St George's Hall Winter Ale Festival

My friend Roland (left) and I in St George's Hall 

for the last beer festival

Tickets are now on sale for the St George's Hall Winter Ale Festival which will be taking place in the famous St George's Hall in Liverpool. I went with some friends to the last festival in this venue, and everyone had a great time. It was my first ever visit to the spectacular Great Hall - I say that with a slight feeling of shame, having been born in Liverpool! The session we attended was concluded with the Grim Reaper calling 'Time!' while Mozart was being played on the great organ.

There will be up to 200 different real ales and ciders alongside an indoor gin garden with a selection of boutique gins, spirits, wine and prosecco. This ale festival definitely caters for all tastes.

The bar sponsor for the festival will be Ossett Brewery, which is based just outside Bradford, and many of their award-winning brews will be on the bars. Not only that, but Ossett will be bringing their sister breweries with them too, so there will be beers from Fernandes, Riverhead and the famous Rat brewery. You can expect many other breweries to be announced as the festival draws closer.

Entertainment will be provided at all sessions, except for Friday daytime. If you get peckish, there will be tasty hot and cold food prepared by Liverpool Cheese Company, Peninsula Pies and Crackpot Catering (serving up their special Scouse) throughout the festival.

All CAMRA members receive a discount on production of a valid membership card at the Thursday evening and Friday daytime session: a full card of tokens is £15, but at those two sessions is only £13 for CAMRA card holders. There will also be a return of the 'Beer of the Festival Award', voted for by all customers.

The festival runs from Thursday 30 January to Saturday 1 February 2020. For those unfamiliar with Liverpool, the venue is adjacent to Queens Square bus station and less than 10 minutes' walk from Central Station.

This is a popular festival so it might be wise to buy your tickets well in advance here.

► This is one of a series of articles that I write for the CAMRA column in our local papers, the Southport Visiter and Ormskirk Advertiser. Older articles on local pubs are here.