up from his home in the beautiful Somerset countryside and our first stop was a tour of the Moor brewery; a converted milking parlour with a 10 barrel capacity. Justin is a really interesting brewer, his beers have one foot in the US beer scene in terms of their style but he's also firmly entrenched in the UK real ale scene. He's a great believer in traditional beer conditioning but despite winning multiple CAMRA awards doesn't have the same hang ups about methods of beer dispense that CAMRA members usually have.

We left the brewery and after loading the car with Kegs and picking up Justins wife Maryann we headed to the first pub of the night The Devonshire Arms at Long Sutton. First beer of the day was Moor's "Northern Star" a malty beer featuring the new "Citra" hop in large quantity. For anyone who knows Moors beer I'd say this was most similar to their "Revival" but with a maltier body. We also got chance to taste Moors Somerland Gold on draught, that is to say on Keg straight to a bar font. The beer tasted fantastic, perhaps a touch cold but with a great C02 'prickle' and as full of flavour as the cask or bottle versions. Justin had wanted us to taste his beer served this way, and it served as an affirmation to me that, flavour as far as good beer is concerned is not limited by the method of dispense.

We then headed to the awesome Queens Arms at Corton Denham. The Queens Arms is a beautiful pub set in the rolling Dorset countryside and has everything you could want in a rural pub, great beer , great food and great rooms (so i'm told). The pub is all stripped floors and roaring fires but its all done in an unpretentious way and not at all the stuffy "gastro" atmosphere that often attaches itself to pubs like this.

We were fortunate enough to have turned up at the Queens Arms during "Moor Beer Month" and so got stuck straight into "Queens Revival" a dry hopped version of Moors already awesome "Revival". This was amazing beer, pungent aroma hops followed up with smooth malty body and dry citrus finish, a great session beer.

We eventually moved to the dining room for food and enjoyed great steaks and amazing seafood dishes to accompany the great beers we were drinking. Pudding meant a fantastic spread of French Savoie cheese and the main event beer wise; a special dry hopped version of Moors famous JJJ IPA. This is normally a massively hoppy, sweet and piney double IPA in the US style that weighs in at a heafty 9.5%. This version of JJJ had also been 'dry hopped' with fresh Citra hops added to the cask. This gave the beer a massively pungent aroma quality which was fantastic. The beer still maintained its bold sweetness and hoppy bitterness but gained another dimension of pungent piney citrusey hops that dominated aroma and first taste completely.

From this point on the evening got a bit hazy. More JJJ was purchased conversation flowed and time got away from us. We ended up saying our goodbyes swapping a few bottles and vowing to return some time soon. I'd urge anyone who ventures down this way to have a look in to this beautiful pub.

Mark Dredge wrote an excellent blog on the Queens Arms recently here. The pubs website is here.