MEET THE BREWER: FRED CAURE, MOONCHILD
As TTBC undertakes its first collaboration, we take the opportunity to quiz Moonchild’s headbrewer and founder.
Words by Ben Addicott / Photography by Kirsty Burge
So Fred, do you like beer?
What’s your favourite thing about beer?
Yeah, not just looking at it. I think drinking it is probably the best part.
Did you have any relevant hobbies before you started brewing?
I’d been an engineer before this. I stopped doing that kind of job 2 years ago, and it comes in handy if you want to think logically. But I’ve also got a musical background and I think blending the artistic side and the technical side together is what makes brewing so great. You can be an absolute technical geek and you can be completely mad bonkers about creativity.
So Moonchild is your project?
Yeah. I’m Belgian originally, but my wife Sophie and I moved to the UK 5 years ago. We wanted to started a brewery in Hertfordshire first but it was too expensive, so we came to Devon. Our house came with enough space to put a brewery in the back, so that’s what we did.
So it’s an actual cottage industry.
We were called Stargazer. Most things we do are influenced by music we listen to or books we read. Not the actual beers, but the concept around the beers. Stargazer is a Rainbow song. But then we got a call from a brewery in Somerset saying they’d trademarked the name (Laughs).
Yes. So the next day we changed it to Moonchild, for the simple reason that many of the bands we like have a song called Moonchild. And on top of that we had the artwork already and it actually fit better.
In case any other brewers are reading this, who would be your dream collaboration?
Hmm. That’s tough. It would probably be with someone who knows about barrel ageing, because I wouldn’t know where to start.
Unfortunately we can’t help with that.
That’s ok because, right now, I’m in the middle of a dream. I’m collaborating with Gary.
Too kind. If you had to compare your brewing style to an animal, what would it be?
Probably a monkey. Because they take something, through it in the air, and something new comes down.
And if you had to compare your brewing style to a musician, who would it be?
Probably the whole Prog Rock scene of the seventies.
Which would also be a good name for a brewery. Any exciting plans you can reveal?
We’re going to do more one-off specials, less concentrating on the core range. And we’re looking at going into kegs soon, because we’re only doing bottles right now.
Ah yes, we had one of your experimental kegs at Christmas. A spiced ale. It was gorgeous.
Excluding your own, what’s the best beer you’ve tried?
Ever is good, if that’s not too hard.
Ever is easier for me. Rochefort is one of my favourite beers. Rochefort 8 or 10 just sum up everything that’s good about beer. It’s like drinking a bottle of wine to me. Beer is enjoyable as a refreshing drink but, for me personally, beer is all about the enjoyment of flavours.
Finally, any predictions for the beer scene in 2017?
No (Laughs). I’m just a small player I’m just observing. What I hope is that…
The whole Sour Beer thing. Some breweries churned out Sour Beers that were really disappointing, just sour for the sake of being sour. That taste like someone’s chucked loads of lemon juice in there. And then there’s breweries that actually make Sours, proper aged Sours. There’s that line between breweries that want to make a serious flavour experience and breweries that want to jump on a bandwagon. I hope that the scene can start to differentiate between those.
Do you think it’ll start to thin out?
I don’t know. Is it something like a music scene? I’ve been playing in bands for many years and I see lots of similarities in what’s happening in brewing. When something’s popular everyone wants to do it for a couple of months and then it’s over. But the people that are serious about what they’re doing, they’re persistent.
And with that, we allowed Fred to get back to brewing. The child of TTBC and Moonchild will be hitting the bar in the fairly near future. We haven’t decided on a name yet, but we can reveal that it’ll be a Belgian style Tripel with coriander and orange peel.
And that it’ll be truly ace.
