Prepare to celebrate the sour and love the lambic
IPA? You may as well be drinking Foster's. Small 330ml can of American pale with an edgy name and label? Ha. Amateur. Don't you know any beer-lover worth the Wotsit crumbs in their two foot beard are all about the sours, man.
About time then that there was a celebration of all that is sour and Lambic in beerland.
Step forward Northern Quarter sister venues PLY and Kosmonaut, which have pulled together to organise the city’s first sour beer and Lambic festival.
The five day in-house beer event, in collaboration with beer supplier Cave Direct, will take place across the two venues over the course of May Bank Holiday weekend (Thurs 3 to Mon 7 May).
The NQ bars will have 8 taps, each pouring a mix of spontaneous fermentation beer, fruited sour beer, Lambic, kettle sour and barrel-aged sour beer from a mix of UK, European and world-wide breweries. These include: Ft. 3 Fonteinen, Burning Sky Brouwerij Boon, Chorlton, Gueuzerie Tilquin, Oud Beersel and Wild Beer Co.
Resident DJs will play both venues all weekend long, while food will be supplied by PLY’s own pizza producers, who will be competing with Kosmonaut’s Fat Tony to serve the best special addition to the menu.
To plan their weekend accordingly, festival goers will be given a programme listing which brews will be served where and when.
Luca Rollini, marketing manager for both PLY and Kosmonaut, said: “We have a massive love for sour beer so we jumped at the chance to showcase some of the world’s best.
"There will be a huge mix of Lambic, kettle sours, fruited sours, saisons and loads more available over the Bank Holiday weekend. We are super excited for everything we have both on tap and in bottle and the best bit is, there is no ticket needed…just turn up & drink."
Visitors will be able to sample each of the beers and learn some of the interesting stories behind them, such as Brouwerij 3 Fonteinen, a traditional third generation family business which was nearly ruined when a faulty air conditioner caused their whole cellar of beers to explode.
