Brewing in the shopping centre

London has a lot of breweries but not many native brewers. There are a few, most notably Alastair Hook at Meantime, but it’s striking just how many of the city’s most well-known brewers come from somewhere else. Jim Wilson, the East Londoner who’s in charge of the shiny brew kit at Tap East in Stratford, is something of a rare beast.

The story of how Wilson, born in Bow and brought up in Dagenham, came to cask ale demonstrates neatly why this is. “I used to be an avid Carlsberg drinker,” he laughs. 

“That was until I went up to Lincolnshire with my partner to visit one of her friends. We went into a country pub, there was lots of ale; I though, let’s try that. That’s what got me into home brewing and  drinking the usual suspects like [London] Pride and Bombardier.

“I used to go out with my mates and it was always ‘ten pints of lager and one pint of that weird brown stuff’. My mates would say:  ‘oh it’s horrible, why do you want to drink that?’ ‘It’s not, it’s got flavour.”

Wilson’s refusal to give in to public humiliation has prepared him well for his role at Tap East, which, he tells me, is the only brewery in a shopping centre in the whole of Europe. Tucked away in the corner of the huge Westfield shopping complex (which sits alongside the Olympic Park), the brewery is on show to the world – or at least those who wander past on their way into the shopping centre. All that stands between Wilson and a constantly changing cast of smokers, amblers and fascinated toddlers is a large window.

Of course, it means that Wilson, 26, can see what’s going on outside, too. That was particularly handy during the Olympics, when all manner of famous sportsmen and women flitted past his brewery. Some of those taking part even partook of his beer, he says. “I remember there was a Puerto Rican doctor – he was really interested, I showed him around the brewery. We had all manner of East European coaches drinking in here, too.”

If things are a little more humdrum these days on the other side of the window, Wilson’s brewing is going from strength to strength. Yesterday he brewed a Blood Orange Pale Ale with noted beer guru Melissa Cole (“I’d never seen a blood orange until earlier this month,” he laughs) and the size and flexibility of his brewing kit means experimentation is easy. “I’d like to try a Pilsner; Not that many small breweries that have that opportunity – to try different stuff, keep the beer world turning. It’s a case of, ‘let’s have a go and see what we can do’.”

Perhaps Wilson’s late conversion to cask ale has created this expansive approach to brewing. For a number of years, he was a refrigeration engineer – then came that Lincolnshire revelation. He began to homebrew, and a day helping out at Brentwood Brewery in Essex turned into a full-time job. He was there for two-and-a-half years before coming to Tap East in April of last year.  “It was a new challenge, I knew the guys at Utobeer,” he says, matter-of-factly. “It’s a nice place to work.”

Certainly, Wilson takes a lot of satisfaction from seeing his beer being enjoyed. “There’s nothing better than coming in on a Monday and seeing all these empty casks – at least someone has had a good weekend!” he says. “It is very rewarding, that’s the best part of the job.”

He is also quite heavily involved with the London Brewers’ Alliance. “Because we meet each other regularly, we know what everyone is doing. It keeps everyone on their toes,” he says. “We want to improve beer in London. It is an exciting time to say the least." Wilson now lives just outside London, in Chelmsford, but he’s still delighted to be part of the city’s burgeoning beer renaissance. “It’s great to be part of the history of brewing in London,” he says. “To work where you’re from – it’s really rewarding.”

As for the future, Wilson is fairly open-minded. “I’d love to have a restaurant with a small brewery, doing American-style food, not over-complicated,” he says. “Or work for a big brewery. Hopefully by the time I’m there, some of the smaller guys will have grown – but I don’t think I’d ever have my own brewery. Too much stress. All you want to do is make the beer but there’s too much other stuff.”

The malt man

Hops get an awful lot of attention. These little green cones are the undisputed stars of the craft-beer world: any self-respecting drinker can tell his Citra from his Nelson Sauvin, his Simcoe from his East Kent Golding. Brewers have helped to fuel this hop mania - Brewdog used to advertise Hardcore IPA as having more hops in it than “any other beer brewed in the UK”, for example. Hops are hip.

Malt is not quite so fashionable. Despite being the real engine room of any beer (like Charlie Watts to hops’ prancing, pouting, gyrating Mick Jagger), malt doesn’t appear to excite drinkers like hops can.  It’s a shame, especially since Britain can boast any number of beers which give malt the co-billing it deserves (balance, I think they call it).

One of the best examples of this type of beer is brewed here in London – and that’s official. Sambrooks’ Wandle was recently named the best World’s Best Bitter at the World Beer Awards, where judges hailed its “nice fruity nose [while the flavour boasts] fresh tobacco with biscuity malt and floral hops.”

Part of what makes Wandle so good is the malt: Sambrooks use Maris Otter, a type of barley revered for the nutty, biscuity richness it contributes. “We decided right from the off to go for Maris Otter,” says Duncan Sambrook, founder and owner of the brewery. “It’s widely – and rightly – regarded as the Rolls-Royce of malts.”

Anyone who steps inside his brewery – wedged between Clapham Junction station and the grey-brown Thames – will take in great lungfuls of toasted Maris Otter aroma. It’s a traditional scent that denotes a largely traditional brewery, although not one that is stuck in the past: Sambrook’s now have a keg ale on the market, a pale ale that undergoes a period of krausening.

“We’ve produced something that is a cross between a lager and an English pale ale,” says Sambrook, 34. “It was just [about] trying to do something innovative and see how the market responds to it.”

It’s an interesting move from a brewery which has always sought to offer Londoners a taste of traditional British cask ale. Sambrook, who comes from Salisbury and still speaks with a soft West-Country twang, was surprised when he came to the capital at the paucity of breweries. At that stage he was working in the city but when in 2008 he decided to become a full-time brewer, his motivation was clear.

“I always thought that London was an untapped market for craft beer,” he says. “Where I grew up, we had fantastic microbreweries like Hopback, Ringwood, and more traditional ones like Hall and Woodhouse. I was very lucky. I was surprised when I  came to London and there was only Young’s and Fuller’s – and then Young’s left.

“Cask ale is an inherently local product. That’s true everywhere in the country –  look at the furore over Tetley’s shutting down [in Leeds], for instance. I met the guys from Leeds Brewery last week, and I love their advertising, with the hints from the Tetley advertising – ‘the last brewery left in Leeds’. There’s all these pubs up there now which they couldn’t ever supply – overnight, they’re saying, ‘we want your beer in’.”

For all of his passion for tradition, Sambrook is delighted by the proliferation of breweries across London. More good beer available means more interest in good beer. Sambrook’s has certainly grown over the four years of its existence: they now produce some 5,500 barrels a year, which equates to well over a million pints.

The tide may be turning in Sambrooks’ favour. There seems to be a move back towards session-strength beers, like The Kernel’s much-admired Table Beer, which weighs in at just 3 per cent. It’s a trend that Sambrook (whose brewery regularly produces Wandle, at 3.8 per cent, Junction, at 4.5 per cent, Powerhouse Porter, at 4.9 per cent, and Pumphouse Pale Ale, at 4.2 per cent) is understandably happy to welcome.

“I hope it’s the next thing for craft beer,” he says. “We’ve often debated where the market is going. I’ve not fully embraced the American hop thing – I love those beers but our culture in the UK isn’t about that. My expectation is that over the next two or three years you’ll see brewers asking: what are we good at? We’re good at producing low-abv beers packed with taste, at using British ingredients – more malty drinks, porters, stouts.”

Which brings us neatly back to Maris Otter, and Wandle. Sambrook admits he was surprised at the World Beer Awards triumph. “I was absolutely delighted,” he says. “I’ve always been cynical about beer competitions. I’m delighted that this was picked by a panel of independent judges on a blind tasting. Some of the other competitions you’re a bit sceptical about why things get chosen.

“I’ve always thought that Wandle wasn’t a beer that had the flavour profile to stand out – the best thing about Wandle is that it is a lovely, delicate beer. It doesn’t necessarily stand up against something that is packed full of hops, that has a high abv, and therefore if you’re judging it in a competition you’re likely to go for the other one - but if you’re drinking it on a  day-to-day basis you’ll probably have Wandle, because it’s delicious.”