Summer Catch Up Part 2?

Right then everyone, we’re back! It’s been an exciting couple of months at the brewery and it’s time to update you all on what we’ve been up to.

The first week back saw us with a pop-up bar outside the Students’ Union showcasing two of our refreshing keg beers to the new kids and then on to an exclusive Freshers’ event down at The Gate.

Later on, in the week, our Stu Brew team were invited along to Brinkburn Street Beer Festival along with some other cracking local (and not so local) breweries like Bone Machine and Yorkshire Dales. Six of our beers were on draught for the festival including a very special public debut from our newest addition, Deadline Extension – a thirst-quenching 5.6% India Pale Lager liberally dry hopped with Mosaic, El Dorado and Comet. Clare Moore of Brewery Jewellery also hooked us up with some custom Stu Brew earrings modelled here by our glamourous secretary, Arthur.

   

Last but not least of our Freshers’ Week extravaganza, we had our first brewery bash of the year. Our brewery bashes are open to the public and this time was accompanied by some gorgeous food from The Real Mediterranean Kitchen. A huge thank you also goes out to Pete Bennett and Ade Scarlett for supplementing our night with their acoustic sets along with Newcastle Student Radio for bringing us some jams. It was an excellent night all in all and a great time for the launch of our most recent sour, Concentric Objects.

In collaboration with one of Newcastle’s newest breweries, Full Circle Brew Co., this 3.5% kettle sour showcases passionfruit and mango with a subtle Szechuan peppercorn finish. It went down a storm at the bash and even made an appearance at our Town Mouse tap takeover too.

Concentric Objects appeared alongside some other society favourites at the tap takeover, including Prime, our highly anticipated imperial stout in collaboration with Northern Alchemy and Dog and Rabbit Brewery, as well as Lion’s Pride, a 5.8% NEIPA brewed in collaboration with Two By Two. The atmosphere was buzzing and our committee had a great time if you couldn’t already tell from the grins behind the bar. We hope you all enjoyed it just as much and, all being well, there’ll be more events like this to come.

Following the tap takeover, our brewmaster and home brew club were hard at work for our first brew day of the term. New and returning members brewed Lab Session, a Stu Brew staple, as well as a prototype IPA designed by our president and brewmaster. There’ll be plenty more prototypes to come, the next one being a Czech-style pilsner formulated by our recipe design team, so keep your ears to the ground for that one and much more.

Speaking of what’s to come, we’re excited to announce that Stu Brew’s 5th birthday is fast approaching! To commemorate the momentous occasion, we’ll be hosting a celebratory brewery bash on Friday 15th November. There’ll be lots more announcements on the way for this event so keep an eye on our social medias for that.

That’s all from us for now, but we’ve got plenty of stuff in the works for the coming months. Thanks for sticking with us, guys, there’s big things coming for Stu Brew and we’re glad to have you all on board with us.

The Stu Brew Team

Summer Catch Up Part 1

It might feel like it’s been a long time since our last blog, that’s because it has been. Summer is normally a quiet time on campus but this definitely isn’t true for Stu Brew. We’ll try to give you the low down of some of what we’ve been up to this summer as briefly as possible. This blog is will cover the first part of our summer with the second section coming out next week.

In our last blog, we talked about Stu Brews biggest ever beer, Prime. The first release of Prime is now out but won’t be around for long. Prime is a gorgeous imperial stout with more flavour than you’ll know what to do with.

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The best place to see this beauty will be at the Friend of Anarchy beer festival this Saturday. If you haven’t got a ticket yet then there’s still time to get one here. Make sure to check out the Stu Brew stall if you will be attending as we’ll be serving up a range of our best beers.

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Some of our avid followers may have noticed another new Stu Brew beer knocking around for the last month or so. All-Nighter was a real test that had our brewers leaving the Brewery well into the small hours. A black cherry porter which would struggle to be called subtle, the cherry flavour grabs you and doesn’t let go. Not a classical English porter that’s for sure. Keep an eye out for it over the next couple of months because it’s very limited in volume and won’t be hanging around.

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Since then we’ve also brewed another collaboration beer with Tom from Estate Tea Co, this was a part of Collabathon 2019 and we brewed a sencha infused pale ale. Hakko comes in at 5.4% and is super refreshing with a subtle fruitiness created by the infusion with sencha.

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Even more exciting news is that everyone’s favourite blood orange pale, Zest Tube is now available in cans. Look out for it in your local Stu Brew stockist! It’s the perfect drink for some late summer sun.

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The last update for this week is that we have a tasting session and quiz coming up. This event is in partnership with IChemE, therefore, IChemE members can get a subsidised entry of only £5. Any members of Stu Brew can also benefit from a reduced entrance fee of only £10. Availability is very limited and this isn’t one you want to miss. Included in the ticket price is 6 different beers with a guided tasting from two of our most experienced brewers, a Stu Brew glass to take home with you and the opportunity to win prizes in the Stu Brew pub quiz. It should be a great night and we hope to see lots of people there. Buy your tickets here.

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That’s everything for now,

The Stu Brew Team

End of Year Address

Little bit late with the blog this week folks (we’ll get to why in a minute)…

On Thursday night Tom, Carey and Will were representing the team at The Pride or Newcastle University Awards where we scooped the @Siemens Award for Outstanding Contribution to Sustainability and the Environment. #nclprideawards19. Another great win for the team, and a fitting end to their last week in charge.

Tom (President), Will (Treasurer) & Carey (Social media) – 2018-19 Committee

Friday saw the big one with the “End of Year Brewery Bash”. The rain did its best to spoil the occasion, but thanks to everyone who made it down and braved the weather to help us celebrate the end of the academic year in style. Big thanks to The Real Mediterranean Kitchen for supplying the food and Pete Bennett & Ade Scarlett for providing the tunes!

The beer menu for Friday night saw a host of Stu Brew favourites on show

On Saturday some of the team were on clean-up duty after the events we needed the brewery to be shipshape for Sunday’s brew with @BrinkburnStBrew.

Alan, Harry, and Sandy cooked up a special fruity pale that will be launching at the Brinkburn’s summer festival in a couple of weeks time (21-23rd June). Tickets for the event are available from here. Hope to see some of you there!

Alan, Sandy & Harry brewing up a delicious summer pale.

… and now to the reason, the blog was late. Yesterday. What. A. Day. We’ve been planning a little something special with Northern Alchemy and The Dog & Rabbit for a couple of months now and we finally got around to brewing this yesterday. Full details we’re keeping under our hat for now, but we will say that it’s gonna be an imperial stout. We were trying out a new double mashing technique by using the wort from the first batch to mash-in the second batch. It worked excellently, and the original gravity is a MASSIVE 1.1093. Which might not mean much to some but roughly translates to North of 10-11% ABV!! The downside was it took forever. We’ll not say how long the brew day took, as it probably broke a few employment laws, but basically, some of us left the brewery in the early hours of this morning.

Mash 2 of 2 (190kg each!!)

The blog might become a little less frequent over the next couple of months as some of the team are away for the summer break, and we’re still on the lookout for someone to take over social media responsibilities for next year. We’ll still be brewing and keeping you updated with what we’re up to though so don’t worry 😉

Thanks for all the support this year, and a huge thanks to the outgoing committee who have now officially hung up their Stu Brew overalls… You’ve been a fantastic committee and have left huge safety boots to fill!

Harry, Lucy, Carey, Will, Lydia, Harry, Tom, Rachel, Liam, Paulius & Dom
The 2018-19 Dream Team.

That’s all for now,

Chris

Final week of term, but still busy as ever

This week the Stu Brew team have been very busy hosting events and preparing for more in the upcoming weeks. Friday night saw us running the bar at the fine art show. It went down a treat with Arthur and Matthew as our bartenders for the evening, with a great response to the two beers we had on, Lab Session and Vienna. Was a privilege to host and the night was enjoyed by all. Saturday saw some work going on in the brewery, bottling our gin and getting the brewery sorted for the upcoming bash on Friday

This coming week we’ll be at the Chemical Engineering social on Wednesday, serving up three beers, as well as our cider, looking forward to seeing a few familiar faces to celebrate the end of their assessment period!

And of course, the big event, we have the Brewery Bash on Friday. Some new stuff is happening so we hope to see you all down. As well as the range of keg and cask beers you’d expect, we’re now serving our own gin, selling gin and tonics at the bar as well as offering the purchase of a full bottle at our merch stall. We have a new, more environmentally-friendly drinks plan as well, using glasses rather than plastic pint pots to reduce waste, A deposit will be put down on the glass and at the end of the night you can choose to keep the glass or trade it in for any of our cans.

The bash will be happening at Merz court with food provided by The Real Mediterranean Kitchen, the Gyros are a staple of the Quayside market and we can’t wait to have them down. As well as live music from Ade Scarlett and Pete Bennett of the Kush, two acoustic sets and music inbetween. All setting up to be a great night so we hope to see you all down there in Merz Court Car Park 5pm till Late.

That’s all from us, see you all at the bash on Friday

The Stu Brew Team x

Final Weeks of Term…

Hello from the StuBrew team. We hope all is going well with revision and things are going well, you’re all in the final stretch and soon you can have the freedom to go out and sup on some ales whenever you like. The end is in sight.

Another week with has gone by and the new committee are starting to find their feet with their new roles. We’ve been as busy as ever brewing and sorting out sales and beers, all action stations here still!

This week we’ve had a big brew day on Saturday with Harry and Dan doing a long shift brewing, kegging 13.3 keys of Lab Session and doing a LOT of cleaning casks. A lot of transferring zests and puree to our brews to get that delicious fruity flavour. Harry has also been busy earlier in the week bottling up a load of cider getting it ready for sale. Check out the perfect pour of the puree for that extra fruity note in the pints.

Don’t forget we’ve got our final brewery bash of the year on the 7th of June, get yourselves down for a celebratory pint or two now that exams are finally over. We have food, live music and beer; what more could you want. Expect a couple of acoustic sets from Pete Bennet and Ade Scarlett so get ready for that. Keep an eye on the Facebook event here for any more info and to let us know that you’re coming.

That’s all for this week, keep powering through exams and see you all in Merz court on the 7th for a final evening before summer

Cheers

The StuBrew team

Things are getting zesty!

Hello! We hope that everyone’s exams, revision and deadlines are going to plan. This is a really stressful time of year for everyone – but don’t worry, it will be over soon. It’s nearly summer!

You might have noticed that we’ve got our Brewery Bash on the 7th June. This is the perfect opportunity to come and raise a glass of something soft or strong to the academic year, have a boogie and stuff your faces. In terms of food vendors we’re yet to confirm who is going to be joining us but based on previous bashes it will go down a storm! Also joining us will be Pete Bennett and Ade Scarlett who some of you might remember from The Kush. We’ll be having a few acoustic sets: here’s a snippet of what you can expect to hear…

If this seems like your cup of tea we’d be over the moon to see you there. For updates keep track of our Facebook event, made especially for the Brewery Bash!

Chris and Ali brewed Zest Tube last weekend! This is the perfect summer beer which is packed with the tasty squeeziness of blood oranges. Keep your eyes peeled (if you’ll pardon the pun…) and you might get a chance to try this in the next couple of weeks.

As we explained in last week’s blog post, we’ve just formed our new committee for the next academic year. The team have spent the last few weeks finding their feet, getting to grips with how we operate and have picked up some great transferable skills so far! There’s still time to get involved with the team as we have opened up the role of Creative Design to any students interested in getting involved with the society. This role will be perfect for anyone looking to enhance their design skills. You don’t have to have any previous brewing experience for this role, just like any of our other roles, so we’re looking for someone with a passion for design with bags of enthusiasm to learn. For more details check out the advert here.

That’s all from us for this week but make sure you keep an eye on our Facebook and Twitter for any updates.

Cheers!

The Stu Brew Team x

Out with the old, in with the new

This week saw our AGM and the election of our new committee for 2019-2020. So introducing our team for this year we have:

President – Dan Wolst

Secretary – Arthur Moss

Treasurer – Jack Colledge

Stocks and Sales – Harry Laing

Events Coordinators – Conor Killeen & Emma Paterson-Stephens

Media and Marketing – Harry Brown

Quality Control – Ali Middlemiss

Welfare Officer – Matthew Dark

This week we have an end of year brewery bash coming up on Friday 7th of June, get yourselves down there. From 5pm we’ll be serving up a range of keg and cask beers for you to try. Food vendors and music to be decided, keep an eye on the Facebook event for more details as they come.

As well as this we have been busy brewing on both Saturday and Sunday, getting a lot of new gear ready for the upcoming months. We’ll keep you posted of what is ready when and if you’re a bar or pub feel free to get in contact if you’re after any of our beers.

That’s all from us this week, hope to see all of you down at Merz Court car park on the 7th for one last bash before summer to celebrate the end of exams.

Cheers

The Stubrew Team

A year in office…

Today marks the last committee meeting of the current committee. With the AGM on Friday, we thought it’d be nice to summarise what can be achieved in a year in office. Over 30,000 pints later – here’s what we got up to.

May:

  • First brewery bash held by the new team. Sylvia provided some gorgeous Gyros to accompany the beer.
  • The team won the Community Impact Sustainability award from NUSU.
  • Emily and Jack gave a Pint of Science talk about ‘Yeast in Brewing’.
  • We packed up the 400l kit and TRIPLED in size!!
  • Ran a pop-up bar outside the Student’s Union.

June:

  • Won ‘The Siemens Award for Outstanding Contribution to Sustainability and the Environment’ at the ‘Pride of Newcastle University Awards’.
  • We got a swanky new electric delivery van.
  • Another brewery bash saw the big revealed of the new kit.

July:

  • Ran a Graduation 2018 bar and launched our newest Saison in the Graduation Saison series.

August:

  • Shot some footage with Thumb Design for our nomination for the 2018 Green Gown awards.

September:

  • Finally put beer on Eebria Trade.
  • Teamed up with Tyneside CAMRA and made a cider.
  • Fresher’s Week stall and bar.
  • Pizza and Pint night at Newcastle Tap.

October:

  • First brewery bash of the academic year.
  • Launch of Core Curriculum at the Town Mouse, followed by a bar crawl showing the new students the Newcastle scene.
  • Our first batch of cans arrived!

November:

  • Green Gown Awards – finalist in enterprise category.
  • Final brewery bash of the year.
  • Second batch of cans arrived.
  • Collaboration with Rob from Two by Two.

December:

  • Last pub quiz of the year, at Errant Brewery.
  • Return of our third batch of cans.

January:

  • Celebrated the end of exams with a MTB session at Coppers.
  • After a chat with Zac from Chasing Everest at the MTB, we collaborated the next day to brew ‘Back to School’.

February:

  • First brewery bash of 2019.
  • Collaborated
  • Attended ‘Craft Beer Evolution’ at Tynebank Brewery. Collaborated to make ‘Sticky Imp’.
  • We also brewed ‘Gose’berry Jam’ with Red from The First and Last Brewery.
  • Hosted Naomi from the Guardian to be interviewed for a feature.

March:

  • Provided beer for the Siris Beer Festival held in the Student’s Union.
  • End of term Brewery Bash.
  • First ever Stu Brew tour!

April:

  • Came runner-up at Tyneside & Northumberland CAMRA’s ‘Battle of the Beers’ competition with ‘Exam Room Tears’. The beer was also voted ‘canniest bevvy’. ‘Copy and Paste’ won the same accolade in the cider category.
  • Will be hosting the AGM and post-AGM Brewery Bash on Friday the 3rd of May – find out more here!

The year in numbers…

  • 30,000 pints brewed.
  • The top 6 rated beers on Untappd have been brewed under this committee.
  • 4 collaborations with other local brewers.
  • The beer has been served in over 50 venues.

What do now?

Going to miss the class of 18/19 and want to know what they’re doing next?
Tom Nesfield – President
Either a yearlong placement (we’ll see how the interview goes) or standing for a position on next year’s committee (probably more likely with his interview track record).
Harry Laing – Secretary
Hopefully standing for a position on next year’s committee.
Will van Woerden – Treasurer
Graduating and starting work back home in Loughborough.
Paulius Rasiukas – Brewmaster
Finishing his PhD and getting married! Congratulations from us all here at Stu Brew!
Harry Conn – Sales
Perusing his dream of becoming Homer Simpson and working in the nuclear industry at Sellafield.
Lucy Brearley – Sales
Completing her Masters
Lydia Joynes – Events
Completing a year long placement at Lucite International.
Rachel D’Amours – Events
Graduating
Liam Plunkett – Creative Design
Completing his PhD
Carey Boyle – Marketing
Graduating
Dom Smith – Quality Analyst
Completing a year abroad.

That’s all from this year’s committee, we’ve had a blast! A big thank you must go to Chris, Sandy and Jake who without we wouldn’t have been able to do what we have. Come down to the bash and have a pint with us this Friday and we can’t wait to welcome the next team. There’s still time to stand for a position and if you’re considering it get in touch with contact@stubrew.com.

Cheers,
The 2018/2019 Stu Brew Team

Exam Room Tears? More Like Exam Room Cheers!

Last week saw Newcastle host Tyneside and Northumberland CAMRA’s annual beer festival. As every year we were honoured to brew a beer for this year’s ‘Battle of the Beers’ competition, this year entering the flavoured stout category. WE ONLY WENT A SECURED A RUNNERS UP SPOT! Yes, you read that correctly. ‘Exam Room Tears’, a maple and pecan stout went on to secure the runners up spot in a category competing against some of our favourite local breweries. We still haven’t stopped smiling about this and want to give our biggest thanks to Tyneside & Northumberland CAMRA for organising such a great festival. We hope everyone enjoyed it as much as we did. A big well done must go out to Firebrick, who won the category with their sugar spun stout; it was a worthy winner! If you fancy having a cask of Exam Room Tears, drop Harry and Lucy a message at sales@stubrew.com – there isn’t much left so get some ASAP!

Other than not smiling since Wednesday, it has been a fairly quiet week for the team. We do have one of the most exciting events of the year coming up though – the AGM! This year the AGM will be held in L101 of Merz Court at 4-5pm on Friday the 3rd of May. For more information about the positions you lovely people can stand for, check out the event here. To celebrate the new team coming into office / trying to ease the pain of the old team leaving, following the AGM we will be having a Brewery Bash. We’ve even got Fire and Dough providing pizza for the event. Keep your eyes peeled for a Facebook event that’ll be made sometime soon.

That’s all for this week!

Cheers,
The Stu Brew Team x

March(ing) on Together

With tour, a brewery bash and brewing these last few weeks, we haven’t had chance to do our weekly(ish) blog. So here’s your chance to read a little recap about what we’ve been doing these last few weeks.

On the 22nd we had our first outdoor brewery bash of the year, hosted alongside our good friends at Goodtimes Tacos. The event was a pleasure as always to host and it was great to see some of your friendly faces drinking all of the beer. Our next bash is on Friday the 3rd of May from 5pm.

Dom hard at work! Photo credit: @craftbeerNCL

Following the big clean up after the bash; Chris, Alex and Jack were hard at work brewing our entry for Newcastle Beer Festival’s ‘Battle of the Beers’ competition. Our entry this year is ‘Exam Room Tears’, a 5.5% maple and pecan stout. If you would like to get your hands on some find it pouring at the event this week. Stu Brew members can get free entry to the Wednesday and Saturday sessions with a valid student ID card. With 120 cask beers and 50 ciders pouring you’d be a fool to miss out! Alongside ‘Exam Room Tears’, we also have ‘Textbook’ our 4.5% IPA and ‘Copy and Paste’ our 5.0% cider pouring at the festival. Hopefully we will see you all there!

Jack and Alex post brew day.

As many of you may have already read, last weekend we had an awesome time in Brussels, if you’ve missed out on the action, catch Carey’s recap here.

Next Saturday marks a year since this year’s committee was elected to their roles. We can honestly say it has been a blast of a year. Sadly, all good things must come to an end. This means it’s time for our AGM which is going to be held on Friday the 3rd of May (4-5pm) in Merz L101. More information can be found on the Facebook event, but if you have any questions for now don’t hesitate to drop us a message on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or email us at contact@stubrew.com.

That’s all for this week – see you all at the beer festival!

Cheers,
The Stu Brew Team x