The story of Korev, a very Cornish lager

Originally launched in 500ml bottles in 2010 and then on draught in 2011, Korev lager has been an outstanding success story for St Austell Brewery. It was conceived by St Austell's Head Brewer, the late Roger Ryman as a result of challenge from the companies Board of Directors. They felt that although Tribute had become a tremendous brand in the ale sector, the company needed to look to the future where lager sales were on the increase at the detriment of ale.

To create the new lager Roger worked closely with the St Austell marketing team. One of the first tasks was to come up with a name for the new brand and create its values and imagery. We wanted a brand that was uniquely Cornish but at the same time was a premium lager, capable of taking on the major World lagers such as San Miguel and Heineken. A local advertising agency, Bray Leino who were based in North Devon were instructed to help us achieve this and they came up with the name Korev. 

Korev is the Cornish word for beer so fitted perfectly with our ambitions. The imagery created reflected the Cornish heritage, focusing on the Cornish cross and using the Cornish coastline as a backdrop. However, the name Korev, although brilliant in its Cornishness to those in the far South West, was to prove a double edged trait.  As the brand began to grow from its geographical roots many drinkers wrongly assumed the name was eastern European and that the new lager must come from Poland or similar! 

Roger Ryman pictured at the initial bottling run of Korev

With the marketing of Korev going well, Roger was busy developing the new lager. He used a genuine Bavarian bottom fermenting yeast strain and although Korev was originally brewed in traditional squares, cylindroconical vessels would eventually be installed. The brew time of the new lager was to be two weeks, before transferring to a lager tank at -1degree C holding (lagering) for a further week before packaging.

Korev was initially brewed in bottles, but the challenges really began when it was launched on draught a year later. When Korev was launched Roger likened brewing a lager to running down the beach naked as there was no hiding place - the flavours in lager are delicate and subtle so any imperfections to the taste would be immediately obvious. Roger originally described Korev as being in the Hellas style although overtime he would change this view to being more of a Pilsner style and I'd have to agree with this later description.

It was in the summer of 2011 that the brewing challenges of Korev really began to hit home. St Austell had a very strong sales team and they were champing at the bit to get Korev on draught. By the early summer of 2011 installs were going so well that St Austell had to restrict them, production of the new lager could not keep up with demand. As a result, the lager time in tank began to shrink from the planned one week as sales demanded more - Roger would later reveal that for some brews it had been as little as one day. Regretfully this affected quality and the clean crisp refreshing taste of Korev began to take on other less attractive more sinister flavours - Rogers naked run on the beach analogy was coming true!

There was huge demand from licensees and the sales teams for the new lager but St Austell simply did not have the production capacity to meet this in the first year. Somehow we got through that difficult period and Roger would remark years later that we were a little fortunate that no long term damage was done to the brand with the inconsistency of flavours.  A valuable lesson was learned and further investment in production facilities was soon in place as well as improved awareness of likely demand.

On the marketing front it was important that Korev developed some aspirational brand values. A link to surfing seemed ideal and a contract was negotiated to make Korev the Official Beer of Surfing GB (later to become England). This was a major masterstroke as we were able to place Korev in many high profile coastal bars etc that would become shop windows for the brand. 

Korev sponsored Looe Music Festival

Other sponsorships and appointments of brand ambassadors soon followed including Luke Dillon, Newquay based surfer and the highest ranked British surfer in the World. Sponsorships extended to many outside events/festivals such as Looe Music Festival and North Devon's Oceanfest as a strong link to music was built up giving the brand appeal to a younger market. Evermore engaging and innovative merchandise were developed such as the Korev Ford Ranger which became a familiar sight at events, plus giant deck chairs, steel barrel poser tables, seemingly hundreds of feather flags and there was even sponsorship of a Silent Disco!

The Korev Ford Ranger and a selection of merchandise on show for a sampling at Exeter University

The Korev story was completed in 2017 as a brand update took place tweaking the imagery to make it more contemporary. A new bespoke premium glass was also developed which gave Korev access to an improved head keeper. This latter point was important as Korev could sometimes pour a little flat compared to its peer's and the new glass resolved that issue.

Updated Korev bar font and glassware

As a marketer I was very proud to have worked on the Korev brand and was one of those that put in many hours at festivals etc making sure the Korev branding was always premium and to the forefront. It is a great brand and has led the way for other regional lagers to follow but has always remained true to its Cornish roots with strong premium credentials. I'll end the story here apart from the following, as there can be fewer greater measures of success than these comments from the St Austell sales team.

"Korev is a great door opener for us, licensees want to stock Korev but as they can only buy it from St Austell Brewery they have to trade with us, it has become a must stock brand for many pubs and bars in the far South West".

Underdog, a tale of Trade Mark concerns

The official press photo of Head Brewer Roger Ryman at the launch of Underdog & Eureka

Working in marketing for St Austell Brewery we had great success with many brands including the likes of Tribute and Korev, but for every winner there are also losers. St Austell were very innovative and had a great Head Brewer in Roger Ryman, who along with his talented brewing team had a reputation for being ahead of the curve in terms of new beers and failures were rare, but one such beer was Underdog.

Underdog was launched on draught keg in early 2017, it was a 3.5% abv session IPA, originally brewed using a new unnamed experimental hop (US 7270), plus Galaxy and Simcoe hops. It was a high flavour, low alcohol beer with pineapple, citrus and lemon notes intending to leave pub goers wanting more. Underdog was also unfiltered and thus became St Austell's first intentionally hazy beer to become a permanent part of the portfolio. This latter feature was a contributing factor for its eventual demise, although not the main reason as we'll see.

With the interest in craft beer becoming ever more popular the brewing team at St Austell began to experiment with new interesting beers, challenging beer styles, ingredients and flavours. One such beer they developed with was a wonderful low abv sessionable IPA called Underdog. The beer was experimental and the use of the Underdog name was fine for this, but there was a problem, the Underdog trade mark was owned elsewhere and if we continued there was a commercial risk. In the marketing team we highlighted this and advised we should not use the name. However, the ball was rolling, Roger and his team were keen to progress and the sales teams were also enthusiastic. It seemed an understandable passion for the new beer might be clouding judgements around our trade mark concerns.

Underdog, along with another new beer Eureka were showcased at our Sales Conference in January 2017 and launched a month later. Investment was made in font lenses and other marketing materials and the sales teams began to get listings. A year later Underdog was launched in cans, which required a significant financial commitment in terms of brew lengths for canning and also purchasing and storing empty cans. Everything was now in place for Underdog to potentially flourish, but that's not what happened.

Underdog cans where the abv was increased to 4.0%

On draught a problem had emerged. The hazing of the beer was not consistent. Beer poured from a full keg would appear as an appetising light hazing, but as the keg was used the beer began to pour more like soup. Customers at some of St Austell's more traditional pubs were not ready for this and the beer began to lose listings. In cans, sadly none of the major supermarkets showed an interest in listing Underdog meaning St Austell had a lot of stock, both filled and empty cans with no big customers. Things were starting to look rocky for Underdog, but the final and sharpest nail in its coffin came from our trade mark solicitors.

I recall we had a review meeting every year with our solicitors. I was the main point of contact for Intellectual Property matters (IP as it was called), although I was far from an expert, hence the reason we employed the services of solicitors who were. I remember at the meeting they left us in no uncertain terms of the financial commercial risks we could  incur by using and investing in a brand name that was owned by someone else. Underdog was actually owned by Brewdog, who our solicitors advised had a reputation for being quite litigious. I've no idea if that was true, but in the case of Underdog they had every right to be so. It was time to take the risk seriously.

Trade mark challenges from other parties are never a pleasant experience. Solicitors letters are strongly worded to the point of being aggressive with implied huge financial implications. They are not the sort of letters one really wants to land on your desk that often! In my time at St Austell IP challenges included from the likes of Paramount Studios for the use of Italian Job and Halo Foods, owners of Sugar Puffs for the use of Honey Monster. As a marketing team we were not keen to add Brewdog to this undesirable roll of honour!

By early 2019  Underdog was quietly withdrawn from sale. Sales had not reached expectations but above all possible financial penalties from the IP risk was too big to ignore. Would it have survived without the trade mark issues? It had certainly begun to get a few fans and the brewing team had overcome the hazy consistency issues. However, it had limited appeal on draught keg in South West pubs where cask beer was still king and there was only minimal interest for the cans from supermarkets. My personal view is that Underdog was a little ahead of its time and were it to have been launched two years later under a new brand name, a different outcome might have been possible. As it was I believe St Austell had no alternative but to withdraw Underdog given the sales performance and more importantly the IP concerns. 

There were lessons to learn in that the name Underdog, although a good name should not have been used for the launch. Ideally the beer should have been renamed as the liquid was good. One of the positives to come out of this is that St Austell began to take IP concerns more seriously and potential names were now always checked for ownership, even if they were only to be used once for a small batch beer. So sad as it was to see Underdog bite the dust, the tale has positive outcomes for future new brands.

Are you ready for a Ruddles?

Are you ready for a Ruddles is a long forgotten advertising slogan for Ruddles beers, their two brands being Best and County. As a young man I recall these were big brands and County in particular had cult status in the cask ale market and also very popular in its unique stumpy bottles with rip cap in the take home market. Sadly, after a succession of takeovers resulted in various new owners these statements are no longer true. So what is the story of Ruddles and how did it fall from its once lofty perch?

Situated within England's smallest county of Rutland, Ruddles was originally founded in 1858 by Henry Parry in Langham (known as the Langham Brewery). On Parrys death in 1909 the brewery and its pubs were sold to George Ruddle, the then Brewery manager.  Success came and by the mid 1970's Ruddles sold off their 38 pubs to Everards to allow more focus on brewing and supplying beer to supermarkets. 

In 1986 Ruddles was acquired by Grand Metropolitan. Their ownership was not to last as in 1991 to circumvent the 1989 Beer Orders, Grand Met entered into a brewery's for pubs deal with Courage who in turn rapidly moved the brewery on again, selling to Dutch brewing giant Grolsch for a reported £30m. Despite a major investment in marketing, the Ruddles brands were losing their shine as new cask ale brands began to prosper, driven by the changes from the Beer Orders. By the time Morland Brewery of Abingdon acquired Ruddles in 1997 for £4.8m, Best and County were in serious decline and the once powerful brewery at Langham was only brewing to a third of its capacity at 100,000 barrels.

I worked for Morland at the time and we knew it made commercial sense to close the brewery at Langham and transfer brewing to Abingdon. As part of the Morland taste panel we worked hard with the brewing team to taste match the Best and County brewed in Oxfordshire to those from Rutland. The senior management at Morland had good intentions for the brands being reluctant to close Langham if there was any doubt the beers did not taste as they should. At one stage this lead to a postponement of the closure for six months to allow for more refinement. However eventually the closure sadly took place with brewing moved to Abingdon.

Morland had big plans for Ruddles and a new Brand Manager was appointed, the pump clips redesigned and a new advertising campaign themed around the countryside was created. However the golden touch that Morland had with Old Speckled Hen did not work with Ruddles and the decline could not be arrested. Shortly Morland befell the same fate to the Langham Brewery as they themselves were taken over by Greene King in 1999 and the Abingdon brewery closed. The brewing of all brands including Ruddles were now transferred to Bury St Edmonds.

Greene King primarily purchased Morland for its premium Thames Valley pub estate and the Old Speckled Hen brand. The Ruddles brands came as part of the package but were never likely to receive much love and attention in GK's mighty war chest of beer brands and this soon proved to be the case. Best was thrown on the bonfire as they say, being offered to JD Wetherspoons as their value brand and County was allowed to wither further on the vine as it took a back seat to the likes of Abbot Ale etc.

Stumpy bottle

Rip Cap

In the take home market the once iconic stumpy bottle was long gone. This had been Ruddles point of difference but as the premium bottled beer sector grew and the 500ml bottle became the dominant force, the stumpy bottle appearing as poor value for money and not nearly as premium, Ruddles was repackaged in the new size format but it became one of many and lost its appeal against other brands. 

So in 2021, not withstanding the current issues with Covid, tracking down a Ruddles to drink is more challenging. However, I recently tried a four-pack of County cans with its 4.3% abv - I remember this originally being 4.9% and then 4.7%. I really wanted to like this beer as it was once a classic beer and equally iconic brand, but disappointingly it was not a beer I particularly enjoyed, although the can design itself is strong and offers good shelf stand out.

As regards the future, hopefully Ruddles will continue as a valuable niche brand for GK and survive the current craft beer onslaught. Who knows, one day it may yet return to favouritism as drinkers seek out brands with heritage and credibility as it certainly has plenty of those to its name.  

Cornish Bock, a forgotten beer.

Cornish Bock, a forgotten but fabulous small batch bottled beer brewed by St Austell Brewery was a beer that helped inspire me into becoming a  Beer Academy Beer Sommelier. However, it was not so much the beer, but the story behind it that intrigued me most.  Just what was a Bock beer and how did it come by the name, that's what I found just as fascinating as to what it tasted like. 

The story of Cornish Bock goes back to the 2010, it was then that St Austell Head Brewer Roger Ryman first began talking about the relevance of beer styles.  The job of building Tribute into a national beer brand was well established and with the green shoots of the craft beer movement starting to take root in the UK, Roger was keen for beer styles to feature on the beer marketing agenda. For example, a subtle but important change was made to the Tribute pump clip beer descriptor, changing Premium Cornish Ale into Cornish Pale Ale, thus bringing Tributes beer style into play for the first time.

As a marketing team we began to take more interest in beer styles and recall taking a work trip to London where I enjoyed drinking a bottle of German Bock Lager, it was the first time I'd tried a Bock. I spoke to Roger about it and it was then the idea of producing a Bock brewed in Cornwall was conceived. In 2010 St Austell Brewery launched Korev, a fantastic premium lager and with this experience combined with a major investment in brewing equipment, the brewing team mastered the necessary skills required for brewing authentic lagers. Thus, a platform was now in place for brewing a Bock.

Korev Lager (original branding)

By 2012 Korev had become the brand of choice for many premium lager drinkers in Cornwall, the ball was rolling as they say and the Korev lager story was well on its way. So what next in St Austell's portfolio of lagers? The seeds conceived a year or so earlier were starting to germinate and Roger was keen to try brewing a Bock. My input was minimal bar suggesting the name, Cornish Bock, not perhaps the most novel name but it did very much describe what the beer was all about. 

So what exactly is a Bock? Normally a bottom fermented sweet, malt forward lager style beer with low bitterness, rich in colour with an abv of circa 6.3% to 7.2%. Like many good beer stories the origins of the Bock name are somewhat muddied but the one we chose to adopt in St Austell was that linked to the German town of Einbeck, The Bock style was later adopted by Munich brewers where Einbeck was pronounced Ein bock, which means a Billygoat in German and thus many Bock beers began to appear with the goat images on their labels.

Traditionally German Bocks were brewed in the springtime to be drunk throughout the summer, where the higher abv's acted as a natural preservative. However, in the Netherlands the Bock beer style has become very popular and their Bock beer season normally begins in October, where the beer is drunk in the wintertime and throughout the festive season. Finding a Bock in the UK is quite rare, you'll have to visit a specialist beer shop or online store, assuming we don't count the Portuguese imposter Super Bock beer. 

Rather like Cornish Bock, a traditional Bock has become somewhat forgotten and overlooked in the UK. Its not a fashionable taste, full, sweeter, lacking in bitterness with limited hop characters, its not really on the craft beer drinkers radar. However, it really should be be....its a very authentic beer style, tastes fantastic and is more often brewed by quality brewers with a rich history. What's not to like?

St Austell Brewery's Cornish Bock was partly based on the Korev brew but at 6.5% abv, with Perle, Hersbrucker and Saaz hops, it was a rich, deep marmalade colour, sweet with bold toffee caramel flavours topped off with a hint of burntness. I think it was brewed three times although by the third brew it had become overshadowed by other small batch beers that were more flavoursome in terms of hops, hence it never reappeared. It has become somewhat forgotten over time but I shall always have a fondness for it as it sparked my interest in beer styles and was one of the reasons I trained to become a Beer Sommelier, successfully passing my exams in early 2013.

Admirals Ale, the Worlds Best Bottled Beer!

Launch of Admirals Ale

Crowned the Worlds Best Bottled Beer in 2008, St Austell Brewery's Admirals Ale was voted Supreme Champion at the prestigious International Beer Challenge. However today its no longer brewed so what is the story behind this amazing champion beer?

This story begins in 2005 when St Austell Brewery were encouraged to take part in the celebrations for the Bicentenary of the Battle of Trafalgar, not least because one of their pubs, the Blue Anchor was the second staging post for the famed Trafalgar Way. This was the route route taken by Lt John Lapenotiere who was the messenger for Vice Admiral Collingwood in 1805, carrying news of the famous victory at the Battle of Trafalgar and Admiral Nelsons sad death, 

Sailing in his tiny, fast schooner, HMS Pickle, Lapenotiere returned to British shores across often treacherous, stormy waters. He docked at Falmouth and embarked on a virtually non-stop 271 mile, 37 to 38 hour journey by carriage and horses to the Admiralty in London - the route became known as the Trafalgar Way.

Fast forward now to 2005 and St Austell Brewery decided to not only celebrate the anniversary at the Blue Anchor, but also to brew a special commemorative beer to support the occasion. I recall attending a meeting at Cornwall County Hall in Truro with all interested parties for the celebrations and informing everyone that we would be brewing a new beer and it was to be called Admirals Ale - a name I came up with but that was where my creativeness came to an end and its here where St Austell's then Head Brewer, the late Roger Ryman swung into action.

Roger Ryman

Roger created a fantastic 5% abv dark bronze bottled beer, using Cornish Gold Malt, Styrian Golding and Cascade hops. The beer had a spicy aroma which combined with sweet raisin/dark fruits and toasted biscuit flavours - I came to describe it as the Christmas Pudding of beers and it was certainly a very complex. A similar beer today would be something like Adnams Broadside.

Next came the branding, St Austell employed the services of Drinks Specialist Design Agency W.A Pinfold to undertake the initial work. They proposed a cartoon like illustration in the style of famed artist Gerald Scarfe and the unique Admiral Ale brand was born. It was very different for its time in 2005 and the beer was also very special. Add to this that the public showed great interest in the bicentenary and Admirals Ale became an instant hit!

Admirals Ale was so popular that St Austell Brewery decided to retain the beer as part of its permanent portfolio. It was then that the awards began to flow and in 2008 we were invited to attend the Presentation lunch for the finals of the International Beer Challenge. I attended this along with a colleague representing St Austell. We knew something was up when we were seated opposite the judges on the main table and were thrilled to receive the award for the overall champion and the accolade of the Worlds Best Bottled Beer.

Rogers fame as a brewer was already on the up but this award really put him in the limelight as the local press in the South West and Brewing fraternity began to take notice. Many more awards followed for Admirals Ale including CAMRA's prestigious Champion Bottled Beer of Britain in 2010 and to this day it may still be St Austell Brewery's most decorated beer. However, it is no longer brewed so what happened?

Admirals Ale pump clip

Whilst undertaking a brand review the marketeers at St Austell including myself wanted to make Admirals Ale available on draught as a permanent part the portfolio. It had been tried as a seasonal cask beer which was well received by publicans - I remember taking a stand at Plymouth Beer Festival with St Austell beers and Admirals Ale on draught was the first beer to sell out. So, the signs were good but..... we already had HSD (Hicks) as our 5% strong ale on draught and commercially there was not room for both. We proposed delisting HSD and replacing it with Admirals Ale, the rationale being the latter was a more modern beer, unique design and was an award winner. However, we underestimated the love and loyalty to HSD and there was uproar amongst drinkers when our proposal became public. Wisely we decided to retain HSD but it meant the future for Admirals Ale was limited to bottles or perhaps keg.

Admirals Ale continued in bottled format to circa 2017, by which time both interest and sales had begun to wane. Hops and pale beers were very much in fashion driven by craft beers to which Admirals Ale style did not fit. Roger recognised this and proposed Admirals Ale was replaced with a slightly weaker beer of the same style on keg called Ruby Jack - named after Cornish World Heavyweight Boxing Champion Bob Fitzsimmons. Sadly this was not a success and Ruby Jack suffered the equivalent of a first round knockout as it bombed with both licensees and drinkers alike. I was personally never in favour of delisting Admirals Ale but Roger was correct in that something had to be done to ether rebrand, relaunch etc.

Ruby Jack

So that is how one of St Austell Brewery's most award winning beer came to exist and sadly die in the space of little over a 12 years. Looking now at the branding and the comparing this to the current craft beer designs I think it might actually do quite well as it was certainly quirky. The beer style too might be more appealing to drinkers as craft beers are moving on from just pale and hops and venturing into more elaborate and challenging areas. Personally I would love to see a return for Admirals Ale but I think most unlikely apart from perhaps a special for beer festivals.

So to conclude, I am very proud to be associated with Admirals Ale and to have originated the name. A wonderful beer with a strong brand story, I think its memory is best left as an accolade to Rogers wonderful brewing skills.

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Tamar Creek, the story of a Cornish Belgian!

Pair a Head Brewer with a passion for Belgian beers with tasty Cornish cherries, add a pinch of marketing and what do you get -  Tamar Creek, a wonderful Belgian style Kriek brewed in Cornwall in a traditional method using Cornish ingredients, sourced from the Tamar Valley.

When St Austell Brewery Head Brewer Roger first began to experiment with Belgian style beers he brewed some amazing beers, these included Cardinal Syn, a Dubbel and Bad Habit, a Tripel but none was quite so unique as Tamar Creek, a sour beer flavoured with cherries. Sadly, Roger passed away early in 2020 and is much missed, however with the launch of the latest batch of Tamar Creek it seems appropriate to remember one of his more eclectic brewing creations.

I worked in marketing at St Austell Brewery for many years and was amazed by Rogers brewing skills and his prowess to brew great Belgian beers. In 2013 I had just passed my Beer Sommelier qualifications so was very interested in the different beer styles. I can't recall who first prompted the idea, I suspect Roger, but he and I hatched a plan to brew a Belgian Kriek. I then began doing some research.....

St Austell Brewery Head Brewer, Roger Ryman

Kriek, is a traditional Belgian beer style, sour to taste but flavoured with cherries, the effect is a tart ruby red beer offset with a subtle sweetness from the cherries. However, we wanted to make a very Cornish version of this beer. My research quickly pin pointed that the Tamar Valley area in South East Cornwall had been famous for its market gardens, specialising in daffodils and strawberries, with plentiful apple and cherry orchards. This reached its height in the 1950s' but decline set in with the 1960's railway Beaching cuts and sadly by the mid 1970's the industry was in deep decline. 

I set abut trying to locate some of the old cherry orchards which proved a lot harder than I imagined. Approaching some of the local fruit suppliers it seems the traditional cherry orchards had all but disappeared. However I got lucky and was told to contact Jessica and Will from Bohetherick Farm, St Dominick, near Saltash. As luck would have it, I asked in the early summer, the traditional time for harvesting cherries is in July so the timing was right. Furthermore, 2013 was a good year for cherries, I was to find out in later years that often harvests were poor.

Jessica and Will had a cherry orchard with over 50 Burcombe Cherry Trees, some of which were over 125 years old. Come July, I recall on a rather dubious rainy day being despatched to the Bohetherick for a photo shoot and to pick some cherries. Luckily Jessica and Will had already harvested the required amount we needed so my photo shoot was just for show!

With Jessica of Bohetherick Farm picking cherries in July 2013

I returned to St Austell Brewery with the cherries and these were put aside in the cool room ready for use. Roger brewed the beer on St Austell's micro brewery, a small 2 barrel plant where he developed new beers - well known favourites such as Tribute and Proper Job initially began their life in this small brewing plant.

Roger and colleagues mashed the cherries by foot, crushing them to create a red morass of delicious cherry coloured juices and fruit fibre. The beer, based on St Austell's famous Smugglers Ale had already begun its brewing cycle in large oak wooden barrels and the cherries and a wild yeast were added. These were hidden away at the rear of the Brewery warehouse to slumber on through the autumn period, slowly conditioning allowing the wild yeasts to do their worst.

A wild yeast strain can be a dangerous thing to have in a brewery. The risk is contamination with the brewers existing yeast strain which could cause huge quality issues with core brands. Roger was very aware of this and likened it to planting a hay meadow in your pristine bowling green! Therefore the wooden barrels were kept as far away from normal production as possible.

Shortly before Christmas 2013 the beer was first tried at the St Austell Celtic Beer Festival. Proving to be a hit, 1000 bottles were produced in the spring of 2014. Roger was not only a great brewer, but also a gifted marketing man and he was keen for the beer to be called Tamar Creek, linking it to the area of origin and packaged in 750ml bottles, wrapped in wax paper as the bottle label, much like its Belgium contemporaries.

The original 750ml bottles

The original Tamar Creek was a very traditional Kriek, at 7.3% abv it was plenty funky enough, a vinous tartness with a faint background sweetness from the cherries, its was a beer for the aficionados. For me as a Beer Sommelier it quickly became one of my favourite beers to use at beer tastings and I'd often match it with a creamy Cornish Brie.

As I alluded to earlier, successful cherry harvests are few and far between. There was to be no  repeat brew of Tamar Creek until 2019. Unfortunately no Cornish cherries could be sourced for the new brew and slightly weaker at 5.1% abv, but none-the-less the resulting beer is still a fine drop and great example of a Kriek. You can buy this from the St Austell Brewery shop, either in person or online. Its a lovely beer to enjoy with food or as an aperitif. Roger sadly passed away in March 2020, but he would I'm sure be very pleased with the latest batch of Tamar Creek and thrilled his passion for Belgian style beers lives on. Cheers Roger or as they say in Belgium, Sante!

Brewers & Brands from yesteryear - Kaltenberg Braumeister Lager

Kaltenberg Braumeister was a lager from the late 1980's that Regional Brewers hoped would help them compete on the top table with the big lager players of the time, namely the likes of Heineken, Carling, Skol etc. However for Braumeister, although a quality lager and launched with all the precision and detail you would expect from a German brand, it was to prove a short lived disappointment and end in failure.

Competing with the big national brands in the standard lager category has always been tough for regional businesses, they simply don't have the marketing muscle, but that's where the idea behind Kaltenberg Braumeister was a little different. The thought was that a number of Regional Brewers would brew Braumeister under license and pay into a national marketing pot, thus getting more bang for their marketing buck enabling them to challenge some of their much larger peer group brands. Amazingly this did start to work for a while and there was even a TV advert featuring Freddie Star dressed as a German U Boat Commander.

Other Regional Brewers who joined the Kaltenberg train included Higsons of Liverpool, who soon became part of Boddingtons with a combined estate of over some 800 pubs.

My connection with Kaltenberg Braumeister was as a young man who had just joined Thames Valley Regional Brewer, Morland Brewery. In 1988 Morland had a solid pub estate of over 200 pubs but their main beer was the cask ale Morland Bitter, it had a strong heartland following but that's where it ended. Old Speckled Hen was merely a commemorative beer served in nips and the brewers foray into keg beers had been a disaster - their beer was called Artist Keg and all the name associations that it conjured up! 

So, looking back the decision to invest in a new lager brewing facility and take on the brewing of an unknown German lager was a huge step for a hardly cutting edge Regional brewer. At the time I did not appreciate what a commercial risk this must have been, for a brewer to make that same decision now would be ambitious to say the least.

In June 1988 Morlands lager brewery was officially opened and Kaltenberg Braumeister was welcomed aboard. It came with an illustrious pedigree, Kaltenbergs beers being Royal Bavarian which has a special meaning in the history of lager. Prince Luitpold, Kaltenberg's Managing Director is a member of the Royal Family, which apart from ruling Bavaria for over eight centuries was responsible for one of the most important beer regulations - the Rheinheitsgebot - the 1516 purity law which stated only the purest natural ingredients of barley, malt, hops and water where permitted in the brewing of all Bavarian beers. Kaltenberg Braumeister was brewed to the Rheinheitsgebot and much of its marketing focused on this.

Prince Luitpold of Kaltenberg at the time of the launch

I recall Morland launching Kaltenberg with a couple of large outdoor garden parties with Prince Luitpold in attendance, complete with traditional Bavarian fayre of drink, food and the musical kind. Sales of Kaltenberg initially boomed, the launch had gone well and many pubs were keen to take the new brand. With its iconic stein style bar font and good marketing to back it up what could possibly go wrong, but wrong it certainly went! The lager itself was distinctive with plenty of flavour and at 3.8% abv it compared well with some of its weaker abv competitors. However, the flavour was to the be the first of Kaltenbergs undoings......

A photo taken from the launch

At a time when most standard lagers were easy to drink tasteless affairs, the more authentic tasting Kaltenberg was something very different and some of the key target market found this too challenging. It was also said that Kaltenberg would give you a headache. Remember at the time people were used to drinking in quantity and not quality so this was unwelcome side affect. The Rheinheitsgebot was a mark of quality and should have been a positive but to the UK market at the time it meant very little. However Morland saved up the the biggest torpedo that sank the good ship Kaltenberg Braumeister for a couple of years later.

Kaltenberg used a traditional Bavarian lager yeast and this was shipped every eight weeks from Munich. However, sadly after 18 months Kaltenberg suffered serious quality issues to the point where pubs took the lager off the bar - it was cloudy and tasted bad. The culprit turned out to be a cross yeast contamination caused by Morlands own ale yeast. Kaltenberg sales never recovered with Morland customers as licensees were reluctant to try it again and with its reputation sunk, by the mid 1990's it was gone. A disaster you might say, BUT NO, on the horizon was a knight in shining armour, or in Morlands case, speckled armour! 

1990 saw the new Beer Orders come into force and Morland were lucky enough to have a very creative Marketing Manager at the helm (not me, I hasten to add, I was his number two). I recall he took the allocated marketing money for Kaltenberg and realising that it would be money wasted, he spent it all on the launch of Old Speckled Hen without telling the Chief Executive!  However his gamble worked and very soon Morland had one of the biggest ale brands of the 1990's on their hands.

So back to Kaltenberg Braumeister. In my view, it was a lager aimed at the wrong market for its time. It also met with some bad luck that would ultimately be its undoing. It had a lot going for it in terms of provenance and quality and were it to be launched today, it might be a different story. The Kaltenberg beers would resurface again, the Diat Pils version is well known and the brewery continues to thrive in its Bavarian homeland.