As Cask Ale Week continues, Beer Today publisher Darren Norbury looks back at his cask-drinking timeline, a journey of more than 35 years.
It began with Flowers Original. You know, the one with Shakespeare on the pumpclip. Well known for supping a tankard while waiting for the inspiration to flow. It was the occasion of me joining my first newspaper full time in 1985, and we’d just put an edition to bed at the typesetters. And so, true to the long tradition of journalism, we headed to the pub.
That, then, in a pub in Fordingbridge, Hampshire (I can’t remember which one, alas), was my introduction to cask ale. It’s been a bit of a journey since then, via some of the big brands back in the day. Marston’s Pedigree, which I enjoyed then but don’t think is as good now. Wadworth 6X, which I had in bottle recently and did transport me back to the Town Mills, in Andover, where it was served as well as you were ever going to get it.
In the ensuing 35 years or so many more cask ales have provided waymarks in my life. By 1994 I’d been living in Cornwall for five years and was around when Bill Sharp created his first brews near Rock. I went to interview him for a county magazine I worked on, and although he wasn’t the easiest interviewee I’d met (although nowhere near the excruciating Ted Heath encounter of 1986 – another story!), I was impressed by the independent brewer’s commitment to his clients. Within the small industrial unit (these days forming a stairwell within the Molson Coors-owned site) there was a map with pins inserted like a general’s battle plan. Each pin represented a pub and had a string running to a whiteboard showing how the licensee liked their beer delivered. Bright, for almost immediate sale, or yeasted, to varying degrees, for continued fermentation in the pub cellar. Attention to detail.
By 1999, I was in charge of the internet. Well, not all of it. Just the bit involving our group of Cornwall newspapers. My role in life was to take charge of dubious publishing projects. “Not sure this internet thing will take off,” was said by a senior manager in a meeting about this time. It was the time of the solar eclipse. And Cornwall would have been the best place to see it had it not been a gloomy, overcast, anti-climax of a day. But from the gloom emerged Daylight Robbery, a cask special created by St Austell Brewery’s new head brewer, Roger Ryman. This was the base beer that went on to become Tribute, heralding new use of these imported, US, high-alpha hops. Tribute has since become St Austell’s flagship brew, although I always argued with Roger that this honour should go to the fantastic Proper Job IPA. Roger, alas, died in 2020, taken from us far too early. He did, though, turn St Austell from a purveyor of ho-hum beers to a world-class cask brewer.
In 2000, I started drinking in the Star Inn, Crowlas. We lived in Hayle, but the in-laws were around the corner and I suggested Mrs N drop me off at the Star while she visited them. Background information: you may have wondered what a lad from Hampshire was doing in Cornwall. Truth is, it was as far away (I thought) that I could get from my mother. You’re too similar, my father said, that’s why you’re always arguing. Degree of truth in that, I suspect. Anyway, I remember this first visit to the Star particularly because, on the stroke of 5, one of the village matriarchs arrived for her daily few halves of bitter and she was… The. Spitting. Image. Of. My. Mother. The edge was taken off this shock, however, by a couple of pints of Ventonwyn beer. I’d come into the Star because it was the only pub I knew of selling it. Created by James Vincent, this was wonderful, flavoursome, balanced, moreish cask ale of the highest quality. Through no fault of James’s, the brewery was, alas, short lived. My love affair with the Star, however, was off the mark. Twenty-one years on, I’m still having the occasion contretemps with ‘mother’.
In 2008, Star owner Pete Elvin, who had bought the pub in 1999, after it had been closed for a while, started brewing his own beer. It’s fair to say the Penzance Brewing Co has been a multi-award-winning success. In recent times, production has ramped up, and the beers are now bottled, too. In common with many other small brewers, he turned to packaging as the lockdowns bit. But the hub of the sales is The Star, where I do a few hours behind the bar. And more hours on the other side of the bar. It’s well known that my favourite PZ beer is the English-style IPA (6% ABV and deliciously sessionable, trust me!). Orange marmalade notes, bready malt, quenching bitterness. All you want from the style. The main production is hoppy goldens, but Scilly Stout (7% ABV) has something of a cult following, and Crowlas and Brisons serve the market for amber beer lovers.
I drink cask and craft these days, but much more of the former. There’s something about seeing a clear, polished brew (when finings have been used) shining in the glass in the sunlight, and so many memories of cask being the ultimate social lubricant in pubs. So many conversations with good friends, when you lose track of time. And so many new friends made, pilgrims coming to the Star when on holiday, or making a special trip to the CAMRA-dubbed “real ale Mecca”.
There’s still a day or two of Cask Ale Week left. Get to the pub to try your favourite, or venture further and try something new. We have some extraordinarily talented brewers here in the UK, and they need and deserve our support, as do the fabulous pubs where their best work is served. Cask in crisis? I don’t think so. In fact, I think some of the young craft boys and girls may try their hand in the future and we may see a second renaissance. That would be great, and continue a style of brewing for which these islands are so well known.
