CAMPAIGN FOR REAL ALE

• Community Pub of the Year
• Community Pubs Week Feb 2008
• Real Ale in Growth
• Beer Tasters Needed
• Landlord's Tale

It sounds like a dream job. CAMRA needs more tasters for its network of beer tasting panels.

CAMRA set up tasting panels in the late 1980’s to publish tasting notes in the Good Beer Guide, select finalists for Champion Beer of Britain competitions, characterise beer styles and generally boost the image of Britain’s national drink.

Tasting panels have been largely successful in most of the UK. But it is an ongoing task to survey new beers and monitor existing beers for changes in their character and the more tasters we have, the more reliable the results as differences between the palates of individuals are averaged out.

New tasters will undergo some simple training organised by their local tasting panel chair or coordinator. This involves smelling and tasting individual beer flavours such as malts and hops, firstly on their own and then in beers. In this way they will learn to recognise and quantify beer flavours. Then they will be given tasting cards to complete whenever the opportunity arises on visits to pubs or when enjoying real ale in bottle at home. Some panels also meet occasionally for group tastings to help with standardisation.