SEPT/OCT 1998

VOL.3 NO.8

London Calling

It all began with an innocent phone call to Roger Protz, Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) notable and accomplished beer writer and editor. I don't quite remember what it was we were discussing, but I do remember mentioning to him in passing that I would be in London about the time of the 21st annual Great British Beer Festival. The next thing I knew, I had been signed up as a GBBF judge.

Of course, I had been planning to attend the Festival, as I was to be in London the entire time that it was on, but the idea of judging simply did not appeal to me. Visions of the multiple hours that Great American Beer Festival judges spend assessing dozens upon dozens of brews flashed through my head and did wonders to discourage me from active participation. What I did not know at the time, however, was that the preliminary judging for the GBBF takes place at the local level and only the very best in each category get to go to the final. When I learned of that, and found out that I would be asked to taste a mere handful of ales, I was instantly made much more amenable to the idea of acting as judge.

The judging on Tuesday, August 4 took place at the same locale where the Festival would begin later the same afternoon, the London Olympia on the city's west side. My panel consisted of six individuals, myself included, and our assignment was to appraise six standard bitters. It was a fairly casual judging, with each of us marking our own scores but still free to discuss the beers with our co-adjudicators. And at the end, it was obvious that one beer had risen head-and-shoulders above the rest.

That beer was the Coniston Bluebird Bitter and it went on to be judged the Champion Beer of Britain, the GBBF's version of "Best of Show." It was spot on what I consider to be an excellent, true-to-type bitter, with bright florals and an appetizing undercurrent of nuttiness on the aroma, light fruitiness and gentle bitterness in the body (making it both complex and profoundly drinkable -- an all-too-rare combination), and a full bitter finish with a slow and lengthy fade. In short, it was delicious!

I was never able to get back to the Bluebird at the GBBF over the course of the next few days, but that was only because there was so much else to try. Living up to its billing as "The World's Biggest Pub," the GBBF is a cask ale lover's delight, with over 300 real ales on offer. And when you add in the dozens of ciders and perries, plus the foreign beer bar where dozens more beers -- including virtually every gueuze produced! -- were available for very reasonable prices, it becomes easy to see how the GBBF has earned its reputation as one of the world's great beer fests.

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