It was a sunny morning when we left Kings Cross on the 10am train to Dundee to attend this year’s CAMRA Members’ Weekend. With a journey of nearly six hours we had plenty of time to plan our weekend schedule and also enjoy the beautiful British scenery along the way.
A confession: we were not actually that interested in the AGM and conference (but thank you to those doing the governance, all the same) but a Members’ Weekend offers an opportunity to try a well curated local beer selection in a bar run by CAMRA volunteers from an area that you perhaps haven’t been to before. As we hadn’t yet visited Dundee, this was an opportunity to see local attractions such as RRS Discovery (Scott and Antarctic exploration), the Verdant Works (jute museum) and the architecturally stunning V&A Museum Dundee.
Dundee’s Caird Hall is a magnificent venue, equivalent to a Grade I-listed building, built in the 1920s. It has a splendid organ which we heard played by the talented Timara Easter, also a CAMRA volunteer! The beautiful ceiling in the spacious bar, the lovely staircase and floor made Caird Hall a pleasure to visit several times during the weekend.
The cafe had a selection of traditional pies (cheap and cheerful, unlike many a festival in the South) but then we didn’t anticipate eating too healthily on this trip. The lack of a substantial meal on Friday may have contributed to our feeling rather delicate on Saturday, having a late breakfast and missing Conference kick-off. Oops!
Friday evening passed by very pleasantly in the members bar, sticking mostly to thirds to maximise our tastings. There was a varied selection of local ales from zesty pales to rich porters and stouts. We then selected our favourite one and got a pint in, in preparation to watch a feature length film about Desi pubs. However, as the start of this was delayed, we were obliged to drink a bit more; no problem there. ‘Desi’ is a word that is applied to South Asian people and culture and Desi pubs are those run by Indian landlords, providing a combination of beer and traditional food, typically Punjabi style or mixed grills. There are more of these pubs in the north of England than in south, reflecting the local communities.
The film Desi: A Pub Story, directed by Zaki Solosho, gave us a tour of a number of Desi pubs with insights from punters and publicans. What struck me was the lack of women in these pubs (only a couple of female voices in the film), one of whom raised the point about the link between alcohol and domestic abuse. However, it wasn’t too many decades ago that many British women didn’t feel comfortable going to pubs, particularly on their own. Hopefully things are changing but we still have a way to go in making all pubs feel welcoming to everyone. This is an important film telling the story about the impact of racism and segregation and how Desi pubs were conceived. A CAMRA book is available if you want to learn more, written by award winning British-Asian writer David Jesudason. It is available on-line from CAMRA Books.
Other fringe activities included tours to local breweries on the Friday and Saturday evenings. To book these you usually need to be quick off the mark. However, as we had travelled some distance, we didn’t want to risk missing a paid trip due to possible train delays, hence we chose the Friday film (free) and a Saturday afternoon tasting event (great value at £10). There were also discussion groups to attend on Saturday if you preferred, covering such subjects as attracting younger members, pub heritage listings plus a rerun of the Desi film.
On Saturday afternoon, National Chairman Nik Antona spoke about some of the key issues that CAMRA needs to focus on: planning regulations, pub demolitions, supporting small businesses standing up to the large pubcos and educating people about the nature of the beer industry. We still need to fight for consumer rights and for our pubs, clubs and festivals. There has also been a lot of work on digital media behind the scenes to help the public and volunteers, as well as developing the Learn and Discover programme, which does sound encouraging.
We then had a couple of opposing motions presented by the entertaining Colin Valentine of Edinburgh branch (and chair of the organising committee), which ended up with a resolution which hopefully we can all get behind: to press for full measures of liquid beer! There were also branch website and magazine awards; congratulations to all the winners.
After a short break, we bought a doorstop sandwich from an old tram cafe in town, which we munched down at the start of Des de Moor’s excellent talk on cask beer. This was a swift canter through five beers (all Scottish and all on sale at the members’ bar) interspersed with information about cask (origins, styles etc) and all about the shillings duty ratings given to Scottish beers: the more shillings, the stronger the beer. These ranged from bitters such as Broughton 60 Shilling (3.4% ABV) and Belhaven 80 Shilling, pale ales such as Fyne Ales Jarl (3.8% ABV), which is a great flavour for a modest alcohol content, a dark ale, Kelvin Dark Moor (4.5% ABV) and finishing on the Loch Lomond Silky Stout (5% ABV). We tasted citrus, malt, molasses, liquorice and coffee! More about the history and styles of cask beer can be read in Des’s book Cask, also available on-line from the CAMRA bookshop. https://shop1.camra.org.uk.
After the sampling we felt that a little break from beer was in order but we returned to the members’ bar in the evening to tick off a few more beers. We renewed our acquaintance with the lovely couple we met from Edinburgh on Friday and the evening flew by nicely. Sadly, a couple of our favourite beers had already gone but there were others to sample. After time at the bar at 11pm, a nightcap at the hotel was in order, Glenlivet single malt for him and a Dundee gin for me.
Conference continued on Sunday morning. However, we decided to do a bit of sightseeing before popping in to the members’ bar for a couple of pints before it closed at 4pm. After a break and a bite to eat we thought we’d check out a couple of pubs. We were not alone as we saw fellow CAMRA folk wandering in and out of the local pubs. The Phoenix on Nethergate comes highly recommended, a vibrant looking but old-fashioned pub with a great atmosphere and nice range of beers. Not a bad way to wrap up the weekend.
The 2025 CAMRA Members’ Weekend is going to be a little closer to London, just three hours away in the Devon seaside town of Torquay. We are looking forward to a trip to the English Riviera next April. Cheers!
Maria Freeman