Calling All Homebrewers
Competition Launched for 2027 Beer Festival

Stockport & South Manchester Branch of CAMRA is again running a competition for local homebrewers to find five beers for Bar Nouveau at next year’s Stockport Beer & Cider Festival.

Judges at work Bar Nouveau was introduced in 2015 and features brand-new beers launched at the festival. It’s proved to be a very successful feature and we will be running it again next year (the festival dates are 17-19 June). There will be up to ten beers, all served on a separate bar and properly cooled to ensure optimum condition.

More judges working For the past few years, we have involved local homebrewers and have been delighted by the response. As in past years, each of the five winners will have their beer brewed by a local brewery. The festival will purchase two firkins of each winning beer and the rest will be sold on to the market by the brewers concerned. If you are a homebrewer, this is a great chance to join in a brew day at a local brewery, and also see one of your beers out there on sale to the public.

The brewers who have kindly agreed to host the winners are:

• Steelfish, Manchester (Mild & Brown Ale)
• Marble Beers, Salford (Bitter, Pale Ale & Session IPA)
• Cloudwater Brew Co., Manchester (ESB, Strong Pale Ale & IPA)
• Torrside Brewing, New Mills (Stout & Porter)
• Runaway Brewery, Stockport (Speciality)

Many thanks to these brewers for supporting the competition.

NOW - THE BEERS

The five categories are quite broadly drawn so that you can use your imagination. Here’s what we are looking for:

Mild & Brown Ale — this is a chance to take old beer styles and run with them. Maximum ABV 4.5%.

Bitter, Pale Ale & Session IPA — session ales, pale ales, brown, amber or blonde – the choice is yours. Maximum ABV 5%

ESB, Strong pale Ale & IPA — while we’re not style fanatics, you should aim for a minimum ABV of 5.1%. Apart from that, it’s up to you – brown, red, black or white IPAs are all welcome. Maximum ABV 6.5%.

Stout & Porter — again this is broadly drawn – added flavours and ingredients optional. Maximum ABV 6.5%.

Speciality — this is where you can really go to town. Saisons, bocks, rauch biers – all are welcome. Note – all beers with lactose will fall into this category. Maximum ABV 7%.

A FEW THINGS TO BEAR IN MIND:

First - Although the beers will be judged from bottle, they will have to work as cask beers.

Second - In previous years we have asked people to think about the hops and while that's not really an issue, please do consider commerciality. We will be buying some of each brew for the festival but the host brewers will have to sell the rest into the trade so the beers will have to be commercially viable for them.

Third - Please also note that we will be looking to ensure the entries observe the ABV limits for each category - a tiny amount of drift is OK but not huge overshoots.

Finally - The time lapse between the brewing of the beer and its need to be on sale at the Stockport Beer & Cider Festival is no more than 6 weeks, so inclusion of a maturation period of say 6 months is not possible.

HOW TO ENTER

Just email your name, contact details and which categories you want to enter to: moc.tenretnitb@macots.

The cut-off date for entering is 10 January (but we won’t need details of actual beers until early February).

Judging will take place in late March/early April next year.

 

Winners Win!

Rob Walsh (left) with Chris Clough For some years now, the beers from the homebrew competition have fared well in the Beer of the Festival voting, and this year was no exception.

Dan Leaman & Mike Cunliffe with Keir Allen (left) The winning Beer of the Festival was Dark Corridors, a 4.5% brown stout, brewed at Torrside to a recipe by homebrewer Rob Walsh, from the Chiverton Tap Brew Club. The winners’ certificates were presented on Saturday 29 August at the Torrside brewery tap. Rob, left, and Torrside’s Chris Clough are pictured with their certificates.

The Silver Award at the festival was taken by another homebrew competition winner. This was Project 192, a 6.5% ESB/old ale from homebrewers Dan Leaman and Mike Cunliffe from Levenshulme Homebrew Club which is based at the Station Hop in Levenshulme. Their beer was brewed by Cloudwater, and brewer Keir Allen is shown here, left, alongside Dan and Mike with their certificates.