Brewing With Friends : An ISBF Brewday with Runaway
From the (semi legendary) first tweet, Mark & Sam Welsby have been here, on the ISBF Love Train right from the start. I (Jim) am not a Fanboy of any brewery, but Runaway are probably about as close as it gets.
Mark may not be actually FROM Manchester, but the adoption papers were served long ago and he is as much a son of this city as anyone and the DNA of this city is his DNA.
Self-deprecating yet fiercely held of opinion. Heart on sleeve, a worker bee, quietly buzzing away in his own personal hive, making something exceptional. Exceptionally Mancunian.
There are a handful of people I personally would drop everything for.
And this man is one. Over to the Mancunian beer legend that is Jeff. This day belonged to him and the lovely Max. Go Jeff….
Brewery from the (exceptional) Taproom
As it gets closer to ISBF each year Jim invites a few of us the chance to participate in a brew day. It’s a great day and an opportunity to learn more about this magical nectar we all love so much. So a couple of weeks ago on a very wet Friday morning, Maxine & I travelled up the A6 on the mythical 192 into town for a trip to Runaway. Those who’ve not been should as their tap room is open every Saturday from 12-8 ( Unit 4, Millgate Dantzic St, M4 4JW) about ten mins walk from Victoria Station but for us on this Friday morning it was the longer & wet route from Piccadilly.
So we arrived at the brewery as pre arranged for 9am, today was going to be a short brew as it was to rest over the weekend with the final ingredients to be added on the Monday. The head brewer Mark was leaving in the capable hands of Oli & Josh today who we both know anyway. The lads were already setting up when we arrived getting the water up to temp (66 degrees) & shifting the sacks of malt closer to the tank. A quick greeting & the kettle was soon on whilst we got ourselves dried off & got some wellies on.
We had a chat about the day’s plans & Oli gave us an overview of the whole process. Plenty of helpful sharing of knowledge, patiently answering our questions. We took notes hoping that we could add that to this piece but as I have little technical knowledge ( aka none) I’m sure I would just highlight that more by getting it all confused.
(“Jeff's” idea of cleaning the mash tun…. Max. Ed…. 😂)
We got stuck in as & when we could, which means adding the malt ( pale Maris Otter) to the mash tun & stirring it before the transfer. We had a mug of the lovely liquid as it passes to the transfer tank which we all agreed tasted like Ovaltine (SUCH a good call! Ed….)
More music chat followed whilst the sparging is going on. This beer will stay in the copper over the weekend with the hops & special ingredient of canton berry & hibiscus will be added on the Monday.
Cleaning the mash tun was done between myself & Max, shovelling into the wheelbarrow & then tipping into the bins (which are collected by a local farmer, nothing gets wasted here).
I’d not looked at my watch as I’d been enjoying myself too much but my stomach was starting to tell me it must be lunchtime. Sam appeared as if by magic & offered to go & get us all something from Popup Bikes café just down the road. We got cleaned up & went upstairs into the tap room to share lunch together & of course we had a few beers too. Our work here was almost done but not until we had helped with the final sweeping & tidying . A great day with lovely people. But you’re asking what’s the beer going to be? It’s a dry, lightly spiced, tart, pink & seasonally fruited Berliner. I do hope you’ll all enjoy.
See you at the festival, we’re most likely 2 of the first people you’ll see as we generally hanging around the entrance checking tickets & giving you beer tokens.
Cheers Max (for the hard work), Jeff (pics and words 😂). Don't let them undersell themselves, they do way more than lurk in doorways!
Runaway simply can't do wrong. This is one of those beers I will be making a (worker) bee-line for come QC time on Thursday afternoon - the things I put myself through for you lot eh?
Come get some. Get some tickets. Come join our little slice of heaven. And put some money into our Charity's coffers. It's all for you. And them.
Doing good things by drinking great beer. Altruism. Right there!
See you next week.
Back soon. Be kind to one another.
Jim x