Right Up Your Valley
Independence Day has come for Welsh Craft Beer Out amidst our lush green hills and fed by the finest of Welsh spring water a brewing revolution has been quietly taking place for years. Now, finally people are starting to notice. Luke Waterson takes us on a tour around some of the bright stars in the welsh ale brewing scene. The watershed came in 2015. CAMRA, the Campaign for Real Ale awarded overall gold to a Welsh brewery at the Great British Beer Festival. Since then Welsh brewers continue to push boundaries in their quest for new, exciting flavours using everything from seaweed to oysters. In a move not seen since the 1870’s some are even brewing with Welsh-grown hops. Better still you can go see many of them in operation. Scenic brewery settings, such as Tenby Brewing Co’s beach bar and Bluestone Brewing Co’s lovely mountainside farmhouse give the visitor experience a uniquely Welsh character. Today, there are funky indie brewers making amazing beers all over the country. Here are a few that we think really stand out.
Monty’s Brewery, Powys Comfy armchairs, flagstone floors and beams are not the welcome you might anticipate in a brewery, but head brewer Pam and her husband Russ have bucked trends at Monty’s, since day one. Their convivial visitor centre in historic Montgomery, sheltering beneath the town’s 11th-century ruined castle, might seem a genteel townhouse, but it includes a brewery shop and a development brewery where the latest hops and experimental beers are trialled. The visitor centre offers a unique opportunity to buy the experimental brews, and you can expand your palate further with the regular beer-and-chocolate, or beer-and-cheese pairings. Wacky one-offs aside, their multi-awardwinning, golden and citrussy Sunshine heads the best of the rest. We also dig the Best Offa, a golden bitter brewed especially as the Offa’s Dyke Path’s official beer. Buy the beer: Monty’s Brewery Visitor Centre, The Cottage, Montgomery, Powys SY151QT; www.montysbrewery.co.uk Price: £2.20-£3.50 per bottle
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www.taste-blas.co.uk
Boss Brewing, Swansea Way before the first sip, this 2015 addition to the South Wales brew scene founded by Sarah John and Roy Allkin impresses. The slick website looks like a sequence from a graphic novel for goodness sake! In 2018 the outfit remodelled and moved into a centuryold cinema for their new premises. Inside, not only are you treated to the whole grain-to-glass process, but the £20 tour fee covers as much beer as you want to quaff. So, don’t drive there, OK? There is an on-site taproom open Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, plus another, Copper, in central Swansea which also specializes in coffee. Of all their brews, it is perhaps the stouts that stand out. The silky Boss Black was Champion Beer of Wales in the stout category in 2016 and 2017. Look out for the comic book-style pump clips. Buy the beer: Boss Brewing, 176 Neath Road, Landore, Swansea, SA1 2JT; www.bossbrewing.co.uk Price: From £2.75 a bottle
