Durham is a good town for drinking, so the beer festival was the start to a day meandering through classy & classic boozers.   Most of the beers had gone by the Saturday afternoon session we went to, but there was still a reasonable choice of around 20.

By far and away the best beer for me was an old favourite: Hophead from Dark Star - a beer brewed 300 miles away in Sussex.   An extremely pale, dryish ale with bags of citrussy, floral hop (I'd put money on there being Cascadeⁱ hops in there) flavour & aroma, all in a beer at less than 4%.  

Second best was Killellan from Houston Brewery that was a pale ale with good floral hop taste.

There was a large gap between second place and the rest, with nothing really standing out in the ones we tried.   Local beer company Maxim had several ales present as you'd expect, but all a little too malty & not bitter or hoppy enough to stand out for me.   Even their Sladek beer with noble hops was mostly malty on taste.   Obviously if you like malty-sweetness & body to your beers then these are for you.

Amongst other beers tried were;

Yard Of Aleⁱ - One Foot in the Yard

Hexamshire - Devil's Water

Allendale - Black Grouse Bitter

Camerons - Festival Special.   Nothing special.

Grainstore - Cooking Bitter.   Not an inspiring name.   Average beer.

Phoenix - Arizona.   Usually a very good, dry pale ale but only an also-ran this festival.

Plassey - Blue Bell.   Had trouble finishing this one.

Durham - Cloister (bottled)

Overall, a festival of ordinary beers by Saturday lunchtime.   Clearly the answer is to roll up on Friday to try the beers that caught our eye on the beer menu but which had sold out;  Durham - Magnificat, Wylam - Angel, Brains - Dark Mild, Mordue - Workie Ticket, Harviestoun - Ptarmigan, Ellend - Beyond the Pale, Inveralmond - Ossian's Ale, Orkney - Raven, Roosters - Boneshaker.