Hjemmebrygger: Sigurd Johan Saure

Sigurd Johan Saure (image from Kveik Training)

Sigurd Johan kommer fra Tormodgarden i Sykkylven, ca 85 km fra Hornindal, der han lærte å brygge kornøl av sin bestefar og onkel. Sigurd Johan er opphavet til kveik #8 Tormodgarden. Han har også begynt å tilby opplæring i brygging av kornøl under navnet Kveik Training.

Sigurd Johan stiller med en porter gjæret med kveik og en tradisjonell rå kornøl med kveik og einerlåg.

English: Sigurd Johan comes from the farm Tormodgarden in Sykkylven, roughly 85km from Hornindal. Sykkylven is quite close to Ålesund airport. He learned to brew kornøl from his grandfather and uncle. He is the owner of kveik #8 Tormodgarden, and has started offering courses in kornøl brewing under the name Kveik Training.

Sigurd Johan will be serving a porter fermented with kveik and a traditional raw kornøl with kveik and juniper infusion.

Hjemmebrygger: Jørund Geving

Jørund Geving drying malts in Stjørdal, 2017.

Jørund Geving kommer fra Stjørdal og er eneste representant for bryggetradisjonene i Midt-Norge (blant hjemmebryggerne). Stjørdal er kjent for stjørdalsølet, som er berømt/beryktet for røyksmaken, fordi bryggerne selv lager maltet på gammel måte. Jørund lærte å brygge av sin bror, og bruker en gammel vaskemaskin med direkte oppvarming i mesken. Han koker ikke vørteren, og bruker einer. Opprinnelig gjæret han med Idun Blå, men de siste årene har han også brukt kveik.

Jørund ble årets kornølbrygger i 2017, og kom på andreplass i 2018.

In English: Jørund Geving is from Stjørdal and brews stjørdalsøl in the traditional way. He is the only representative (among the home brewers) of the brewing traditions of Central Norway. Jørund makes his own malts in the traditional way, as shown above, which is why his beer is powerfully smoky. He learned to brew from his brother, and mashes in an old, repurposed washing machine that has direct heating of the mash. He does not boil the wort, and uses juniper. Originally he fermented with bread yeast (Idun Blå), but recently he’s also started using kveik.

Jørund was kornøl brewer of the year in 2017, and placed second in 2018.

Hjemmebrygger: Lars Andreas Tomasgård

Lars Andreas Tomasgård demonstrerer kornølbrygging på festivalen i 2016

Lars Andreas Tomasgård er bonde på Larstunet gård i Hornindal, noen hundre meter fra festivalhallen. Han har arvet bryggingen sammen med gården og er en av tradisjonsbærerne for kornøl i Hornindal. Han er opphavet til Kveik #21 Tomasgard, og det er selvsagt den som er brukt i ølet hans, som er et tradisjonelt råøl med einer.

Lars Andreas ble årets kornølbrygger i 2016. Les mer om ham på NRK.no.

In English: Lars Andreas Tomasgård is one of the few farmhouse brewers that also actually are farmers. His farm is Larstunet, a few hundred meters from the festival hall. Lars Andreas inherited the brewing tradition together with the farm and has his own kveik, #21 Tomasgard. He will be serving a traditional kornøl, unboiled, with kveik and juniper.

Lars Andreas won the kornøl brewing competition in 2016.

Jochen Förster fra Carlsberg om kveik

Jochen pouring himself a beer

Carlsberg-laboratoriet er et av de fremste i verden på gjærforskning, og forskerne der har samlet inn og analysert flere kveik-kulturer. De hentet ut en stamme som blir brukt i brygging på Ringnes Brygghus i Oslo (bryggeri-puben til Ringnes, ikke hovedbryggeriet).

Professor Jochen Förster fra Carlsberg kommer til Hornindal for å snakke om forskningen sin på kveik. Den fulle beskrivelsen av hva han gjør står under på engelsk. Tittelen på foredraget er «From lager to wild yeast for beer production«. Dette gleder vi oss til!

English: The Carlsberg Laboratory is one of the leading labs in yeast research world-wide, and researchers there have collected and analyzed several kveik cultures. They isolated one strain which is now used in brewing at Ringnes Brygghus in Oslo (a brewpub owned by Ringnes).

Professor Jochen Förster from Carlsberg will be coming to the festival to talk about his research into kveik. Jochen is Professor, Director Yeast and Fermentation at Carlsberg A/S, and is heading the Yeast and Fermentation Platform at the Carlsberg Research Laboratory. Research is dedicated to novel brewing organisms for application in alcoholic and alcohol-free beverages. This includes research with typical brewer’s yeast but also with wild yeast and bacteria.

The title of the talk will be «From lager to wild yeast for beer production.» We’re looking forward to this one!

«Brewing+festival» tickets partly sold out

The guest house at Knausen

We have been offering the «Brewing+festival» tickets with accomodation in the hotel, but those are now all sold out. In addition, the brewing session on the Friday is now full.

However, we still have accomodation available in the guest house at Knausen Hyttegrend. And we still have room in the brewing session on Sunday.

So new tickets have been added called «Brewing+festival Sunday, X people». These give you exactly the same as the old tickets, except you must participate in the Sunday brewing session, and you’ll stay in the guest house at Knausen.

Since that accomodation is less convenient and less expensive, the price of these tickets is lower.

Sigrid Strætkvern er årets konferansier

Vi har vært veldig heldige i år, og fått Sigrid Strætkvern til å være vår konferansier. Sigrid jobber for Ringnes, der hun har tittelen «Stemningsskaper.» Sigrid er kjent for å være både entusiastisk og kunnskapsrik innen øl. I sommer har hun reist Asia rundt og holdt kurs i Carlsberg-systemet.

In English: We’re proud to announce that this year’s announcer will be Sigrid Strætkvern. She works for Ringnes, the biggest brewery in Norway, and is known both for her enthusiasm and her wide knowledge of beer.

About the festival

Norsk Kornølfestival is the only festival (as far as we know) that is dedicated to traditional farmhouse ale.

The beginning of the festival was in 2015 when William Holden decided there needed to be a festival for the traditional farmhouse ale. He thought right place for it had to be Hornindal, since Hornindal is a major centre for the traditional brewing in north-western Norway.

William started a Non-profit organization for the festival and recruited a board for the organization to help him arrange the festival. He chaired the board himself, and did most of the organization.

The first festival was held in 2016, and was relatively small. The demonstration brew in the hall was a local kornøl, demonstrated by Ståle Raftevold and Lars Andreas Tomasgård. There were only 10 home brewers, but a decent number of attendees, and the festival actually made a small profit. That gave the board confidence enough to try again.

The second festival was in 2017, and this time the profit from 2016 was used to invite Richard Preiss to talk about his kveik research, and Martyn Cornell to blog about it, in order to spread the word abroad. One demonstration brew was a stone beer, brewed by Simonas Gutautas and Vykintas Motuza from Lithuania. Another was a stjørdalsøl brewed by Jørund Geving, who showed how to use an old laundry machine to do a long, circulating mash.

Outside the festival there was even a demonstration of stjørdal-style malt drying, with a såinn custom-built for the festival.

Reimund Geving demonstrating malting on a stjørdal-style såinn.

The third festival was in 2018, and was the largest one yet in terms of the number of attendees and home brewers. The demonstration brew was a keptinis, brewed by Simonas Gutautas and Ričardas Počius from Lithuania.

About a month after the festival William Holden died of cancer, prompting some changes in the festival board. The board decided to carry on the festival without William

The board

The festival is a non-profit organization, so any profit from a year’s festival is used to arrange the next year’s festival. The board is unpaid, but the members have some of their expenses covered.

Amund Polden Arnesen

Amund is the head brewer at Eik og Tid in Oslo. He is the festival’s accountant, and handles everything to do with money.

Lars Marius Garshol

Lars Marius took over as chair after William. He has written a little about this decision on his blog.

Eirik Hoem

Eirik is a software engineer living in Ørsta, near Hornindal. He joined the board in 2019, and is responsible for the kitchen serving food at the festival.

Gard Severin Mek

Gard is William Holden’s brother. He lives in Ålesund and handles accomodation, the volunteers, and many other odd jobs.

Ståle Raftevold

Ståle works in the offshore oil industry. He lives in Hornindal, where he’s brewed traditional kornøl for several decades. (He’s the brother of Terje Raftevold.) Ståle takes care of setting up the hall for the festival and cleaning up the mess afterwards, as well as innumerable other tasks best handled by a local.

Roar Sandodden

Roar is a freshwater biologist by day, and helps the festival with communications with the commercial breweries and much else. Roar is a farmhouse brewer and maltster in Stjørdal.

Stig Seljeset

Stig comes from Hornindal, and has brewed kornøl since he was old enough to do it. He’s best known as the original owner of kveik #22 Stalljen. He joined the board in 2018, and helps Ståle with local tasks. He’s also responsible for the brewing demonstration held before and after the festival.

Påmelding for frivillige åpnet

Vi i styret mener at kornølfestivalen er ett av de viktigste tiltakene som gjøres for å holde norsk tradisjonsøl og kveik levende. Festivalen skaper stolthet blant bryggerne og viser folk i Nordfjord og på Sunnmøre at norsk ølkultur er viktig. Vi har allerede påmeldte deltagere til festivalen fra Danmark, Sverige, Tsjekkia, Tyskland, Storbritannia, Nederland og USA.

Å arrangere ølfestival er mye jobb, og vi i styret har jobbet med det siden november allerede. Vi kommer til å legge ned mye mer jobb fram mot festivalen i oktober, men vi klarer ikke alt selv. Har du tid og mulighet til å hjelpe oss å skape stolthet rundt norsk ølkultur? I så fall blir vi veldig glade.

Se frivillig-siden for informasjon om oppgaver, hva du får, påmelding, osv.

Early bird-salg snart slutt

Salget av billige festivalpass slutter om akkurat to uker. 1. august går prisen på festivalpass fra 500 til 700. Det lønner seg å kjøpe nå! Tikkio

English: The early bird sale of festival passes ends in exactly two weeks on August 1, and the price will then go from 500 NOK to 700 NOK. Better to buy now! Tickets here.

Hotellet utsolgt / hotel sold out

Gjestehuset på Knausen / Guest house at Knausen

Alle hotellrommene på festivalen er nå utsolgt, så vi går over til å selge andre typer overnatting som erstatning. Vi starter med dobbeltrom i gjestehuset på Knausen Hyttegrend. Se info-siden for mer. Når disse er utsolgt vil vi gå over til å selge overnatting på steder som er litt lenger unna festivalen. Transport vil bli arrangert.

De som kjøper «Brewing + festival»-billetter får fortsatt hotellrom.

The hotel rooms at the festival are now sold out, so we are now switching to selling other types of accomodation. First out are double rooms in the guest house at Knausen Hyttegrend. See the DIY page. When these are sold out we will start selling accomodation at places a bit further away from the festival. Transport will be arranged.

Those who buy «Brewing + festival» tickets will still get hotel rooms as part of the package.