The monks of Ampleforth are reviving an ancient and traditional art of producing beer.  The Ampleforth Abbey Beer will be a bottle-conditioned dark coloured and fullbodied Abbey beer in the Belgian style with a fruity, malty flavour.  It will be brewed and
bottled by Little Valley Brewery, West Yorkshire under license to Ampleforth Abbey.  It has been developed from an ancient monastic recipe originally used by the Benedictine monks in Dieulouard in France.  The beer has been described by the beer expert and aficionado Roger Protz as ‘a russet-brown beer with a lively head of foam. The aroma and palate are rich with creamy, biscuity malt, dark raisin and sultana fruit and a good peppery hop note. The finish has great length and is dominated by creamy malt, dark fruit and a lingering peppery, spicy hop character.’The Ampleforth beer will be released and available for general sale in July 2012. We have been lucky enough to already sample this ale at Trembling Madness and it is something definitely worth waiting for. RRP £2.99 a bottle.
View a BBC clip here or download Ampleforth's promotional leaflet here 

We did have 2 Stone Roses tickets for Heaton Park in Manchester up for grabs. The support included Plan B, The Wailers and Dirty North. Guess what after asking around for a week seemed like most people in York didn't like the Stone Roses - 1 ticket was finally sold and the other one touted in about 10 seconds outside the gig. Well all those people who said they didn't want to go have missed out on a gig that will never be forgotten. Yes, there were plenty of Manchester idiots there - pushing, throwing and mouthing off but as hard as they tried they still couldn't spoil the aged Roses bringing back those classic tunes and reminding us of that era when ............ er, the era, yes, no, I can't remember that era, my god I am wrinkly too and grey, what happened? 

P.S. Shame about the Fosters Lager £4, well I suppose the good thing is that it leaves the body almost as fast as it enters.  

22 year old still missing from the gig on Friday night -    
http://www.gmp.police.uk/mainsite/pages/0190C0B2C5995AC980257A2F004CD228.htm 

A great night was had by all on Thursday 5th April. Over 150 glasses of York Chocolate Stout from Rudgate Brewery was given away by our two Oompa Loompa's in an hour. A big thanks to Craig from Rudgate for providing the beer on our evening of the celebration of chocolate. For more information on the new Rudgate beer have a look at www.oneandother.com or the weekend article in The Press .

We will once again be having it on tap this weekend so if you missed out last week then come down and enjoy  this marvellous new beer. 

View some of the evenings photo's below, courtesy of a great photographer Andy Gaines - check out his site - http://andygaines.com/  

It's ventured around the Belgium and Czech breweries and goes to and from our Goathland cottage. It's a  pimped out Wellhouse Leisure conversion Toyota Granvia with many extras. Webasto Heating System, Cramer hob and sink, Solar panels, Dual Leisure Batteries, Hot Water system and Shower, Fridge, Driver & Passenger Television, Rear drop down TV/Monitor, Kenwood DVD/Stereo system, Freeview international TV system, Panasonic Subwoofer, 32 litre water  tank, Electric hookup, Reimo elevating roof, Black Leather seating, Airconditioning, Swivel Captains chair, Alloys. This van has it all and goes like the wind!! It has a Landcruiser engine that has never had any problems and will last almost forever .  It's now sold - goodbye - we've had some great adventures together