As St Austell Brewery’s Small Batch Brewery gears up to maximum production, the pubs that will form the core of the newly established Small Batch Beer Club have been announced, giving ale lovers across the South West the chance to catch up on all of the innovative and exciting brews being born in the heart of the nation’s favourite regional brewer.
Building on the success of the company’s previous micro-brewery, but with the opportunity to brew 3,000 pints at any one time instead of the previous 600, St Austell Brewery is keen to provide its own pubs and free trade sites with a constantly changing selection of new styles for customers to experience.
3,000 pints equates to 40 barrels of the good stuff, so the Brewery has hand-picked 36 pubs from across the Westcountry – from Goldsithney in the west to Cricklade in the east and all well known for stocking the best craft and specialty ales – to be the ambassadors of the Small Batch Beer Club. An extra cask will be available for quaffing at the Hicks Bar in the Brewery’s Visitor Centre, while the other casks will be kept for special functions or in case of emergency requirement elsewhere!
As brewing team leader Rob Orton commented, “We traditionally brew some fantastic beers every year for the St Austell Brewery Beer Festival and other events and wanted to be able to share them with more people than ever before. The Small Batch Brewery gives us the opportunity to build on our brewing skills and create a whole new world of beers for people to enjoy.”
Taking inspiration from all corners of the world, St Austell Brewery will be producing everything from Belgian beer to Eden Project-inspired pints, with the first cask ale available to club members being SMASH#1. SMASH stands for Single Malt And Single Hop and the aim of SMASH brewing is to break beer down to its basic elements and emphasize the flavour of a single malt and single hop variety. A truly educational experience for any brewer, SMASHing helps you to truly understand what one hop and one malt bring to the beer.
Created by Matt Knowles, brewing full-time with St Austell since 2014, SMASH#1 uses Golden Promise malt from Simpsons and Target hops, bringing lovely orange, pine and cedar aromas.
Roger Ryman, brewing director at St Austell Brewery, said: “All of our leading brands, including Tribute, Proper Job and Korev, started as experimental brews. With the Small Batch Brewery we can produce more limited edition beers, some of which could well be the new brands of the future.”
For more information about the Small Batch Beer Club click here