Evans Brad - The London Craft Brewers beers & culture

ABOUT THE BOOK

Experience the very best craft beer in over 40 London pubs and breweries.

Take a tour with the guys behind the Craft Beer Channel, who have hunted out the best breweries and pubs in the capital and given insider tips on what to drink and eat when youre there.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Jonny Garret is one half of the Craft Beer Channel team, and is a former deputy editor of Jamieoliver.com. As well as being a freelance writer and editor, he also works full time at Cave Direct, a lead importer of artisan craft beer from Germany, Belgium, and the US.

Brad Evans is part of the Craft Beer Channel duo. He is a freelance graphic designer, animator and photographer. He worked as lead graphic designer in Jamie Olivers creative team and worked on the illustrations for Jamie At Home and graphics for all of his tv shows.

CONTENTS

BEER HERE NOW

CRAFT BEER IN THE CAPITAL

IT HASNT ALWAYS BEEN THIS GOOD. A DECADE AGO, BREWING IN THE CAPITAL WAS NEARLY EXTINCT.

Back then there were just 10 breweries, and many of those wouldnt live to see the craft beer revolution take off. Since reaching its peak of 115 breweries in 1830, this world-famous trading hub had let one of its most famous exports go down the drain. The dockworkers had abandoned their porters, and pale ale breweries were being bought out and closed all over the city. Names like Charringtons and Taylor Walker were consigned to history, just words etched in stone above pubs, while the buildings were left derelict, the tall chimneys blocked up and coppers reclaimed.

By the 1970s most bars cellars were full of the dull, mass-produced lagers that had helped ruin real ale, championed by suited men who knew nothing about beer but plenty about profit. As they cashed in, the pubs went into decline, drowning under rising rents and thinning margins. Forced to drink overpriced pseudo-brews, drinkers were forgetting how beer was supposed to taste.

The Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) hadnt given up though. In 1971, over a few drinks in Dunquin, Ireland, four men swore to fight for the survival of traditional cask beer. For the next 30 years they battled to keep real ale alive, running festivals, publishing pamphlets and hounding the government. It became one of the biggest consumer movements in the world, but the British pub and its traditional beers were still in danger. First resigned to bad lager, then bored by it, drinking tins at home became the norm as supermarkets discounted their beer to irresponsible levels in the hope of attracting shoppers. The greatest brewing nation on Earth had become homogenous, bloated and boring.

Thankfully, a nation famous for its complete lack of brewing heritage was bored too, and a revolution had just begun that would change everything. New varieties of aromatic hops, originally developed to be more disease resistant, were falling into the hands of homebrewers in California, Oregon and Washington. Most of these beer nerds were brewing British bitters and historic IPA recipes, but the experimental hops were adding extra dimensions to the beer they were much more bitter, but the trade-off was hints of pine, resin and grapefruit unheard of in beer before. Excited by what they had discovered, many of these brewers decided to go pro people like Ken Grossman of Sierra Nevada Brewing Company. This movement spawned the American pale ale and IPA, two styles that changed the way the world looked at beer.

But while new-fangled craft beer spread across the USA in the 80s and 90s, in the UK things were still looking bleak. Tens of pubs were closing across the country every week. Continental lagers were able to market themselves as premium, ripping out real ale lines and the heart of British tradition. Pockets of local, traditional breweries survived in the Black Country and Yorkshire, but in London we celebrated the Millennium with Prosecco and discount cans of Carling. To many it was the darkest hour in the history of British beer.

In a lock-up opposite Charlton Athletics stadium a man called Alastair Hook was taking a different view. Hed studied brewing at Heriot-Watt University before heading to Bavaria, where he did an apprenticeship at the oldest brewery in the world, Weihenstephan. As a pupil of German brewing he was never going to be the saviour of real ale, but he did have ambitions to change British beer. To start, he focused on traditional German styles like Helles and Weissbier and back then that was pretty revolutionary the idea of a London lager was certainly brave. It didnt take him long to outgrow the garage and move to Greenwich, where he assumed the name Meantime, after the longitude that dissects that part of town. Meantime showed that artisan beer had a place in the UK, but over the next decade only a few new breweries joined the ranks in London while others closed or moved.

It was actually a tiny town near Aberdeen where Americas revolution truly hit our shores. Fraserburgh is just about the least likely place in the world for a modern US-inspired brewery to spring up, but the one that did went on to kick open doors all over the UK. Brash and controversial, BrewDog were exactly the kind of company needed to challenge the powerful corporations that owned the market. Their beer was hoppy as hell, high in alcohol and branded, it seemed, to cause offence. Faced with vocal opposition, the founders Martin Dickie and James Watt were unapologetic, locking horns with anyone who tried to moderate them. Whatever you think of their marketing approach, their beers are regularly cited as an influence by some of the UKs greatest brewers. One such brewer is Evin ORiordain of The Kernel, who stands at head of the London craft brewery family tree. Unlike BrewDog though, Evin had no ambitions beyond the walls of his brewery. He simply wanted to brew big-flavoured American craft beer. As it turns out, that was a solid business strategy.

It wasnt just Evins exciting beers or successful business that encouraged others: it was how he went about creating them. He believed in experimentation: he never brewed the same beer twice and rejected all advertising and marketing. He broke every rule in the start-up book, but the business model he cobbled together has been copied by brewers all over the country. Since he opened The Kernel in 2010, the number of breweries in London has grown from 10 to 100 a rate of more than one every month. By 2019 there will be more breweries than there have been at any time in the capitals history.

This book tells the tale of this remarkable revolution. It doesnt take the form of a history book or novel; it has no beginning and certainly no ending. Its a collection of short stories about fleeting moments, magical places and incredible people, all of which have come together to create something envied the world over. This is a snapshot of what it is like to live and drink in London today.

What follows isnt just the tap lists and opening times of the best bars or breweries in London, its an account of the people and places that come together to form a counterculture.

Some people think that craft beer is a bubble, set to burst when something new and exciting comes along. But what youll find in this book are stories that will be told in a hundred years, backed up by bricks and mortar that have reinvigorated parts of the capital.