Wychwood Brewery
Encyclopedia
Wychwood Brewery is an English
brewery
founded by Paddy Glenny in 1983, and located in the town of Witney
, Oxfordshire
in the United Kingdom
. It is owned by Refresh UK, a subsidiary of Marstons plc. The company's flagship brand
is Hobgoblin, a 5.2% abv
ale
, described by Wychwood as a "Ruby ale".
Wychwood Brewery produces around 50,000 barrels (8,200,000 litres) of cask ale
each year, and is the United Kingdom
's largest brewer of organic
ales. Wychwood filtered and bottled beers are exported all over the world, including the United States
, Canada
, Sweden
, France
, Australia
, Russia
, Japan
, and Israel
.
The brewery is noted for its intricate, fantasy
-based label artwork, inspired by the myths and legends surrounding the ancient mediaeval Wych Wood Forest.
barley
for John William Clinch's brewery.
Clinch & Co Brewery
was respected in Southern England
with an estate of seventy one pubs. In 1961 Courage bought Clinch's for its pub estate and closed down the brewery.
In 1983, the original Clinch's Brewery site was purchased by Paddy Glenny who christened the building The Eagle Brewery, but named the brewing company Glenny Brewery. Chris Moss became the founder after Paddy Glenny moved away. In 1990, the Eagle was re-named the Wychwood Brewery after the ancient Wychwood Forest which borders Witney. The brewery was taken over in the spring of 2002 by Refresh UK.
in bottles and cans, 4.5% (previously 5.0%, and before that 5.6%) on cask
, and is described by Wychwood as a "Ruby ale". Jeremy Moss, Wychwood's head brewer, describes the drink as "full bodied and well balanced with a chocolate toffee malt flavour, moderate bitterness and a distinctive fruity character with a ruby red glow". It was the first bottled beer in the UK to feature an illustrated label, as opposed to a simple text-based one, and it is currently the 5th best-selling bottled ale in the UK.
The current motto for Hobgoblin is "What's the matter Lager
boy, afraid you might taste something?", challenging drinkers of pale lager
, a more popular style of beer in Britain, to consume a more prominently-flavoured drink. In October 2004 and 2005, Wychwood used a variation of this motto for Halloween
, "Afraid of the dark, Lagerboy?". In 2006 a complaint lodged by a lager drinker against Wychwood to the Advertising Standards Authority
that the Halloween campaign was "aggressive" and "offensive" was not upheld.
During a meeting at the 2010 G-20 Toronto summit
, Prime Minister
David Cameron
and President
Barack Obama
gave each other bottles of beer from their respective home towns/cities, with Cameron presenting Obama with twelve bottles of Hobgoblin, which is from his constituency area Witney
. The President remarked that he would drink his beer chilled, as opposed to the optimal room temperature (15.5 °C/59.9 °F) at which strong ale should be drunk, prompting Wychwood to create a T-shirt in their online store reading "What's the matter Obama, afraid you might taste something?".
"Special Reserve" ale
. To date it is available bottled in Morrisons
supermarkets, Draegers supermarkets in the U.S., and on draught during "real ale" festivals at Wetherspoons pubs
.
It is also stated on Wychwood's site, that King Goblin is only brewed during a full moon.
. It combines whole leaf Target hops with organically grown English Barley Malt. It sold from the time of its release as Scarecrow in the United States
. When it was launched in the UK it was called Corn Circle beer, but the name was changed after a dispute with the Hop Back Brewery
who produce a beer called Crop Circle
. The new name Circle Master is a reference to CircleMakers, the UK arts collective founded by John Lundberg
who have been creating crop circle
s since the early 1990s. The label depicts a scarecrow standing in the middle of a crop circle. The name in the UK was again changed in 2010 to Scarecrow, as it had been called all along in the US market.
traditionally craft-brewed ale with Pale & Crystal Malts for a sturdy ruby colour and rich malty taste. With a hefty wack of English Fuggles and Styrian Goldings hops for a classic refreshing bitterness. Brewed by Wychwood and available in bottles only.
bottled and 3.8% abv
in cask. It was released by Wychwood as their version of the more popular pale lager
style of beer.
cider
called Green Goblin, under their branding, but produced by Thatchers.
of the newly-acquired Brakspear
beers in October 2002. The new Brakspear brewery was integrated into an expansion of the Wychwood plant, and includes parts of the copper (boiling vessel), as well as some of the fermenting vessels which themselves had been refurbished at Henley. There is only one brewhouse at Witney but two separate fermenting rooms for the separate Wychwood and Brakspear beers. The Brakspear beers are still brewed in Witney by Wychwood and not in Henley, where the original brewery site has been converted into a boutique hotel.
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
brewery
Brewery
A brewery is a dedicated building for the making of beer, though beer can be made at home, and has been for much of beer's history. A company which makes beer is called either a brewery or a brewing company....
founded by Paddy Glenny in 1983, and located in the town of Witney
Witney
Witney is a town on the River Windrush, west of Oxford in Oxfordshire, England.The place-name 'Witney' is first attested in a Saxon charter of 969 as 'Wyttannige'; it appears as 'Witenie' in the Domesday Book of 1086. The name means 'Witta's island'....
, Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....
in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. It is owned by Refresh UK, a subsidiary of Marstons plc. The company's flagship brand
Core product
Core products or flagship products are a company's products which are most directly related to their core competencies. These products are then integrated into a variety of end products, either by the company holding the core product or by a second company to which the core product is sold to, and...
is Hobgoblin, a 5.2% abv
ABV
ABV is a three-letter acronym that may refer to:* Alcohol by volume, a measure of the alcohol content of alcoholic drinks* Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, Nigeria, from its IATA airport code...
ale
Ale
Ale is a type of beer brewed from malted barley using a warm fermentation with a strain of brewers' yeast. The yeast will ferment the beer quickly, giving it a sweet, full bodied and fruity taste...
, described by Wychwood as a "Ruby ale".
Wychwood Brewery produces around 50,000 barrels (8,200,000 litres) of cask ale
Cask ale
Cask ale or cask-conditioned beer is the term for unfiltered and unpasteurised beer which is conditioned and served from a cask without additional nitrogen or carbon dioxide pressure...
each year, and is the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
's largest brewer of organic
Organic food
Organic foods are foods that are produced using methods that do not involve modern synthetic inputs such as synthetic pesticides and chemical fertilizers, do not contain genetically modified organisms, and are not processed using irradiation, industrial solvents, or chemical food additives.For the...
ales. Wychwood filtered and bottled beers are exported all over the world, including the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
, and Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
.
The brewery is noted for its intricate, fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
-based label artwork, inspired by the myths and legends surrounding the ancient mediaeval Wych Wood Forest.
History
The brewery is sited at the old Eagle Maltings, built in 1841 to maltMalt
Malt is germinated cereal grains that have been dried in a process known as "malting". The grains are made to germinate by soaking in water, and are then halted from germinating further by drying with hot air...
barley
Barley
Barley is a major cereal grain, a member of the grass family. It serves as a major animal fodder, as a base malt for beer and certain distilled beverages, and as a component of various health foods...
for John William Clinch's brewery.
Clinch & Co Brewery
Clinch & Co Brewery
Clinch Brewery is an English brewery, located in the town of Witney, Oxfordshire. It was founded by James Clinch around 1811.-Early history:...
was respected in Southern England
Southern England
Southern England, the South and the South of England are imprecise terms used to refer to the southern counties of England bordering the English Midlands. It has a number of different interpretations of its geographic extents. The South is considered by many to be a cultural region with a distinct...
with an estate of seventy one pubs. In 1961 Courage bought Clinch's for its pub estate and closed down the brewery.
In 1983, the original Clinch's Brewery site was purchased by Paddy Glenny who christened the building The Eagle Brewery, but named the brewing company Glenny Brewery. Chris Moss became the founder after Paddy Glenny moved away. In 1990, the Eagle was re-named the Wychwood Brewery after the ancient Wychwood Forest which borders Witney. The brewery was taken over in the spring of 2002 by Refresh UK.
Brands
Hobgoblin
Hobgoblin is the best-known and most popular beer brewed at Wychwood Brewery and was created by Chris Moss. It is 5.2% abvAlcohol by volume
Alcohol by volume is a standard measure of how much alcohol is contained in an alcoholic beverage .The ABV standard is used worldwide....
in bottles and cans, 4.5% (previously 5.0%, and before that 5.6%) on cask
Cask ale
Cask ale or cask-conditioned beer is the term for unfiltered and unpasteurised beer which is conditioned and served from a cask without additional nitrogen or carbon dioxide pressure...
, and is described by Wychwood as a "Ruby ale". Jeremy Moss, Wychwood's head brewer, describes the drink as "full bodied and well balanced with a chocolate toffee malt flavour, moderate bitterness and a distinctive fruity character with a ruby red glow". It was the first bottled beer in the UK to feature an illustrated label, as opposed to a simple text-based one, and it is currently the 5th best-selling bottled ale in the UK.
The current motto for Hobgoblin is "What's the matter Lager
Lager
Lager is a type of beer made from malted barley that is brewed and stored at low temperatures. There are many types of lager; pale lager is the most widely-consumed and commercially available style of beer in the world; Pilsner, Bock, Dortmunder Export and Märzen are all styles of lager...
boy, afraid you might taste something?", challenging drinkers of pale lager
Pale lager
Pale lager is a very pale to golden-coloured beer with a well attenuated body and a varying degree of noble hop bitterness. The brewing process for this beer developed in the mid 19th century when Gabriel Sedlmayr took pale ale brewing techniques back to the Spaten Brewery in Germany and applied it...
, a more popular style of beer in Britain, to consume a more prominently-flavoured drink. In October 2004 and 2005, Wychwood used a variation of this motto for Halloween
Halloween
Hallowe'en , also known as Halloween or All Hallows' Eve, is a yearly holiday observed around the world on October 31, the night before All Saints' Day...
, "Afraid of the dark, Lagerboy?". In 2006 a complaint lodged by a lager drinker against Wychwood to the Advertising Standards Authority
Advertising Standards Authority (United Kingdom)
The Advertising Standards Authority is the self-regulatory organisation of the advertising industry in the United Kingdom. The ASA is a non-statutory organisation and so cannot interpret or enforce legislation. However, its code of advertising practice broadly reflects legislation in many instances...
that the Halloween campaign was "aggressive" and "offensive" was not upheld.
During a meeting at the 2010 G-20 Toronto summit
2010 G-20 Toronto summit
The 2010 G-20 Toronto summit was the fourth meeting of the G-20 heads of government, in discussion of the global financial system and the world economy, which took place at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, during June 26–27, 2010...
, Prime Minister
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the Head of Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are collectively accountable for their policies and actions to the Sovereign, to Parliament, to their political party and...
David Cameron
David Cameron
David William Donald Cameron is the current Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, First Lord of the Treasury, Minister for the Civil Service and Leader of the Conservative Party. Cameron represents Witney as its Member of Parliament ....
and President
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
gave each other bottles of beer from their respective home towns/cities, with Cameron presenting Obama with twelve bottles of Hobgoblin, which is from his constituency area Witney
Witney
Witney is a town on the River Windrush, west of Oxford in Oxfordshire, England.The place-name 'Witney' is first attested in a Saxon charter of 969 as 'Wyttannige'; it appears as 'Witenie' in the Domesday Book of 1086. The name means 'Witta's island'....
. The President remarked that he would drink his beer chilled, as opposed to the optimal room temperature (15.5 °C/59.9 °F) at which strong ale should be drunk, prompting Wychwood to create a T-shirt in their online store reading "What's the matter Obama, afraid you might taste something?".
King Goblin
King Goblin, essentially a stronger and more flavourful variety of Hobgoblin, is a 6.6% abvAlcohol by volume
Alcohol by volume is a standard measure of how much alcohol is contained in an alcoholic beverage .The ABV standard is used worldwide....
"Special Reserve" ale
Ale
Ale is a type of beer brewed from malted barley using a warm fermentation with a strain of brewers' yeast. The yeast will ferment the beer quickly, giving it a sweet, full bodied and fruity taste...
. To date it is available bottled in Morrisons
Morrisons
Wm Morrison Supermarkets plc is the fourth largest chain of supermarkets in the United Kingdom, headquartered in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England. The company is usually referred to and is branded as Morrisons formerly Morrison's, and it is part of the FTSE 100 Index of companies...
supermarkets, Draegers supermarkets in the U.S., and on draught during "real ale" festivals at Wetherspoons pubs
Public house
A public house, informally known as a pub, is a drinking establishment fundamental to the culture of Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. There are approximately 53,500 public houses in the United Kingdom. This number has been declining every year, so that nearly half of the smaller...
.
It is also stated on Wychwood's site, that King Goblin is only brewed during a full moon.
Scarecrow
Scarecrow, formerly known as Circle Master, is a golden pale ale made organically at 4.7% abvAlcohol by volume
Alcohol by volume is a standard measure of how much alcohol is contained in an alcoholic beverage .The ABV standard is used worldwide....
. It combines whole leaf Target hops with organically grown English Barley Malt. It sold from the time of its release as Scarecrow in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. When it was launched in the UK it was called Corn Circle beer, but the name was changed after a dispute with the Hop Back Brewery
Hop Back Brewery
Hop Back, one of England's award-winning small breweries, brewers of Summer Lightning, Crop Circle, G.F.B. and other beers was founded by John and Julie Gilbert. Beer was first brewed in 1986 at the Wyndham Arms in Salisbury, and moved to larger premises in Downton six years later...
who produce a beer called Crop Circle
Crop circle
A crop circle is a sizable pattern created by the flattening of a crop such as wheat, barley, rye, maize, or rapeseed. Crop circles are also referred to as crop formations, because they are not always circular in shape. While the exact date crop circles began to appear is unknown, the documented...
. The new name Circle Master is a reference to CircleMakers, the UK arts collective founded by John Lundberg
John Lundberg
John Lundberg is an English artist and documentary filmmaker. In the early 1990s he founded circlemakers, a UK based arts collective famous for covertly creating hundreds of the world's largest and most elaborate crop circles....
who have been creating crop circle
Crop circle
A crop circle is a sizable pattern created by the flattening of a crop such as wheat, barley, rye, maize, or rapeseed. Crop circles are also referred to as crop formations, because they are not always circular in shape. While the exact date crop circles began to appear is unknown, the documented...
s since the early 1990s. The label depicts a scarecrow standing in the middle of a crop circle. The name in the UK was again changed in 2010 to Scarecrow, as it had been called all along in the US market.
Goliath
Goliath is a 4.2% abvAlcohol by volume
Alcohol by volume is a standard measure of how much alcohol is contained in an alcoholic beverage .The ABV standard is used worldwide....
traditionally craft-brewed ale with Pale & Crystal Malts for a sturdy ruby colour and rich malty taste. With a hefty wack of English Fuggles and Styrian Goldings hops for a classic refreshing bitterness. Brewed by Wychwood and available in bottles only.
Wychcraft
A recent addition to Wychwood's selection, Wychcraft is a blonde beer, which is 4.5% abvAlcohol by volume
Alcohol by volume is a standard measure of how much alcohol is contained in an alcoholic beverage .The ABV standard is used worldwide....
bottled and 3.8% abv
Alcohol by volume
Alcohol by volume is a standard measure of how much alcohol is contained in an alcoholic beverage .The ABV standard is used worldwide....
in cask. It was released by Wychwood as their version of the more popular pale lager
Pale lager
Pale lager is a very pale to golden-coloured beer with a well attenuated body and a varying degree of noble hop bitterness. The brewing process for this beer developed in the mid 19th century when Gabriel Sedlmayr took pale ale brewing techniques back to the Spaten Brewery in Germany and applied it...
style of beer.
Green Goblin
Recently, Wychwood began selling an oak aged 6% abvAlcohol by volume
Alcohol by volume is a standard measure of how much alcohol is contained in an alcoholic beverage .The ABV standard is used worldwide....
cider
Cider
Cider or cyder is a fermented alcoholic beverage made from apple juice. Cider varies in alcohol content from 2% abv to 8.5% abv or more in traditional English ciders. In some regions, such as Germany and America, cider may be termed "apple wine"...
called Green Goblin, under their branding, but produced by Thatchers.
Wychwood and Brakspear
Wychwood took over the brewingBrewing
Brewing is the production of beer through steeping a starch source in water and then fermenting with yeast. Brewing has taken place since around the 6th millennium BCE, and archeological evidence suggests that this technique was used in ancient Egypt...
of the newly-acquired Brakspear
Brakspear
WH Brakspear & Sons Ltd is the name of a brand of English beers and pubs, based in Henley on Thames, Oxfordshire. While the beer brewing and pub management sides of the business were originally unified, the brewing has since been sold to Wychwood Brewery owners Refresh UK.-History:The Brakspear...
beers in October 2002. The new Brakspear brewery was integrated into an expansion of the Wychwood plant, and includes parts of the copper (boiling vessel), as well as some of the fermenting vessels which themselves had been refurbished at Henley. There is only one brewhouse at Witney but two separate fermenting rooms for the separate Wychwood and Brakspear beers. The Brakspear beers are still brewed in Witney by Wychwood and not in Henley, where the original brewery site has been converted into a boutique hotel.