Sheffield SU's Beer and Cider festival 2025

 Afternoon, readers

       sadly I don't know which year this was in terms of numbers of Sheffield SU beer festivals previously. I now I went to SU Beer Fest in Sheffield in May 1994 for my first ever beer festival aged 19, so its more than 30 years old....

I would also like to point out that :

it is still on today;

and, crucially, that it is staffed by volunteers - so hopefully no staff received embolisms from spluttering drunkards.......

I arrived about 1415 and saw Mr Ciderman, who told me that they had sold all of yesterdays cider as well as half of today's cider the day before - it seems Friday had been a thirsty day! Am no expert on cider by any stretch but am always impressed to find a large range of ciders, many of which I admit I have never heard of.....

I started on a whole pint of evil filthy Thornbridge - their Day Maker, a 4% session IPA - as I supped,  the sky darkened and broiling clouds of wrath simmered in the air above - but thats just May. It went straight back to bright sunshine afterwards.

Next up I ventured into what seemed like the pitch black chasm of Hades, which was the main cask and keg bar - I couldn't see the pumpclips, less so the sheets of info, so I asked the lass behind the bar what she suggested - she froze - so I opted for a pint of Two by Two on kftc - it was a tasty if surprisingly flavoured pineapple sour - not that sour to be honest, but it was refreshing!

Having now selected Hopworks Ferocious Citra IPA and secured a table, my next visit involved finding out that they didnt think that was available, nor my second suggestion which was Triple Point Flux,  (which was on later) so I opted for a pint of Brol Future Depends, which I paid for - sadly the guy serving that said it had run out and the lass serving me said they couldnt do refunds so I opted for a pint of Pollys Little petal at 5.2% which cost the same. I went next for a pint of Bristol Beer Factory laser Juice which was a delicious and cloudy pale which I supped chatting to a chap called Tyler, who was probably from Leicestershire. I was then told that the Thornbridge DIPA had run out, but I opted to check on my next bar visit.

Sadly it really had, but the Triple Point Flux NEIPA was now available so I went for that before having my next to last which was to risk the Necessary Evil whisky aged stout at 13.5% so I only had a third,  and, I have to say - it was fairly easy drinking for its strength!

By now the luffly Tash and George had arrived to see me, along with Meathill who was working, and we quickly (not for me!) went for food, where it transpired that probably due to the level of University student demand, everything meat was chicken! I had a spicy chicken burger and chips which was very nice, along with my final pint which I think was Neptune Hidden Cove IPA - sadly all I know is it was cloudy!

So in summary - some aspects were misleading and therefore disappointing, and the lack of knowledge of what was available was frustrating, but, I did enjoy everything I tasted and I think that overall the festival was well organised - I don't know how the cider bar will be doing today with reduced stock but I hope all goes well!

Warmest regards

Wee Beefy

Kveik

Hello again,

        I should firstly point out that I am not suggesting that I am obsessed with hops - I admit that I do really love the hoppier beers, but then who doesn't? Well, I admit that there are a large number of people who don't. but this isn't about them. This is about my original understanding of the product in the title, and what I have recently learnt....

Some time between November and March I started seeing beers listing Kveik as either an ingredient, a feature or in the beer's name. Either due to my eyesight, slight memory issues, or more unlikely, because on all such occasions I had too much to drink (and even if I had found out the facts I then forgot them) - but for any of the above, I "remembered" that Kveik was a hop.  And further lack of clarity allowed me to invent an idea that this was also a type of Eastern European beer style. Get that citric bite from Kveik - I would no doubt have mis-remembered....

Today I was flicking through Friendache and noticed a post by Polly's Brew Co. Regular readers may know that I have really become a fan of Polly's output (there is a link to the post on the same here ), and the last couple of messages from them suggested they were interested in making a deeply fruity and hoppy IPA or DIPA for our entertainment. So seeing this latest notification I was eager to read on.

Their latest information was about an IPA called The Daphne Touch. In their information they included the following in their list of ingredients - Citra, Simcoe, Mosaic and Azacca Hops, Kveik Scandanavian Super yeast, and lactose. They were particularly impressed with the performance of Kveik - which is a yeast, not a hop - since they described it as a brewers dream - "quick to ferment, active at practically any temperature, and oh so many incredible flavours". As well as being understandably impressed with this information (and the rest) I decided to hope I could get hold of some of that, and also to search for info online, where everything is true, lets not forget....

Kveik is in fact a Norwegian dialect word meaning yeast, mainly (but not exclusively I think) referring to a type of yeast that has been used for generations. A blog post by Blogger Lars Marius Garshol makes much of the fact that Kveik is a type, rather than a strain of yeast, and differs in a number of ways from other farmhouse yeast styles - there is a link to his blog post on the same here . The fact that it is described as a farmhouse yeast from Western Norway is interesting, because my knowledge of farmhouse yeast is very restricted - and I always and indeed only link it to Fantome in Belgium. Their sours are amazing., but I was after mad hoppiness.  The Polly's IPA filled me with the reassurance that in fact it was it's notoriety as a super yeast that would be of importance - and thereafter of delight - to drinkers of pungently spicy and bitter small brewery outputs, when Kveik was used. 

Regarding when I last tried it in a beer - things are a tad unclear. Its five weeks since I went to the pub last and admittedly I have had "one or two" further drinks in that time which may have erased some of my memories. Because even though I keep all of the print outs from Shakespeares which they do about their beer range, as well as having about four months worth of photos on my phone, many of boohars tasted,  I struggled to find any information about Kveik as a style, ingredient or name of anything I have tasted recently.  I did imagine that the ever informative Shakespeares webpage from my second home might help - they did, as it turns out they had a Three Hills Brewery Of Juice IPA or DIPA on - but I missed it, and alas I couldn't find any pictures of their beer board which might help prove my claim (I probably wasn't looking correctly) . It is at this point that I have to most humbly suggest some possible qualities to the Untapped app. That said, I have no plans to involve myself in he near future, am just thinking it may assist forget-me-lots like myself.......

So it's an admittedly low level finish to this post, because although I have approximately 2600 photos on my phone I am not confident of finding the three or four pictures I have taken that would possibly identify that I have had a Kveik beer at any stage in the past!

Meanwhile I would keep looking for beers online that may contain it and, most crucially in this case, I would see how easy it may be to get hold of cans from the fab folk at Polly's Brew Co. In hops we trust!

Your very best of health

Beefy