Castle Rock Rocks

The timing was exquisite. Castle Rock Brewery picked up the coveted Champion Beer of Britain award last week just a fortnight before it opens a spanking new plant in Nottingham that is capable of knocking out 20,000 barrels of beer a year, almost tripling capacity at the present site.

Chris Holmes, founder and chairman of Castle Rock, knows he will need that extra capacity. Harvest Pale, the 3.8% golden ale that won the championship at the Great British Beer Festival, is Castle Rock's leading brand and is in such demand that the brewery was rationing supplies to free trade customers and had none left over for its own pubs.

Help was in hand in the shape of the impressive new brewery being built alongside the original plant just a few yards from Nottingham railway station.

(Head brewer, Adrian Redgrove; commercial director, Colin Wilde; chairman, Chris Holmes and company secretary, Neil Kellett)

"Demand has been phenomenal," Chris Holmes says. He sells Harvest Pale to Punch Taverns and to the free trade via the Society of Independent Brewers' (Siba) direct delivery scheme and "they both just want more and more."

Holmes was national chairman of CAMRA in the 1970s and went on to own several pubs in the Nottingham area before launching Castle Rock Brewery in 1998. His success mirrors the way in which many small craft breweries have mushroomed in recent years. He produced 30 barrels a week at first, then upgraded to 70 barrels in 2005 with the aid of additional fermenting vessels. The new plant is in a spacious former probationer officers' building and uses a traditional British brewing system of mash tun, copper and fermenters.

Chris Holmes and his team are bringing brewing pride back to a city that has lost such famous names as Hardy & Hanson, Home and Shipstones. The new brewery cost 600,000, a considerable sum at a time when the country is coming out of recession.

But there are no signs of economic downturn at Castle Rock, which owns 22 pubs and supplies the free trade as far as York and Lincoln. The brewery also does "beer swaps" with other producers, which is why its ales can be found, for example, in some Fuller's pubs in London.

Harvest Pale, which accounts for 50 per cent of production, has won prestigious awards for Castle Rock from both CAMRA and Siba. But the brewery has an impressive range of other beers, including a dark mild and an India Pale Ale. A new beer is produced every month to support Nottinghamshire Wildlife Fund: Chris Holmes believes in putting something back in to the locality.

Holmes is equally committed to brewing beers of the highest quality, which accounts for the substantial investment in the new brewery. "Quality is essential to grow the business," he says, adding "and we listen to our customers and try to deliver what they want."

Quality includes using the best raw materials. Head brewer Adrian Redgrove, a graduate of Heriot-Watt University's school for brewing and distilling in Edinburgh, uses Maris Otter barley and American hops imported from the Pacific North-west. Maris Otter was de-listed many years ago by maltsters and big farmers as it's "low yielding", which means it produces less barley per acre than newer varieties. But many craft brewers have the grain grown by specialist farmers as they feel it delivers the finest biscuity malt character for their beers. It's more expensive but it works out at around an old-fashioned farthing per pint, a small price to pay for the perfect glass of ale.

Similarly, Adrian considers it's worth the cost of bringing hops all the way from Washington State in the U.S., as the intense citrus fruit of the plants grown there gives just the tart and tangy balance he needs to marry the juicy Maris Otter malt.

By fascinating coincidence, the winner of the Strong Bitter class in last week's championship, Thornbridge Jaipur IPA, has an almost identical recipe to Harvest Pale's. Brewers Stefano Cossi and Kelly Ryan fashion their 5.9% beer with Maris Otter pale malt and American Cascade and Chinook hops. The difference between the two beers lies in the strength: Jaipur IPA has a massive lemon/grapefruit aroma and flavour backed by rich, sappy malt.

It may seem odd that such a quintessentially English beer as India Pale Ale uses American hops but Thornbridge is following a Victorian tradition of importing the ingredients best-suited to the style. In the 19th century, brewers of IPA in Burton-on-Trent often used Pilsner malt from central Europe as well as barley from California and hops from New York State.

Thornbridge, in common with Castle Rock, has grown from a tiny micro, based in sheds in the grounds of Thornbridge Hall in Derbyshire, to new a custom-built site at Bakewell where it can produce 20,000 barrels a year.

It was a good week for Midlands breweries in the Champion Beer of Britain competition. Along with Castle Rock and Thornbridge, the Amber Brewery in Ripley won gold in the speciality class with its Chocolate Orange Stout while Nottingham Brewery won bronze in the mild category with Rock Ale Mild.

As they say in those parts, well done, m'ducks.