Indie Beer Feast Sheffield 2026

 Hello there - am a bit delayed with my first post of the year, and this time its all about the Indie Beer Feast beer festival here in fine, sunny, Sheffield!

Am going to boldly claim that have never missed one, but am well aware that may not be true! The first time I went it was in Abbeydale picture house and I went with my chum Mr P, and I recall we ended up finishing in the Hop Hideout bar and bottle shop nearby - which is where it used to be, and obviously makes sense since it is the planning and organising skills of the fabulous Jules - founder and owner of Hop Hideout - that means the festival exists!

For the last three or 4 years its taken place at Trafalgar warehouse, Trafalgar Street, near Corp in Sheffield off West Street. It features a fascinating range of Brewers and Breweries from all around the UK and has tutored tastings, chances to chat with brewers, numerous food stalls, guest speakers, Sheffield history themed information and details of the city's numerous independent trades and and businesses. All breweries supply their own beers to taste, mostly on keg dispense, sometimes in bottles, and this year am sure Ashover and Thornbridge breweries served their beers from cask via handpump.

This year they gave out a Sheffield Beer Week map and Inside it listed the description about Synth City, an exploration of Sheffield's music history, specifically famous synth pop bands, and notable nightclubs and venues of the past, along with a map and a list of the 11 Sheffield Breweries involved in Beer Week collaboration brews!

It was great to catch  up with Abbeydale Brewery, Courier Brewing whom have found out are from Manchester, Liquid Light from Nottingham, Neptune from Liverpool, Cloudwater also from Manchester and Siren Brewing. I also talked to the reps from Kelham Island Brewery regarding their involvement with Fagans pub, and brewing a Fagans beer. I sadly missed the tutored tastings, but one of the things I always enjoy is meeting up with people I know - mainly from pubs  (supping or working in) or through breweries or working in beer shops.

Its difficult to recall exactly which beers I enjoyed most on my two visits (and I went with Tash for the first time on Friday) but the Cloudwater DIPA, Siren DIPA, Ticking Clock and Duality collabs for Beer Week were all excellent,  Ashover Zoo was delicious, Cloudwater Take it with you 7% DDH IPA was immense! Pink Moon raspberry wheat from Liquid Light, Thicane West Coast from Siren, Cloudwater export lager, were likewise noticably excellent - the only thing I didn't do this year was keep  the glass! Oh - and Tartarus Abbadon stout at 17% was mad......

I look forwards to seeing you again next year

kind regards

Beefy 

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Indy Man Beer Con 2015

Hello,

                  this year I was once again offered the chance to attend the Independent Manchester Beer Convention (or Conference?) in, surprisingly, Manchester. Here are some memories of what I, and Tash, found.

Firstly, lets make this clear - I bumped into, on the train, two gents from the Australian state of Lougabarougah, or Loughborough in Leicestershire, as its more commonly known. I'd seen one take a bottle of porter out of his bag for a pre festival snaffle, and asked if they were going to Indy Man. They were, Rob and Justin one of whom runs the Hoptimism beer shop. So I offered to let them share a taxi with  me and Tash since I had been before. It would, I said, cost about £6.50. Arriving at Chorlton Baths, it transpired I should have asked for Victoria baths. In Chorlton on Medlock. On Hathersage Road. A quick trip through Moss Side later with taxi driver Daniel, and we were 40 minutes and £15.00 down. Sorry Rob, Justin, Tash, and myself.

Once in things improved. I took Tash into the main room to buy some tickets - £1.00 each and in my experience between £1.50 and £2.00 a third. This meant that most, indeed almost all, of the beer, was expensive. However, most, indeed almost all, was keg, strong, and unique.

We started at the Quantum brewery stand. Our first two beers were their Gose for Tash and a beer for me called Gin and Juice, a 6.5% sour orange peel and I think elderflower gin flavoured wheat beer. These two thirds came to £3.50. The tone was set. Mainly, if not exclusively, because both beers were excellent. We enjoyed them outside amonsgt the tents and food stalls in warm sunshine.

Inside next we tried an IMBC collab with Northern Monk called Quinceessential. This was a quince IPA at 6.0% and was very easy drinking. So far, I had tasted two beers at 6.0% or more. This, I was to learn, was far from unusual at IMBC.

A trip into the far bar followed including a taste of and a third of the Tilquin Draft Gueze. It was here that we bumped into Rob and Justin and their friend, still talking to us, and supping a third of the bottled Grande Gueze at an eye watering £5.00 a third. I also tried or rather supped a third of Hawkshead Sundown red ale at a "meager" 4.5% and some Chorlton Farmhouse IPA at 7.0%. We sat down with a photographer and a guy from Lancashire called Mike who was really enthusiastic about the styles on offer. Tash also went to try a third of the strong Thistly Cross dry cider, and talked to the who ran the firm.

From this pint on, its probably best if I try and remember enough of the beers I tried to list them. So, with that in mind, other beers tried included:

Zapato and the Beak - Little Leeds Pale, and Raspberry sour
A Bilberry saison which isn't obviously on the list
Cloudwater IPA
Almasty Imperial Stout (10%)
Tuatar NUI (BIG) IPA

Whilst supping and wandering we saw a few Sheffielders - the guy with the name and his friend from the Bath hotel, Sean Clarke from Beer Central, the lass form Mashtun and meow who might be called Chloe (but probably isn't!), Stuart from Magic Rock Brewing (who is at least a Sheffielder by association, and the manager of the Sheffield Tap. We also met up with Jules and Will from Hop Hideout, who were my friendly and supportive hosts last year.

We also went for a sit down on a green-bag in the dark end room and listened to a DJ set whilst snaffling our pork pies and sarnies, and supping amazing LSD (Little Sour Delight, a young sour at 6.8% from Lervig in Norway, along with their Lucky Jack IPA. This was a lovely space and a great opportunity to wind down from the pressure of trying to sample as many beers as we could before 16.30.

At a point after that, things became a little less good. With two tokens left I discovered the bars weren't serving and so I headed to the ticket booth to get my money back, and was told they couldn't do that. I have never come across that at a beer festival before. When I protested I was advised to go and get a canned beer to take out - they, admirably, canned draught beer for supping that day but it was 4 tokens. I was going to give my tokens, which I had paid for, to the guy from Zapato but someone mentioned I could use them next year - so still have them. I don't, however, understand why I couldn't exchange them for cash.

That was the main downside if am honest, along with a lack of cask beers. A guy behind the cask bar said that not enough was sold the year before so they had to give it away. Whilst I understand this is not a viable sales pitch, its still a shame to see so few (10 I think) cask beers on sale from such an extensive list - the link to which is here.

Despite the above this was another excellent showcase of a wide range of UK and International beers - whether you define them as Craft or otherwise. The beer is expensive, but pushes the boundaries of taste and your expectations in a wonderful and excellent quality way -  we didn't try a bad one. The venue, as mentioned last time, is outstanding, and the atmosphere was great.

A thoroughly enjoyable festival!

Cheers


Wee Beefy