beerfest at the harvest fest

curly.bert

I was down there last night and had a great time. €10 entry is grand considering you get a meal voucher which is essentially a fiver back. The bands inside last night were great, although I agreewith KevKIRL that it would have been better if the music was in the tent, rather than outside. That said, if the tent had been packed, the music might have been too much, so there's probably a logic to it.

€5 a pint is fine IMO. If you're heading down, I recommend trying the TSB cask ale - lovely stuff that we rarely get down here. But the winner of the night for me was Metalman's Moonbeam. Beautiful dark ale.

As an aside, I heard a fella up at the bar giving out to the staff that they didn't have Heineken. FFS.

AdMMM

Was there on Saturday afternoon, Saturday night and Sunday afternoon and thought it was very well run! The toilets were probably the best facilities I've ever seen at one of these events. I was initially bit worried about how the bar would work when it got busy but thankfully it was never more than two deep and the bar staff were happy to give customers a small taster of a beer which I think is very important before somebody pays €5 for a beer/ale that they wouldn't like.

As for the beer itself, they ran out of the White Gypsy beers on Saturday evening which was a pity because their Blonde wheat bear was delightful and nice and refreshing at only 4%. Porterhouse ran out of their own Temple Brau on Sunday too which is a very impressive lager. I mostly stayed on Metalman's Chameleon wheat beer because I wanted to support local and it was beautiful.

Jerry Fish curated the entertainment on Saturday and both his band and Gavin James really impressed. It was a shame about the positioning of the stage because most people opted to stay in the tent meaning there wasn't much of a crowd or atmosphere by the stage until the later part of the night.

Food really left a lot to be desired for a food festival. Looking at the map, I assumed the best food would have been in Bolton Street but it was only burgers and chips. I was expecting something on a par with Electric Picnic but it seems that the pricing for the event meant that only high-margin food vendors were attracted to it i.e. it would have cost someone like Pieminister much more to produce the same volume of food than it cost a burger van using Easi-Singles.

Nevertheless, I had a great time there and will definitely be there next year. A quick note on the pricing, I think it was absolutely spot on for an event like this. Yes, certain beers might be slightly cheaper in certain places around town, but they don't have the cost of a rented marquee, porcelain portaloos, mobile cold room, bar construction, rented furniture, generators and entertainment etc etc to contend with.

Max Powers

curly.bert wrote: »

€5 a pint is fine IMO. If you're heading down, I recommend trying the TSB cask ale - lovely stuff that we rarely get down here. But the winner of the night for me was Metalman's Moonbeam. Beautiful dark ale

As an aside, I heard a fella up at the bar giving out to the staff that they didn't have Heineken. FFS.

That idiot shouldnt be let out, funny though! On a serious note, would have been good if there was some craft cidre there as some cider drinkers wouldnt touch beer. Yes i know its a craft BEER event.

+1 for moonbeam, really impressed. It took me away from my usual metalman pale ale for a couple of pints.

all in all deadly night out.

curly.bert

Max Powers wrote: »

would have been good if there was some craft cidre there as some cider drinkers wouldnt touch beer.

Yeah. The lack of cider would have been my only gripe about the products on offer, but it's only a minor thing. Plenty of great beer available.

Mad that they ran out of stuff on Saturday - don't know if that shows it was a success or they didn't order enough?!