BIRDS ON BEER: Magpie Brewery

End of June 2020

During May I had placed an order for some beer from Northumbria, including some of the excellent From The Notebook seabird themed beers. For June I decided to get a mixed order from Magpie Brewery, which as you'd expect specialise in Corvid-themed beers. As well as a variety of Magpie beers I got to try Jay IPA and Raven Stout, all of which were very good. The other brewery that I'd love to order from are Thames Side Brewery who do Egyptian Goose, Cormorant and Wryneck ales amongst others, but at the moment they don't ship their bottles around the country.

BEER: From the Notebook - Little Tern & Roseate Tern

During a typical week before lockdown I would have picked up a couple of bottles of beer from somewhere in the city, but when this stopped being possible I initially got an order from the Norfolk-based Beers of Europe. By Easter I decided to get a top-up, but this time used the unlikely sounding Northumbria Gifts, who are the main online distributors of the excellent "From the Notebook" range of ales. The labels feature field notebook style illustrations, and money from each goes to a relevant environmental charity. I had sampled many of these before, but not Little Tern and Roseate Tern, the former having been premiered last year at the Bird Fair. As well as those two I got myself a Kittiwake Ale and an Allendale Golden Plover (another birds and beer tick!), whilst being Northumberland Puffins also featured on a couple of bottles.

 Yes, that is a man in a top hat riding a Golden Plover. No, I'm not entirely sure why.

NORWICH: Beer festival

Late October 2018

My annual visit to the Norwich Beer Festival, this year with Karl & Hadley, was enjoyable as always. I was hoping to get to try a beer that appeared to tick all of the birds and beer boxes, Have your cake & Egret by the Magpie Brewery. Magpie Brewery already have lots of beers with Magpies, a Jay and Ravens on the labels, but this one actually features a Little Egret on top of a cake. Unfortunately there was only one barrel, and it wasn't on during my visit. It also gives me an opportunity to raise one of my bugbears, the incorrect use of the word 'literally*'. When the beer was recommended in the Evening News, the manager of the curiosity bar stated "It’s got raspberry and vanilla in it so it is literally liquid cake" - thus showing a fundamental lack of understanding of the ingredients of both beer and cake.

Picture taken from the Magpie Brewery website http://www.magpiebrewery.com/

In terms of beers that I did get to drink, I was pleasantly surprised by Foragers Ale, a beer brewed by Poppyland Brewery and flavoured with Parasol fungi. This is the first time I've tried fungi as a beer ingredient, and it was out of curiosity rather than expectation, but it was actually quite nice. The Poppyland Brewery has previously used a range of foraging ingredients such as Alexanders and Dandelions, but a check on their website suggests that the brewer in charge is retiring and looking to sell the brewery (if you fancy buying it then get in touch with him!). If foraged beers are your thing, then the other one I'd recommend is Wildcraft Brewery, which do a good range of seasonal stuff.

* A week earlier the Autumnwatch social media team, having seen a squirrel caching nuts in one place, had tweeted that the squirrel was "literally putting all of its eggs in one basket". It wasn't doing that.

BEER: A new birdy beer, Light Twite

Thanks to Andy Brown for passing on details of a new bird-related beer for my master list, The Light Twite. I'm always interested to hear about any bird-related beers you might come across (I tend to focus on species on the British list rather than exotics) - you can see the current list through a link at the top of the blog.

BEER: Long-eared Owl and Red Robin

Over the past week I've managed to sample a couple of new birdy beers. If you are in Norwich then it's always worth calling in at the Murderers on Timberhill, but now even more so as you can sample a pint of Long Eared Owl ale from Cotleigh Brewery (a staple source of beers named after birds).

If you frequent further along the Yare Valley then the New Inn at Rockland St Mary currently have Red Robin, a seasonal beer from the Green Jack Brewery, which I'd recommend.

If you see any other bird-beers whilst out and about in Norfolk this festive period then please leave details in the comments!