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Feb 2018

Tring India Stout, Tring Brewery

Added: Thursday, February 1st 2018

Style Stout ABV 6.0%

Tring India Stout 6%

Tring, based in the Hertfordshire town of the same name, is one of Britain’s oldest craft breweries. It was founded in 1992 by Richard Shardlow and he was joined a few years later by Andrew Jackson, both with many years experience of brewing and selling beer. Their first brewery was in cramped buildings off the town centre but in 2010 they moved to more spacious premises at Dunsley Farm on land owned by the Rothschild family, based at Waddeson Manor in nearby Buckinghamshire.

The brewery now has bigger, 30-barrel brewing kit and produces 130 barrels a week. It has added both an eight-barrel kit and a 200-litre kit to make seasonal, monthly and one-off beers. The core beers use names associated with old Hertfordshire legends, the surrounding countryside and local geography. The leading beer, Side Pocket for a Toad, is an old dialect name for something without any use, while Tea Kettle Stout derives from the shape of the old county of Hertfordshire before modern local government reorganisation.

India Stout is a timely reminder – among the world-wide frenzy for India Pale Ale – that dark beers were also sent to India during the time of the Raj. The beer has a complex recipe of pale malt, smoked wheat, oats, brown, chocolate, cara and dark crystal malts, with Hersbrucker hops for bitterness and a late addition of Mosaic for aroma.

The beer has a jet black colour topped by a barley-white head of foam. It has a big aroma of rich chocolate, burnt fruit, herbs and spices. Bitter hops kick in on the palate with dark vinous fruit, roasted grain and bitter chocolate. There’s a long, bitter finish packed with vinous fruit, chocolate, spices, herbs and roasted grain.

£2.40 a bottle. From www.tringbrewery.co.uk and www.beershophq.uk St Albans and Hitchin.

Tring India Stout, Tring Brewery