go into a can and on keg. We wanted to make it a premium product at 4% ABV but even so, it’s really important that it tastes like it comes from the same family of beers.” On the face of it, the recipe is fairly simple with just four ingredients: • Manchester tap water (from Thirlmere in the Lake District) • British malted barley • A new hop called Jester, which didn’t exist when Boddingtons was being brewed • JW Lees yeast, which is thousands of generations old
Getting the balance right is less straightforward.
So brewing Boddingtons with the same flavour profile as before was critical. The problem was that nobody had the recipe! Not even Budweiser, which now owns the Boddingtons brand. “It’s not been brewed [in cask] for a while,” says William. “Budweiser is brewing Boddingtons at 3.5% ABV to “The challenge with any drink is getting the flavour right. Everyone will remember when Coca-Cola changed their recipe and it was an absolute disaster.”
In 1963, Whitbread bought a 13% stake in Boddingtons and in subsequent years, helped to fight off several hostile takeover attempts until, in 1987, Ewart Boddington finally sold Strangeways Brewery and the Boddingtons brand to Whitbread in its entirety, ending 200 years of family ownership. In 2000, Whitbread was subsequently bought by the international beer giant Interbrew, which ultimately became Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev). In 2007 the famous Strangeways Brewery was demolished and turned into a surface level car park. The area is now a focal point for residential regeneration in the city. No recipe Having agreed to bring back cask Boddingtons the first challenge for JW Lees was the recipe.
JW Lees spent a long time talking to former Boddingtons employees to make certain everything was right, including being contacted by the son of Peter Laws, the old Boddingtons headbrewer. After a huge effort, and when the beer had finally passed all the quality checks of Budweiser, William insisted on one final step before launch. He invited about 30 regional committee members from CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale), and Roger Protz, arguably the most important beer writer in the UK, to a tasting session at the Greengate Brewery. “It was incredible,” says William, “they turned up with all their tasting notes from the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s! But more importantly they gave it the thumbs up as a faithful rendition of
FBUK Issue 5 8
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