Bird’s Eye View
Cider with Rosie
Like many of the staff at the 4th Hinckley CAMRA Beer Festival I managed to leave work a few minutes early on Thursday to catch Matt Hampson open the show at 5pm, and was keen to buy his new book “Engage” too but as soon as the show was open we were off, so like me you can get the book at www.matthampson.co.uk/
In the new venue we were in the same hall as the Beer Bar so it gave us more of an idea of how many people were actually there, although of course there were many more upstairs in the café and on the terrace.
Tricia Bannister and I opened the “Cider” Bar with 16 out of the 20 different varieties of Cider, Perry and Pyder, plus 13 different fruit wines available over the weekend. Two of our first customers were a couple from Yorkshire en route to Devon, who had decided to make us a scheduled stop over, and had booked overnight accommodation to enable that. What a good idea! From the 2 Perries, a Pyder, and 13 Ciders the early runner on Thursday was Broad Oaks’ Somerset (7.5%) Perry. Jackie Wallis took over from Tricia at 7pm and we had a steady night with our only two “empties” being a couple of the wine bottles. A dip of the barrels gave us an approximate total of 14 gallons of ciders having been consumed. No pressure then just another eighty nine to go. A pleasant evening giving us time to learn how to dodge each other whilst serving, chat to people and compare the brews, whilst working out what we needed for the rest of the weekend. A cooling fan was going to be essential as it was quite warm.
On Friday Tricia and I opened up for the day at 12noon, with a crowd already waiting to descend, so a nice steady trade again. At 3pm Hilary Miller took over from Tricia and amongst our little crowd of cider drinkers a kind lady with Welsh connections got our Gwynt – y DDraig Pyder translated, So Wind of the Dragon became Windy Dragon which we all thought was slightly better than Dragon’s Wind. Customers now knew what to ask for, and that started to sell very well. Helen Jones came over to help and I took advantage and went home for an hour. We expected to be very busy but it was manic. Hilary went back to do the Front Desk and Helen to the Beer Bar. Jackie came on to the Cider Bar and from 7pm to 11pm we had no time for a break or to speak to each other. Fortunately Robin Newhouse was able to lend a hand as it was non-stop. The crowd managed to push the counter ever nearer the barrels during the evening so it got very cosy for the three of us behind it. The Thatcher’s and the Broad Oak both went but we had another barrel of the Perry so at some stage someone changed that over, and we also put the other Broad Oaks on, ciders Moonshine & Old Bristolian. By the end of the evening we were rather shell shocked, and another 14 bottles of fruit wine down plus another quick dip of the barrels showed that The Wilkins Farmhouse, Norbury Farmhouse, Gwatkins Stoke Red and the Westcroft Janet’s Jungle Juice were all finished. So Friday consumption over 50 gallons gone and thirty seven to go.
On Saturday Tricia and I again opened up at 12noon, and with the prospect of all day to go, although not expecting as many customers , we added the Rockingham Northants Perry and also their Kingston Black Cider which proved very popular. Again it was quite busy, and Claire, who was working to gain more experience for running her own Beer Festival to raise funds for the Samaritans took over from Tricia, and did a sterling job as by the time Liz Lewin and Jackie took over from her later we were fast running out of everything. So by 10pm a further twelve bottles of fruit wine had been consumed, and having squeezed every last drop of cider out of the barrels I awarded myself the last pint, as I had barely touched a drop all weekend, apart from a tiny taste of each so I knew what they were for the customers. Not from choice of course but we just didn’t have the time. Finishing earlier than planned gave us a bit of time to start the clearing up, which we finished on Sunday, followed by a quick zap around town to retrieve the banners whilst there was not much traffic around. So many thanks to everyone, I think we all thought it was fun despite the hard work involved. And some feedback given to Alan was that people commented how nice it was to have so many ladies taking such a proactive part in all the various capacities.
Rosie Cooke