The BeerCast

As a general rule, change is something that happens remarkably slowly in Edinburgh. The drudgery of the tram fiasco is the prime example, but museums and galleries routinely close for years to redevelop themselves – and the Cowgate fire site still remains empty, leering up at the Bridges like a pulled tooth. However, there is one part of Edinburgh changing at a giddying pace. Lothian Road – once infamous for after-hours trouble – is flourishing, with relative newcomer the Red Squirrel now nestling alongside Illegal Jack’s, Wagamama, and (ahem) Nando’s.

For a while though, rumours have swirled around the Edinburgh beer community that another bespoke bar was to open on the same street – and when it did, it would be worth the wait. Officially announced yesterday, The Hanging Bat is set to take over the expiring lease of Mr. Modos. Having been Uluru in a previous guise, the re-invention would only be minor news if it weren’t for the people behind the latest incarnation – and the details of what the Hanging Bat will provide.

Apart from retaining the split-level interior, the inside of the bar will be completely refitted – and will also involve a brand new frontage featuring plenty of greenery (a rarity for Lothian Road in itself). Aside from the cosmetic, the beer on offer will change almost beyond recognition – four cask lines and at least twelve keg will include a house pale ale brewed by one of Yorkshire’s most exciting new breweries. The best nanobrewery in Scotland will also be involved with one of the cask ales, and craft cider will be on offer.

What sets the Hanging Bat apart, however, is that it will also be a fully working brewpub – with a Sabco Brew Magic kit and four fermenters on site. With a head brewer in place, the team can produce their own bespoke beer for the bar, either as a limited special or something more regular. They are also very keen to get the public involved, and for the first time in Edinburgh drinkers can sign up for a brewing lesson and then try their beer on what will be a true ‘customer tap’.

There’s some way to go yet – work begins in six weeks, and hopefully if all goes well the Hanging Bat will be open for business at the end of July. The landscape really is changing – having a fully-fledged brewpub on Lothian Road is huge news for the Edinburgh pub scene. Following on from other recent bar openings, once again the proof is there that when it comes to drinking – change can happen quickly, and definitely be for the better.

The Hanging Bat, 133 Lothian Road Edinburgh EH3 9AD
Twitter Feed – @TheHangingBat

The issue of minimum pricing for alcohol is once again dominating the Scottish media. Yesterday, the SNP administration announced that they would be seeking the widely expected tariff of 50p per unit. Back in November, when the bill was re-introduced, we put down our thoughts on minimum pricing, and how the various groups expressing an interest (either for or against) would respond. There is still a long way to go before minimum pricing becomes the law in Scotland – despite what the SNP state publicly. Here are four major turning points, as we see it.

1. The big night out
There can’t be a person in Britain who hasn’t seen the TV news clips of young people staggering around in the ‘no-go areas’ of our night-time city streets. It’s not as if the boozers are depriving the well-behaved masses of their gentle evening passeggiata – but something needs to be done. Minimum pricing won’t affect pre-loading – put up the price of cheap voddy, and the kids will just spend less once they get into town. Many publicans are responsible, but cracking down on those who serve people already inebriated would be a huge step forward instead.

2. Don’t make the spirits angry
The Scottish Government has a target of doubling Scotland’s exports by 2017 – and as whisky constitutes 20% of the current figure (worth £1.8bn) – our distilleries clearly carry some weight. Many of their trade bodies are not happy with minimum pricing – the Scotch Whisky Association has consistently argued that minimum pricing is illegal under EU Trade Law. Can the government placate this key sector of Scottish Industry? Look for legal challenges to be mounted if minimum pricing becomes law.

3. Most drinkers won’t even notice
The vast majority of alcohol sold in British pubs is already dispensed at higher than 50p a unit. In theory, pubs should have nothing to fear from this. Small traders and off-licences will notice the difference however, as they will have to sell mega-strength ciders at a higher price. One notable exception to all of this is the most infamous Scottish elixir – Buckfast – which already retails at over 50p a unit, so won’t be affected. Most drinkers will carry on buying their booze, irrespective of a price increase – so is 50p too low?

4. Follow the money
Lester Freamon knew what the most crucial factor was. Minimum pricing is not a tax (unlike the high strength beer duty increase), so the money will not go to the Government to spend on the NHS – assuming that’s where it would have been invested. As a point of sale tariff, it will be a windfall for the one group who, to this point, have been rather quiet on the issue – the major supermarkets. People will continue to buy alcohol on their weekly shop. Prices of most other goods are increasing anyway, cushioning the ‘whoa, why is that expensive now?’ factor. Labour has warned of a £140m bonanza for the supermarkets.

There are so many implications still to be considered – minimum pricing is far from a done deal. Scotland is the first country in the world with freely available alcohol to attempt this measure. Broadly, we’re in favour of the measure here on the BeerCast – but then, we earn a decent wage, drink in great pubs and already pay well over 50p per unit for all the alcohol we consume. And our days of stumbling in the puke-filled gutters are over (at least for this week).

Historically, has prohibition ever worked? Even lesser schemes such as this – pricing people out of their drug, rather than cutting the supply off completely – are fraught with problems. For minimum pricing to work in Scotland, firstly it will need to be completely legal – which even the SNP aren’t completely sure of (Nicola Sturgeon said before Christmas that they ‘believed’ it complied with EU law). Of course, they have presumably strengthened their legal position now the actual 50p price has been revealed.

Secondly, it needs to be studied. Last night, BBC Scotland dispatched a reporter to Leith to ask the public if they thought it would work. Clearly not a scientific study, anecdotally at least Leithers seemed to be of the opinion that it wouldn’t – people would still drink if they wanted to. Are the Governement listening? Have they tried to understand why the general public in areas like Leith (rather than Morningside) don’t believe it will work? Alcohol statistics are clearly vital to assessing how minimum pricing fares once it is introduced.

The SNP wants their ‘smoking ban moment’ – fair enough, Scotland’s drinking is an issue and something needs to be done. But it’s not just enough to simply rely on making booze harder to get hold of. Other measures also need to be given as much publicity – alcohol misuse drop-in centres, effective community policing, and a crackdown on unscrupulous publicans, club owners and retailers. Merely putting up the price of a drug isn’t enough. For it to work – and we’re hopeful it will – the wider issues also need to be addressed.

A couple of years ago, I struggled to find words to describe what was, to that point, the worst beer I’ve ever had. I’m not talking about the macrolagers we beery types love to hate; even their greatest detractors would admit they don’t really taste of much. Some can be quite unpleasant, but anyone can close their eyes and chug them down if needed (which, of course, is why they are popular). No, the beer I had back then was revolting – it turned the stomach from the first taste. It was, of course, the infamous Garlic Beer.

Although the memory of seeing the slug-like garlic clove drifting around in the bottom of the bottle is fading, I’d thought my gag-inducing beer days were over. That was until I tried a beer that was almost as bad – in fact, it may actually have been worse. Again, this wasn’t an offering that was simply tasteless, or one that had gone off, or spoiled in some way. The experience of drinking Forstner Chili Hotbeer is unlike any other I’ve had.

It begins reasonably enough – if a little strangely. Completely flat opaque orange isn’t what I was expecting (for some reason I thought it would be brilliantly clear and bright red). The aroma is sweet, hot peppers – like the ones you get on Pizza Express American Hot pizzas, or those roquito peppers that are all the rage at olive stalls. To be honest, it actually smells quite nice – not in terms of something to drink, but as in a decent hot sauce for serving with nachos, or something.

Anyway, on to the taste. AHHHHHHHH!!!! It’s astonishing. Right from the start, from the very first moment of the tentative opening sip – mammoth chilli burn. It’s pure chilli. Heat. Like drinking a police-issue pepper spray. It makes you want to roll around on the floor crying for help. In short – it’s spicy. I had never before had a beer that is patently undrinkable, but this readers – this is the one. You could kill small animals with it.

Released as an ‘extra-sharp’ version of their regular draught chilli beer, I’m not quite sure what Handbrauerei Forstner were thinking. It seems utterly counterproductive to brew a drink that is painfully difficult to even sip. I know some people who quite enjoyed the firepower it deployed – but not me. I want to enjoy beer – go back to the glass on many occasions, and find each one rewarding. The only reward I got from Forstner Chili Hotbeer was sparklingly clear sinuses.

Welcome to the latest Edinburgh Beer Weekly! Every Sunday we’ll be posting a preview of all the beery happenings in the city for the next seven days – so you won’t miss a thing. You can sign up to our subscription service, ensuring you’ll get a notification every Sunday when the Edinburgh Beer Weekly is published. Just enter your email address in the panel on our front page. Also, follow us on Twitter (@thebeercast) to keep right up to date throughout the week. There are so many great beery things going on at the moment – stay tuned to the BeerCast, and enjoy each and every one of them!

So – what’s happening in the Edinburgh beer scene over the next seven days?

Friday 18th
Harviestoun at RBS Lates National Museum of Scotland, Chambers St
RBS Lates Website SOLD OUT

If you have a ticket for Friday’s RBS Lates event at the National Museum of Scotland, then there will be more than historical treasures on offer to keep your attention. Harviestoun Brewery are running tutored tastings of their best beers – Old Engine Oil, Old Engine Oil Engineers’ Reserve, Ola Dubh 12, Ola Dubh 16 and Ola Dubh 18. Led by brewers Amy and Ari, the tastings will run at 7:15pm, 8:15pm and 9:15pm, with 25 places available for each. Harviestoun will also be supplying their Bitter & Twisted and Schiehallion to the bars for the evening.

The Edinburgh Beer Weekly will be published every Sunday here on the BeerCast. If you have an event in or around the city that you’d like to feature – please get in touch at the usual email address. Cheers!

Like footballers and groin injuries, getting hangovers is part of the job – a challenge faced by even the most eminent of beer bloggers and writers. There’s many an occasion I’ve woken up wishing that I’d taken more of an interest in stamp collecting, or another safe indoor hobby that could leave you merely out of pocket, rather than out of kilter altogether. Last month, following a Magic Rock takeover of one of our local Edinburgh pubs, I had such a crushing hangover the prospect of collecting small sticky pieces of paper seemed almost enticing.

Thankfully, it soon passed – which is more than can be said for the hangover. A couple of days later, I caught up with the other people I’d been ruining the rest of my week with. They had all been suffering very differently, leading to the idea that hangovers (and their victims) can be divided into five distinct categories:-

1. The Immobile
These people have hangovers that sever all major motor function. Balls of agony are dispatched by the brain to gather at every major nerve junction, crunching the body into whatever unnatural shape they woke up in. Moving isn’t an option, as even the twiddling of a toe sends blasts of pain and nausea in every direction. The only option is to lie there under the duvet, whimpering, and hope the monster hangover passes by their hiding place. But just at exactly the wrong moment, they sneeze.

2. The Puker
‘Get it out, that’s the best thing’ ‘You’ll feel better once you’ve stopped’ ‘Don’t worry, the toilet needed a clean anyway’. These lies are all familiar to those who favour the most spectacular hangover category. None of them are to be believed – except the second, as once every facial orifice has stopped streaming you do, briefly, feel better. Flumping back into bed, just a bit of sleep and it’ll be fine – until three minutes later when the stomach begins pitching once again, and its back to the toilet. Don’t worry – the body has no use for bile anyway.

3. The Denial
“No, I can’t have a hangover. I only had four beers last night. And that wine wasn’t a strong bottle. The doner on the way home must have soaked some of it up, surely? Although…I don’t remember going into a kebab house. I wonder what I was eating. Anyway, I can’t have a hangover today – it’s the presentation to the vice-chairman of the regional board. Why is my left hand covered in salt? Must be something else. I wish the cat would stop staring. But I don’t have a cat. Who’s that lying on top of me? And why does my presentation have teeth marks on it?”

4. The Headache
This is often seen as the ‘best’ hangover type to get – as from the chin down you are, to a cursory glance, a real human (following a shower to wash off the stench of shame, of course). However, the tradeoff is that the City of Edinburgh appears to be building an extension from the Gogar tram depot to your brain. If it weren’t for the finest drugs available, there would be no chance to be productive. As it is, you’re not productive either – but at least you can fake it whilst mashing the keyboard with your non-coffee hand.

5. The Unaffected
Of course, everyone knows somebody who will say to you – with a beaming smile – that they don’t get hangovers. This statement is usually delivered whilst they are cheerfully pulling on their running shoes four hours after you both crawled home from curry n’ absinthe night at the Red Lettuce. As you are currently lying on the hall floor using the shoes as a pillow, face smeared with tikka masala, feel free to respond to these people in the correct manner – by noisily throwing up in them.