business: beer
Raise a glass above: The Saltaire Brewery produces nearly 500 casks of quality ales a week. Opposite page and below: Their beers have won more than 50 trade awards, including two national championship brews and two international gold medals.
“It encourages breweries to get better and produce more unique beers,” enthuses Gordon. “If you look at somewhere like Magic Rock they have all these big, hoppy tastes. It’s important for new breweries to find a niche.” With nearly 500 cask ales a week distributed to pubs across the region, Saltaire is leading the way for microbreweries in the UK. The region is also home to some of the country’s leading craft beer pubs, including the revered Fanny’s Ale House in Saltaire, which also produces its own cheese. The Sparrow Bier Cafe in Bradford stocks beers from Saltaire, Ilkley, Magic Rock and Kirkstall. Last year The Guardian declared The Sparrow as one of the top 10 British craft beer pubs. The range of ales is certainly impressive, with about 70 available at any given time. The Sparrow’s proprietors are quick to champion local breweries. Co-owner Les Hall says: “The Saltaire Brewery is remarkable and they may have shown many the way, but many brewers now are young folk, passionate about what they’re doing, highly skilled with a vision and a determination to succeed. “We deal with many breweries and try to maintain a choice of beers of the highest quality. We regularly deal with, and are never disappointed by, Ilkley, Kirkstall, Salamander, Saltaire and Summer Wine, who are all local. “A little further afield we get fantastic beers from Buxton, Marple and Thornbridge. The choice and quality out there is amazing.” “As for real ale coming back into fashion, that is an interesting question. Great brewers have been providing ace ale for years and years and to many of us the drink has always been ‘in fashion’. “Perhaps the significant change now is the broad spectrum and volume of folk that enjoy ‘craft’ or ‘real’ ale seeing it as an essential and worthy product. When it comes to ale, we punch well above our weight in Bradford.” A passion for Yorkshire ale among the residents of its towns and villages is hardly a revelation, but with a string of microbreweries sweeping through the west of the county and making a significant contribution to the area’s economy, it’s perhaps safe to guess that real ale will continue to be supped here for generations to come. ❖
winter 2012
Bradford 43