The Great Baltic Adventure

I noticed in the latest issue of the IBD magazine that master brewer Tim O'Rourke is going recreate the original journey of Imperial Russian Stout by sailing from Greenwich to St Petersburg with casks of beer from British breweries.

This follows the excellent tale of beer writer Pete Brown trying to take IPA to India by the original route (the Great Balti Adventure?) and home brewer Christopher Bowen reviving Allsopp's Arctic Ale.

The Great Baltic Adventure website is a bit clunky but when I could get it to work I saw some interesting stuff. For starters there was an official launch party at a beer festival I went to. I can't say I noticed anything but looking at the list of beers they've already been promised does explain why a number of regional breweries had Imperial Russian Stouts on sale at the festival. It was also interesting to see that Heineken currently have the rights to Courage Imperial Russian Stout, so it's not the fault of Wells and Young's that it hasn't been revived.

As I find beer history fascinating I'll be eagerly watching to see how they get on, but I'm not going to get involved in any export recreations myself.

With the historic export of IPA, Burton Ale and Stout from Britain now covered I think there's a gap in the market for historic beer imports. So watch this space to see me go to Calais to cram as many bottles of cheap French lager into my car as is physically possible and recreate the famous booze cruises that made the St Omer brewery the biggest brewery in Kent.