IT definitely is a beer festival like no other. Which is what you would expect from Cloudwater, organisers of Friends & Family & Beer (March 1-2), the first of two groundbreaking spring hopfests at Upper Campfield Market (checkmout our We Are Lager preview).
F&F&B is essentially a celebration of the global, collaborative, spirit of pioneering craft brewing community. Hence the ‘family’ in the title. Session tickets are high at £60, but you get unlimited pours of some remarkable beers (50ml or 100ml) with all profits going to charities in Manchester that focus on supporting those with inadequate shelter or opportunity.
Both sessions on Saturday, March 2 are sold out, but you can join a waiting list for any late availability. Buy tickets for the Friday sessions (11am-3.30pm and 4.30pm-9pm) here.
More than 60 craft breweries are taking part, including some of Europe and the US’s most groundbreaking operations. We’re having fun just following the lipsmacking @cloudwaterbrew Twitter updates.
The latest trumpets the merits of Fonta Flora, Appalachian wild and mixed fermentation specialists (pictured above looking suitably folksy), who use seasonal plants and little-known ingredients such as kudzu flowers, paw paw fruit and false pennyroyal, finding inspiration in English and Belgian beer traditions.
Anyone for a ‘Doppelbock boiled in an open-top oak foeder with hot granite rocks, and a blended Flanders Red fermented on roasted figs and cherries’?
Their connection with a brewery based in Piccadilly Trading Estate? Cloudwater have collaborated with Fonta Flora on Fanny Pack Convention, a DDH mixed-culture saison brewed with native grapes that was released this year. Small world, big flavours.
Friends & Family & Beer will also be celebrating six UK breweries, which have played key roles in establishing the current scene.
Three are local, Marble, Rochdale’s Pictish and family-run veterans JW Lees, collaborators with Cloudwater (a rare wooden cask of their barley wine Harvest Ale will be at the festival). The other trio are Rooster (Knaresborough), Scottish farm-based Fyne Ales and the wonderful Harvey’s from Lewes, Sussex.
It all promises to be great hop-fuelled bash. Cloudwater are already in party mood, having celebrated their fourth birthday by realeasing a colourfully canned Triple IPA (main image, now available online from the brewery).
Friday, March 1 and Saturday, March 2. Upper Campfield Market, Barton Street, Manchester M3 4NN.