Saltaire Brewery spices up Festive Season

It is the time of year when brewers are allowed to get creative! Winter warmers, Christmas specials, more alcoholic beers – there’s a little madness in the air! There certainly has been at Saltaire Brewery, where the team have come up with three spicy new beers in the last month in time for the Festive Season.

First, they were commissioned to brew a special new beer, using ginger, for the J.D. Wetherspoon’s ‘University of Ale’ Festival for their 72 pubs in the North East of England. Seeking inspiration from the American home brewing community, Head Brewer Tony Gartland, produced a new brew based on an old U.S. favourite. Called ‘Academia’, the beer is almost a porter, with dark crystal and chocolate malts, but also features piny Cascade hops and a fistful of fresh ginger in every cask. Tony commented, ‘Experimenting to come up with the recipe for this was fun; the heat and spice of the ginger gives it a distinctive character which complements the piny Cascade hop.’

Next up was the Brewery’s ‘Red Hat Spiced Ale’, a red beer made with bags of crystal malt and a fantastic mix of spices including ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon, orange peel and cloves. “The spice is added to the brewing kettle with the final hops, so the oils are slowly released from the spice, but the subtle volatiles are not driven off by prolonged boiling. The beer tastes like a mouthful of Christmas pudding!” The motor in Tony’s Magimix blew up with the effort of grinding the kilos of spice! 

The third beer was the inspiration of John Wall, manager at the Rawson Spring pub in Hillsborough and a Wetherspoons real ale guru. He was confident that a dark, spiced, high alcohol beer would be a winner at Christmas. Welcome ‘J.D. Wether Warmer’. Weighing in at 6.5% ABV, the alcohol is sure to give the beer presence and body. In style the beer is a spiced dunkle weizenbock!! A dark wheat beer made with Munich malt, wheat and crystal. It is the sort of Bavarian brew typically found at the German Christmas markets! It is deep amber in colour with moderate bitterness to let the spice shine through. “This time the spices used in the boil include, caraway, allspice and star anise, with orange peel and ginger (of course!). The flavours are unbelievable, but not overpowering.” Said Tony.

Look out for this one in your local Wetherspoons pub this Christmas.

Tell us what you think of these beers – they are a bit different so Saltaire Brewery is looking for feedback. 

Email info@saltairebrewery.co.uk and win a free Brewery Tour for 4 people in our prize draw.