Little Talks – National Home Brewing Club

Ok, so i’ve been meaning to get up to the Little Talks at WJ Kavanaghs (www.wjkavanaghs.com /@WJKavanaghs) for a while now. The idea is basically they get a person in from a food/drink area to have a talk with people who are interested in that particular area.

This week it was the turn of the National Homebrew Club (www.nationalhomebrewclub.com / @HomeBrewClubIRL) who were doing a live demo of homebrewing. Both an All Grain Brew, and a Kit Brew.

Firstly, the location, WJ Kavanaghs, I can not believe up til now i’d not been here before. This place is amazing. A very wide range of craft beer on draft, but also 5 Casks on the go. What a range. As we’d eaten in Bobo’s earlier we weren’t going to be eating here, but the menu looked really good. Its no wonder this establishment is known for its food as well as its drink menu.

We settled in with a couple of Purity Ale Golds, a lovely cask session ale, at only 3.9% was very drinkable. 

So Padraic and Declan from the National Homebrew Club got the very decent crowd to order and kicked off.  As I said above the idea was they were going to go through an All Grain Brew, and Kit Brew. From the get go Declan made it clear this was going to be an interactive session, ask as many questions as you wanted, and come up and have a gander at the kit in action. Declan was ably assisted by Padraic and James. Who both explained the processes involved. It was a kind of a bit like the old L’Oreal slogan, “Here comes the science bit” thankfully, after each “bit” it was simplified into Laymans language. 

What did I pick up from it, well essentially Kit Brewing is like making a cup of tea essentially, according to Declan anyway, i’m sure i’d find some way to stuff it up. And all grain is where you can take your skills, and develop your own recipes. Or even attempt to imitate well known beers. 

What I found very encouraging was the community feel of the event, I suppose that is natural when you’ve a common interest, but there was a genuine feeling to me anyway that if you wanted to get into home brewing, that this was a forum where you’d be welcome to ask questions, and learn from people who have more experience. Everyone was very welcoming I must say, and I am really looking forward to getting stuck in. 

I am also looking forward to coming back in five weeks to sample the goods! 

Littletalks though is a great idea, here is a link here that shows what they’ve had recently, and what they’ve got coming up.  

I’m particularly looking forward to next weeks one, a beer sommelier will be there, Phil Tavey, hopefully i’ll be able to make it. 

While there I also had a pint of Oxman, from the Brown Paper Bag Project. Cask conditioned, and this was the last cask of this limited edition run. It was a lovely brown ale. It was very very tasty, i’m going to have to pick up some bottles of this before its gone.

As for Kavanaghs, which is ran by the good people behind L Mulligan Grocer in Stoneybatter, i was very impressed, i’m very much looking forward to going back and having a few beers with some very tasty looking food. Thank you for your hospitality.