Drink Moor Beer

Yesterday afternoon I went to the Moor Brewery near Long Sutton on an organised trip from work. The trip was organised by the social club and attended by 16 employees. This included two of the usual suspects Andy G and Nigel and myself.
We were dropped off by the Mini-bus at the Halfway House,Pitney where we were due to spend some time later in the evening. This was where we assumed the brewery was but its actually about 2 miles away and its only the offices in Pitney. Fortunately the co-owner of the Brewery Maryann Hawke found us and then very kindly ferried us all to the brewery.

The Moor Brewery was rescued from obscurity in 2006 by Californians Justin and Maryann Hawke.They took an ailing and tired business and transformed it into a great brewery. Justin is a passionate brewer and uses his expertise from the other side of the 'pond' to blend American and British styles. He is also a champion of unfined beer, as he says's 'cloudy doesn't always mean bad' and has recently taken this argument to SIBA and won concessions for unfined beer in competitions. He makes a great argument when he says that the taste for crystal clear ale only dates from when we had beer glasses, before that drinking vessels would have been ceramic,wood or leather and who cared what the beer looked like just whether it tasted good.
The brewery is now a twenty barrel outfit with new equipment that was installed last year.

Justin gave us a very comprehensive guide through the brewing process and also had a barrel of So'Hop on for us to try, unfined of course ! . This ale won the overall champion at the Somerset CAMRA festival in Minehead last year and is a really good hoppy ale at 4.1%. There was also a small amount of one of the ales he inherited from the previous owners, Old Freddy Walker at 7.3%. Justin likes his strong ales and also brews JJJ IPA at 9.5%.
The awards wall pays testament to how well received this brewery is by its peers.

Awards Wall

All too soon our visit was over but Justin came up trumps again and organised a taxi to ferry us back to the Halfway House at Pitney.

We arrived at the pub around 7pm and as usual it was already full. We had taken the precaution though of booking a table for 16 so we were soon ordering meals and beers. This sign made us all chuckle though, something lost in translation as it should have read Brecknell, Willis !

Look at all those cloudy beers !

As usual there were ten ales on offer and I was pleased to see two from Moor. I went for Nor'Hop at 4.1%, a beer I had tried a few weeks ago in Crewekerne. It was the unfined version and is a delightfully hoppy and fruity ale with a crisp finish.
Next up was a new brewery for me with Green Jack from Lowestoft in Suffolk. This was Mahseer IPA at 5.0% a strong, bitter but again very hoppy ale.
Third beer of the night was Wessex brewery's Deverill's Advocate at 4.6% a golden ale, but not overly remarkable.
I went next for an old favourite with Hopback's GFB (Gilbert's First Brew) at 3.8% , A nice well balanced session beer.
The time was now getting on and our transport was due at 9pm, but there was still time for 'one for the road' and I plumped for Butcombe 'Bitter' at 4.0%.
A great evening and I would recommend visiting the Brewery if you get the chance.