Nestled deep within the
Gloucestershire countryside resides Hartley Farm, where amongst a modest set of
farm buildings houses Cotswold Lion Brewery. Established in 2012 by Andy
Forbes, it was named after a local Sheep breed known for its distinctive golden
coloured wool. Initially operating from a grain store within a farm, they moved
to its present location in 2021. Two years ago, Forbes retired and sold the
brewery to Dan Powell, incidentally the grandchild of the Head Brewer from the
former Stroud Brewery which closed in 1967. Powell subsequently employed Don
Burgess as Head Brewer, overseeing the daily operations of the brewery. Burgess
was introduced to Powell via a mutual friend who knew him from a previous
brewery; tiring of long commutes, the prospect of working at a ‘shire’ brewery
appealed to him, he notes “the concept of a solar powered brewery using
local resources and barley from malt produced on the farm really ticked the
right boxes!” Burgess has over 30 years’ experience in the brewing industry
and was an early champion of sustainable brewing practices and the use of local
organic/ fairtrade ingredients through his former brewery Freeminer, so in
retrospect he is a perfect fit for Cotswold Lion.
They run on a sustainable
production model, powering the equipment via solar panels while using wood-chip
biofuel to heat the buildings. Burgess explains “we have almost 50KW of
solar power on the roof of one of the farm buildings providing power, it is
enough to boil a 10 BBL copper, and to heat our process water in the Hot Liquor
Tank as a way of storing electric power as energy for use in the process, we
also recover heat exchanger water after the wort chill. The heated water tank
is used to heat the HLT via a plate heat exchanger, we refer to the heat store
as “The battery”, not all batteries store electricity!” As well as being
good for the environment, there is a financial incentive as well to consider, he
adds “sustainable production means an improved bottom line, less
environmental impact, reduced use of natural resources, being aware, and taking
measures to reduce energy use, recover heat energy, and offset CO2 production
in the face of rapidly increasing climate change benefits everyone.” The focus at Cotswold Lion is on local
ingredients, the malt is sourced from barley directly grown on the farm, which
is then processed at Warminster Maltings; while the hops derive from hop
growers based within the Three Counties (Herefordshire, Worcestershire and
Gloucestershire) and their water comes from the Seven Springs, notably one of the
sources of the River Thames. While the brewing industry is generally obsessed
with using imported hops, Burgess champions the use and potential of English
hops, “I have always felt that UK hops showed huge potential due to their
unique terroir and variety, and due to the hop development program at Charles
Faram, there are new flavours and aromas appearing year on year from our own
shore.” While he has used American and New Zealand hops in the past, he
notes they come with a big carbon footprint, so it makes ecological sense to
utilize often overlooked yet excellent legacy heritage hop varieties available
on his doorstep, which in turn is beneficial to local hop growers and
suppliers.
Burgess takes a dim view on the
preponderance of brewers who tend to produce bigger, stronger and hoppier
beers, infused with all manner of adjuncts, Burgess contends there is much
scope for brewers to innovate with traditional English styles, made to a
premium quality and a sensible price. “Taking
traditional styles and reinterpreting them with modern innovations in hops and
in production has enabled huge leaps in quality and presentation without
leaning towards the theoretical made flesh.” This is reflected in the roster
of traditional English style beers Cotswold Lion produces through its
core-range, from the likes of Shepherd’s Delight (3.6%) a light hoppy
pale ale, to the session bitter, Top Notch (4%) and stronger examples
like Golden Fleece (4.4%) a Golden IPA, and their ESB, Top Tup (4.8%).
Since Burgess joined the brewery, their beers have been sold in various pubs
around Gloucestershire and the Cotswolds. Notably last July, Golden Fleece was
available on draught at Jeremy Clarkson’s pub The Farmer’s Dog in Burford; and later
that Autumn the brewery started to expand their cask sales outside the county
to pubs in the West Midlands. Looking to the future, Burgess hopes promote the
brewery further, “I am working on keeping our Facebook feeds more active, we
are getting more followers as the new beer styles I have introduced at Cotswold
Lion are finally coming to more recognition.” He also hopes to raise more
awareness about the green credentials of the brewery from its solar powered
production, to its usage of locally grown barley, hops and water. While the
brewery builds traction, he ruminates “we hope to do more “Open Door” days,
I have several plans up my sleeve, some interesting one-off beers are in the
book of brewing, but at the moment, with our standard sales growing, it's
keeping the wheels on the wagon, it's easy to over promise, keeping growth
steady with quality to the fore.” Burgess
notes he was very lucky to know a number of ‘old school brewers’ in his time, “I
learned many tips and techniques from them, and some to avoid! I developed a
style of creating the new, pushing the envelope, but keeping familiarity there
to encourage the drinker to try the beers.” With
his beers, he likes to generate as much novel flavour as possible, whist
staying within the confines of using local ingredients, reviving heritage beer
styles, and along the way giving a few new varieties a modern facelift, without
needing the use of hop rockets and every fermentable adjunct under the sun.
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