To celebrate International Women’s Day on 8 March, the women of Pivovar Bars came down to Sheffield to brew a beer with the Tapped Brew Co team.
Along with choosing the name and the hop for the single hopped pale, they helped to brew the beer. The beer is Dea Latis, named after the Celtic goddess of beer. This beer is a 4.5% single hopped pale using El Dorado hops.
To be launched at the Sheffield Tap and Pivovar Bars along with a guest appearance at the Market Cat in York on International Women’s Day, 8 March. Big Thanks to the staff from Pivni, York Tap and Market Cat for a great day in the brewery.
Ben, Tapped Brew Co
Discussing the malt billMashing-in teamHop additionDigging out the mashMashing InKeeping an eye on the run off
We have two beers out to celebrate Sheffield Beer Week, taking place from 7th-13th March! It’s always a wonderful time to go for a few pints in our fantastic home town with absolutely loads going on, and we’re paying homage to our city’s brewing traditions with Sheffield Rocks (4.1%), a heritage pale ale given our own modern twist. A balanced beer, completely characterised by drinkability and made using all UK ingredients. We were joined by Sheffield brewing legend Stuart Noble in the brewhouse for this one, who has been in the industry since 1974 and has a wealth of knowledge and experience to share from his time at breweries including John Smith’s, Courage and Bass.
And we did tease you with this last month, but do also look out for Wanderer – Cryo NEIPA (6.0%), which is the new name for a rebrew of our popular collaboration with Peddler Market, previously known as Cryo Huckster. Super juicy, hazy, and delicious.
Our springtime special, Reverie (4.2%) makes a return this month with a tweaked recipe, notably a hop boost from Centennial Cryo. The result should be a refreshing pale ale with notes of zesty citrus and resinous pine.
For something a little different, we’re incredibly excited that for the first time in our 26 year history, we’ve made an ESB! This one is the next in our Restoration series and we’ve kept it classic, with Fuggles and Goldings hops. Just super drinkable, timeless and tasty.
Lastly, and something we might be even more excited for – Voyager: There & Back Again. Effectively a double Voyager, this Triple IPA weighs in at 11.2% and features the same West Coast bitterness/East Coast fruitiness hybrid that you know and love, but with all those juicy tropical notes singing even more loudly and an extra intensity in the finish.
Hope to catch plenty of you for a pint either at Indie Beer Feast (4th & 5th March) or during Sheffield Beer Week itself!
Last October, we reported on the Sheffield Wheat Experiment in which 200 local people planted wheat. A year later, the wheat was harvested, allowed to dry and threshed. Two kg of the resulting 130 kg of grain went to local brewery Grizzly Grains to form part of a collaborative brew. A kilo of the remaining harvest was the seed for the second sowing of the experiment and the rest became flour.
Over two hundred, 33 cL, bottles of Growers’ Union, 5.2% ACV resulted. After a suitable maturation period, the beer was recently sampled as part of an online tasting event led by Sam. A brief introduction from grower, Ruth Levene, included the obvious: ‘What happens in beer tasting stays in beer tasting.’
Sam then provided a succinct description of the brewing process and explored the main differences between ale and lager. Over 40 participants then progressed to Helles Lager, 4.1% ACV, a gluten-free beer from the nearby Triple Point Brewery. This summer beer was a little incongruous on a cold January evening. However, the traditional light hops and floral malt flavours were evident. As one participant put it, ‘tastes of Germany.’
We then moved to the main event; the first commercially-produced beer that has included ingredients grown in our garden: Growers’ Union. This unfined, unfiltered bottle conditioned beer is a hybrid of styles. The nose, and taste, is predominantly malty, but includes notes of apple, biscuit, caramel, dates, dried fruit, honey and toffee. In short, an excellent use of locally grown wheat. The label was designed by local grower, Rachael McNiven.
Throughout the evening, Sam expertly responded to a series of questions as we progressed to the final beer of the evening: Grizzly Grains, Tilt Hammer, 4.9% ABV Stout. The original home of the brewery was above the Rivelin Valley, home to many such hammers in the 19th century. This traditional bottle conditioned stout has notes of blackcurrant, chocolate, coffee and even a hint of liquorice.
As the Sheffield Wheat Experiment goes into its second year, I look forward to the 2022 edition of Growers’ Union, a beer which is likely to reference Belgium, targeting a style which will allow the wheat to dominate.
Another couple of new beers have been brewed by Temper Brewing, including their first stout. The Stout is called Sinter and is a sensible 4.8% ABV whilst Valleys is a 5.2% pale ale. You may wonder what “Sinter” means – Sintering is the process of compacting and forming a solid mass of material by heat or pressure without melting it to the point of liquefaction. So now you know!
Neepsend Brewery have been busy brewing new beers as well as their old favourite, the blonde. On the roster of new beers there are a couple of session strength pales – Callisto, a 4.6% brewed with Mosaic, Ekuanot and Simcoe for fruity, tropical hoppy notes; whilst Leda is hopped with Amarillo & Simcoe for apricot, orange and soft fruits with a lingering bitterness. They have also brewed a 5.3% ABV liquorice stout called Glabra and a 7.2% hop burst IPA called Ajax. This was Continuously hopped throughout the boil with an addition every 3 minutes to a target IBU of ~120. Citra, Cascade, Centennial and Chinook are going in initially with dry hopping to follow. Expect a big, bitter, resinous West Coast IPA.
With Christmas now almost a distant memory and the Belgian Blue running out, Bradfield Brewery are celebrating the time of year when the dark nights of winter start to give way to the lighter evenings and optimism of spring by brewing a vanilla flavoured edition of their Farmers Stout. Available in cask for pubs and mini kegs to drink at home! Meanwhile for Valentines Day a new beer has launched – Farmers Blushed, a pink strawberry flavour ale!
The original brewery shed at Thornbridge Hall is no more, with that kit relocated down Riverside Brewery in Bakewell. The building that the tap room has relocated into is also the new home for the smaller brewing vessels where all the smaller batch cask beer is produced.
Blue Bee have brewed an export stout. It is 6.6% ABV and brewed with 7 malts. Also new is Simcoe Idaho 7.
You may recall that Eyam brewery produced a limited edition Imperial version of their Black Death Stout at 11% ABV which was available in bottles through independent beer shops or direct from the brewery. This beer has since appeared in a one off cask served on gravity pour at Real Ale Corner micropub in Chesterfield as part of the pub walkabout festival weekend at the beginning of February.
Grizzly Grains have brewed a new pale ale brewed with Citra hops in the boil then dry hopped with Mosaic.
New from Chantry Brewery is Styrian Eagle, a 4.1% ABV pale ale named after the hops it is brewed with.
Loxley Brewery recently completed their second canning session, ‘THEM That CAN’ visiting for a morning in early February. In total almost 500 litres of a 4.2%, American Pale, Corvus and a 5.5%, West Coast IPA, Kasper were successfully packaged.
Almost twenty years ago, Communications Engineers, Jamie Hawksworth and Jon Holdsworth established a specialist beer importing wholesale business, based in York: Pivovar, breweries/brewers in Slavic.
As part of their day job, they later found themselves on a roof at Sheffield railway station, adjacent to platform 1b. Looking down, into a semi-derelict building, they were convinced they could see a bar. Further investigation followed: the old First Class Refreshment Room was originally built by the Midland Railway (company architect, Charles Trubshaw) as part of the 1905 station extension. The rooms were disused in the 1960s, by the 1970s were a waiting room and were closed in 1975. They are adorned with Minton tiled walls and fine ornamented bar fittings.
Jamie and Jon suddenly had a new job. Restorations began and in 2009, the Sheffield Tap, the award-winning and undisputed best railway pub in the UK, opened. This followed a £180,000 multiple award-winning comprehensive overhaul in which the tiling, terrazzo floor, parts of the bar fittings and other joinery were beautifully restored, while items beyond repair were carefully replaced or replicated, including the entire coved and sky-lighted ceiling.
The next decade saw a hive of activity as Pivovar added new outlets: the York Tap (2010), the Harrogate Tap and Tapped Leeds (2013), Pavement Vaults (York, 2015) and the Newcastle Tap (2017). They also became partners in the bar group Thornbridge and Co. with outlets in Birmingham (Colmore), Leeds (Banker’s Cat) and York (Market Cat).
However, the key development was the 2013 extension of their flagship: the Sheffield Tap expanded into the former First Class Dining Room. The tiled and mirrored interior was restored and an on-site brewery, Tapped Brew Co. began brewing in January 2013. This 4 Bbl. set-up was a 2008 PBC Brewing Installations kit which re-located from Great Heck Brewery when they moved site.
Like many others, Head Brewer, Ben Tysoe, commenced his career working for Dave Wickett at Kelham Island Brewery, adjacent to the legendary Fat Cat. Aged 16, he was shifting and carrying, bottling and labelling. Three years later, in 2001, he moved to the new Kelham Island venture at the Devonshire Cat. By 2003, his name was above the door as one of the youngest pub managers in the city. 2011 saw changes: travelling, stints working at the Great British Beer Festival and more employment in breweries. Two years later came employment with Pivovar: accounts, deliveries, bar management, and by 2018 work in the brewery. Two years ago saw the seminal move to the First Class Dining Room.
In addition to the Sheffield brewery, Ben also uses the microbrewery at Tapped Leeds to produce pilsners while, in 2020, Pivovar established the Elvington Brewing Company at their York headquarters. The latter produces Mittel Pils, the recent winner of overall best keg lager, at the International Brewing awards.
Back in Sheffield, the all-cask output is sold onsite and at other Pivovar outlets. Tapped beers are occasionally seen in the free trade. The regular range is:
Mojo – the first beer brewed, a 3.6% Pale Ale
Toha – a 3.6% Pale Ale using New Zealand hops
Jericho – a 4% West Coast Pale Ale
Sorsby Stout – 4%, named after Sir Robert Sorsby (1577/1643), the first Master Cutler.
Sheaf Street Pale – a 4.5% session IPA
Station Porter – a rich dark 5% brew featuring chocolate malt
Tapped are currently looking to the future: some minor rebranding coupled with an increased emphasis on collaborations, one-offs and pilot brews. With experienced, enthusiastic and knowledgeable input from Ben, we anticipate hearing many positive reports.
After a relatively quiet year for obvious reasons, Steel City had a late resurgence in activity starting with the latest iteration of the Megacollab. This year’s concept had been kicking around for a while between Dave, Niall off of the Wellington, and McGregor off of various facey beer groups, and was brewed with Lost Industry, Bexar County, Neepsend, Doomed, Top Rope and Ramsbury, plus Lewy off of Lewis Ryan Art, who designed the epic label. Sour was the aim of the game, with a three day double pitch lacto steep and the addition of grapefruit, redcurrant and an unholy quantity of citric acid. A limited edition spinoff, Drop Acid Not Bombs, was brewed with Lemondrop hops in place of the fruit, with just one keg for the Welly and a few cans produced. Brewday was great fun though rain put paid to the usual barbecue and cricket so instead it was a big pot of curry and a nerf gun battle…
Also release in the autumn was the long-awaited Sour Wars first trilogy, with a keg launch at the Crow followed by cans at selected dealers – Hop Hideout may have a few left though maybe not by time you read this! The variants are: Episode 1 The Cranachan Menace – raspberry, mead and a touch of vanilla in a highland whisky barrel; Episode 2 Attack of the Stones – cherries in a red wine barrel; Episode 3 Orange of the Sith – hurricane sour with passionfruit, lemon, lime and orange in a rum barrel. Planning is now underway for the second trilogy to be brewed shortly and released Autumn 2022. A few kegs of the first trilogy remain for future events planned in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Manchester.
The latest in the frankly ridiculous series of one-off brews with Lucienne off of the Shakespeare surpassed even the previous brews (barbecue stout and hoi sin stout) for silliness, being a branston pickle porter! After ‘deconstructing’ the ingredients of the pickle, Dave and Lucienne procured a load of dates, apples, tamarind, mustard seeds, molasses, brown sugar… even they drew the line at pickled onions though! It was certainly, erm, interesting! Opinion was certainly divided, as expected some low Untappd scores but also some decent scores from those who rated it for what it is – nobody could deny it tasted of pickle! Dave and Lucienne certainly proved that they could, but not necessarily that they should…
Plans are afoot for 2022 including a tonka stout ‘I’ve Had My Fun And That’s All That Matters’ (and a BA version ‘I’ve Had My Rum And That’s All That Matters’), a sour NEIPA ‘Exercises in Futility’, plus Steel City’s first band collab, and no doubt more crazy stuff for the Shakey…
Happy New Year everyone and here’s hoping that at the time of reading this you’re sat in one of our wonderful local pubs enjoying a delicious pint!
At the time of writing, it’s fair to say that our plan is a little bit up in the air as we are doing our best to remain flexible and adaptable in light of ever-changing circumstances, but here’s what we’re hoping you will be able to find on bars throughout February!
Dr Morton’s Duck Baffler (4.1%) is a staple of our range at this time of year, so we’re looking forward to having this Citra single hopped pale ale back in our lives! Also on the pale ale front, we’re teaming up with Charles Faram, one of our excellent hop suppliers, to try out an experimental hop for the next of our Hopback series. Tantalisingly titled CF247, it’s one of the stickiest, oilest hops produced in the UK to date and should hold dank, tropical notes alongside yummy berry flavours.
The next of our Salvation series will be an Irish Stout (4.5%), classic and more-ish with a smooth, roasted malt character and soft notes of chocolate and coffee. Bitter and sweet in perfect balance!
Remember Huckster Cryo, our collaboration with Peddler Market? Well it’s back, but with a new face! We’ve brought it in line with our Brewers’ Emporium range and it will soon be released as Wanderer – Cryo NEIPA (6.0%). The recipe has stayed exactly the same so expect all the juicy, tropical good vibes you know and love.
We’re also lining up some exciting releases in time for Sheffield Beer Week, which we’re really looking forward to in March, so keep your eyes peeled for more news on that!
…And if things don’t play out in quite the way we’re currently hoping, we will of course have plenty of beer out in can too, so please do pay a local beer shop (or our online store) a visit!
2021 – the year of our 25th anniversary! I think it’s fair to say it hasn’t been quite the year we’d planned (a Zoom night in, whilst very enjoyable – and you can watch it here – wasn’t quite the party we’d had in mind!) but we’ve made the most of it, we’ve celebrated in as many ways as we could, and most importantly we’re still here and ready to roll into 2022.
In amongst all the uncertainty and challenges, we have a lot to be positive about and thankful for. We’ve brewed over 2 million pints this year – mashing in over 330 times across a whopping 82 different beers. This means we’ve managed to increase our production levels back above those seen in 2020 by around 20% – although we’re still approximately 35% down on what we brewed in 2019. Cask now comprises just over 70% of our total output.
The beers we released in celebration of our 25th anniversary were definitely some of our highlights – bringing back popular old favourites Brimstone and Last Rites, plus twists on some of our much loved regular beers including Cryo Heathen & Double Deception, and some big hearty stouts for good measure. And our Funk Dungeon project joined in the celebrations too, including our first big bottle releases with the launch of our Cellar Master’s Reserve series (stay tuned for more of these to come!)
The cornerstone of our Brewers’ Emporium range, Heathen has had quite a year too, with Fresh Hop Heathen making a guest appearance as well as Cryo Heathen – which we’d initially intended to be a special brewed just for our birthday, but which you all loved so much we had to do again in the autumn! We’ve got a few more twists on our APA up our sleeves for 2022, so watch this space. And Moonshine is still by far our most popular beer, making up more than 4 of every 10 pints we make (although pre-Covid it was consistently over 50% of our total volume, which is a good reflection of how much we’ve diversified in this ever-pivoting world!).
Our canning line, which you may remember arrived in the first few weeks of lockdown in April 2020, continues to prove itself a very valuable part of our team. We’ve released 59 different beers in can (over 17,500 cases in total), which accounts for about 16% of our total output – interestingly, a very similar proportion to that seen in 2020. Minikegs were filled with just under 1% of everything we made… which is almost the exact same figure as what we were releasing in keg just 7 years ago – how far we’ve come!
We added some wonderful new members to our team this year, with Chris and Ewan adding to our little fleet of drivers who’ve been busy meeting and delivering to our 1000+ direct pub, bar and beer shop customers, and Ash, Thom and Dan joining our brewteam. They’ve all settled in brilliantly and we’re looking forward to them creating and sharing their first recipes in 2022! This little bit of this post does also give us the opportunity to do a huge shout out and enormous thank you to our wonderful staff: it’s their flexibility, patience, ingenuity and willingness to do whatever they could to keep us moving forwards and working together which has guided the business through these very challenging times. This of course includes the fantastic team at our pub, the Rising Sun, who have coped admirably with changing regulations throughout the past couple of years and continually provided a warm, welcoming atmosphere at the heart of the community.
And on the topic of new additions, in March, our designer James and his wife welcomed their baby boy Phoenix Johns Murphy to the world… so it was felt the naming of our last Geoglyph beer would be a suitable way of celebrating his arrival! The beers within this range of pale ales were all named after constellations that correlate with the Nazca lines of Peru (more on the series here). No Phoenix Geoglyph exists, but James wasn’t about to let that get in the way of his artistic vision and so created one! The actual Phoenix constellation can be found in the Southern Hemisphere during the winter months.
Collaborations have been a little trickier to co-ordinate this year, so have played a smaller part in our production than we’d have hoped, but we have loved hosting Queer Brewing along with Out & About Sheffield to create two beers with us (which have also been raising money for local organisation SAYiT, who we will be making a donation to early next year), and we’ve also made an as-yet unreleased cider-beer hybrid with the excellent Ascension Cider, so look out for that one in 2022. In addition, we have welcomed local tea purveyors Batch Tea Co and members of the Institute of Brewing & Distilling to brew with us over the course of the year. Our team have visited other breweries as far afield as… erm… still Sheffield, making a mountain IPA with our pal Scott, previously of Team Abbeydale and now head brewer at Heist, and also venturing down to London to create a Margarita inspired Gose with ORA Brewing.
For obvious reasons, events have also been just a small feature of our year, but we were privileged to be selected as one of three breweries to create a nationwide collaboration for Indie Beer Shop Day, producing a special beer to celebrate the wonderful independent beer shop sector in the UK. And we did manage to celebrate Funk Fest in style – this year we went mixed venue for our mixed fermentation celebration, with Sheffield becoming a city of sour for Halloween week! Looking ahead to next year – if, fingers crossed, things return to whatever anyone can remember as normality, we WILL be having that big party for our 25th-and-a-bit birthday! And hopefully will be able to get out and about a little more to say hello to you all in person too.
An ENORMOUS thank you to everyone who’s supported us this year – whether that’s as one of our amazing trade customers, by buying a pint in a pub, some cans from our shop or one of the fantastic retailers we supply, or simply sending us a little hello on social media – it really is hugely appreciated by us all. We’re a team that love what we do, and we hope that shows in the beers we produce. Once again, our staff, industry peers, customers and community have shown what an adaptable, resilient, imaginative and overall really rather wonderful bunch they are, and it’s that which has made our 25th birthday year one to remember.
Temper is a new brewing company just started up, however neither the brewery location nor the brewer behind it is new to the game.
Chris Wigg is the man behind Temper who has previously worked for breweries including Little Critters and Buxton and is now leasing the brewery underneath the Dronfield Arms that was originally set up as Hopjacker but since mothballed.
The first three beers launched at the Dronfield Arms (also look out for them at the Joiners Arms in Bakewell and Beer House at Hunters Bar) on the 16 December including on cask their Resolve, a 4% pale ale while on the keg taps were a couple of slightly stronger options: Prism, a 5% pale ale and Rivers, a 6.3% IPA.
Bradfield Brewery’s six month Barrel Aged Kerry stout has now been released! For this limited edition of Kerry, the original Kerry stout has been aged in Jack Daniels and Buffalo Trace Bourbon and Speyside Whisky barrels. Blending after six months of aging has created an 8% ABV imperial stout with flavours of oak, vanilla bourbon and spicy whisky, backed up by roast coffee and chocolate with a warming finish. There are 1,000 individually numbered bottles available from the brewery shop, hand bottled and wax sealed by brewers Sam, Kieran and Bruce.
South Yorkshire’s answer to the Coca Cola truck has been to kick off the countdown to Christmas – yes, the Bradfield Brewery dray vans have been delivering Belgian Blue, their seasonal fruit flavoured pale ale, to pubs and shops and it is now available!
That said it is no longer the only show in town for if you head down to Perch, Dead Parrot Brewery‘s taproom you can try their Norwegian Blue, a naturally hazy 4.7% ABV pale ale brewed with Citra, Simcoe hops and blueberries.
Stancill Brewery celebrated bonfire night by bringing back Treason, their spiced Yorkshire parkin porter. Treason brings all those comforting toasty, roasty flavours thanks to it’s nine-malt blend, with added ginger for that signature spark of warmth.
A recent brew at Neepsend heading for cask is Nago, a 4.3% pale ale brewed with Mosaic, Simcoe, Bravo and Azacca hops bringing lots of tropical fruit character.
Triple Point have been growing hops in their beer garden and these have now been put in a one off beer! Flora was launched in cask at their bar on 18 November.
