Blackpit Times - Mid 2019

Volume 2 - Spring / Summer 2019

Welcome!
A year and a half ago, after months of planning and a lot of
hard work, we started a brewery. Three friends, that went to
school together, with a kindred spirit for all things beer!
With more than eighty years of friendship between us,
we’ve shared a memory or two. A few of which may have
started with a pint!
For us, the art of ‘going for a pint’ has so many benefits:
relaxing, laughing, talking problems over with friends,
ignoring work and forgetting the ubiquitous smart-phone.
With pubs shutting at an alarming rate and the
conversation around mental-health becoming ever-so
prevalent, isn’t it more important than ever that we head
out and pick up our pint glasses in order to relax, forget
our troubles and enjoy one another’s company? Well, at
least that’s a good excuse for a pint anyway!
Cheers!
Ben, Oly & Duncan

Planing ahead
We give you an inside look at 2019
We’ve been in business less than two years; not a day passes
without learning something new. The beauty of being small,
as a business, is we can explore lots of avenues and change
direction quickly, however we do make the occasional plan...
Collaborations - We’re lucky to
have made some great friends in
other breweries, lots of which came
to our Beer Festival last August.
interesting beer! Dan, our brewer,
is up for the challenge and in talks
with a couple of breweries as we
speak.
Top of the list for 2019 is teaming
up for a collaboration brew. If you
haven’t heard of this before, it’s
where two breweries will concept
a new beer and brew it together at
one of their respective breweries.
It’s a great way to share knowledge,
ideas and (ultimately) make some
Big Events - This year we’re
hosting two large events rather
than three. This slight reduction
means we can focus on delivering
two huge hits...
The Festival of Beer - We are truly
excited about this, it’s consuming a
lot of our time but we’re basically

creating an event we’d love to attend! Great
music, great beer and lots of entertainment
to keep the family entertained... plus quality
camping, with hot showers, so you can get
your head down ready for day two.
Yes, that’s right, there’s two days this year!
Saturday is ‘party-time’ whilst Sunday is
slightly more chilled, to nurse you back into
your a game.
Fireworks - back for 2019 and bigger than
before. Building on the success of 2018,
we’re amplifying the content by spending
more on the fireworks display, adding more
food, making a more elaborate bonfire
and creating a theatrical story to stich it all
together.
Given this year’s event is held on November
the 1 st we’re also adding a Halloween thread,
with a Fancy Dress Ball, that will head on
into the night.
Lucy collecting hops from the local farm
Beer Launches - we’ve got some special
beers coming out in 2019, some are brand
new beers, some are re-releases, like Harvest
Moon. To launch some of these we’ll
be hosting small ‘marketing’ events. For
example, with Day Tripper, given it’s got a
campervan on the artwork, we’re planning
to get lots of campers to a Friday taproom
opening. Obviously there’ll be lots of lush
photos for the website!
Local Wild Hops - you perhaps remember
our test with wild hops we collected from
the farm over the road? Well, this year, we’re
planning on using these hops for more beer
(possibly even a big batch) provided the
hops harvest is as lucrative as 2018!
More Members - memberships took off in
2018 and we’re aiming to grow numbers.
There’s a slightly different format this
year, rather than everyones membership
running January to December, now they
last 12 months from the time of purchase
and you’re able to opt for an auto-renewal
scheme, that’s £5 cheaper.
As a member you get loads of perks, the
total value of which is more than the cost
of membership: members nights (with free
beer), money off events, 10% off in the
taproom... the list goes on, check out our
website for more details.
Seasonal vs. Core Beers - In 2018 we
settled into having core beers (ones that
we’ve always got in the cellar) and seasonal
beers (ones that come and go with the
season or with a special calendar event).
Why? Well, it’s hard to keep stock of every
beer we’ve ever made! We’d like to but we
physically have a limited amount of barrels.
Also, people like to drink lighter beers in
the summer and darker ones in the winter -
or at least that seems to be the trend!
Dan, our brewer, is also very creative. He’s
brewed some stunning beers, winning
lots of awards, so the seasonal programme
enables him to show-off his brewing talents
and further his brewing knowledge... it’s
just unfortunate that we have to test them
all!
New Staff - The crew is growing! We’ve
managed to operate on a shoe-string for
the first months of our existance with
lots of part time staff. We’ve now decided
it’s time to spread our bets and go ‘pro’.
Dan’s coming on-board full-time and
we’ve enlisted the help of Martin, our new
sales-guy, for three days a week. All in a bid
to grow Blackpit, enabling us all to drink
better beer!
Charity - We’ve started to do more with
charities as we’ve got settled into a routine.
It’s hard to choose which charities and
how many but we’ve decided to focus on
a couple of charities per year with the idea
that by focusing we can deliver more of
an impact. Last year we supported Breast
Cancer Care and the MS Society. In 2019,
we’re talking to the RNIB and the RNLI
but are yet to make a commitment.

Collaborations are high on the agenda in 2019; here’s us with Rivington
Brewing Co. at the Fesival of Beer. We’re talking with releasing a
collaboration brew with them specifically for this year’s Beer Festival.

Available as individual bottles,
cases of 12 or in gift-packs of
either 3 or 4 bottles.
Online at blackpitbrewery.co.uk
and collect from the taproom on a
Friday to save on postage.
Or pop into your local shop; there’s
a list of regular stockists below.
Also available for trade, please
contact Martin for more info:
martin@blackpitbrewery.co.uk
regular stockists
Beerfly
Bedford
Beer Guerrilla
Northampton
Buckingham Garden Centre
Buckingham
Duncan Murray Wines
M. Harborough
Kiwi & Pomme
Buckingham
St Giles Cheese
Northampton
T.E. Brown Butchers
Rushden
The Deli at Castle Ashby
Castle Ashby
Wild Leaf
Olney
which beer?
Cloud Nine - Zesty Blonde Ale, 3.9%
Great served chilled from the fridge.
Light & slightly fizzy, great with fish.
Loosehead - Golden Ale, 4.2%
A very easy drinking ale; great with
almost anything... especially rugby on
the TV!
Goshawk - Chestnut Ale, 4.4%
Deliciously dark and malty; great with
any hearty meal or for cooking stews.
Night Vision - Porter, 4.7%
A highly drinkable dark ale! Fantastic
with strong cheese, like Stilton.
Sky Rocket - Modern English IPA,
5.5% - Dangerously quaffable; perfectly
paired with red meat and great in a
steak & ale pie.

Summer’s coming
Festival of Beer tickets are selling fast; here’s why
you need to grab yours quick, before prices go up!
August 17 th & 18 th might seem a life-time away
but we’re spending most days talking about it
in the office... planning content for The Festival
of Beer and wondering which ale we’re going to
sample first!
We wanted to start an event that encompassed
great quality beer, delicious food with a hint of
music festival; this is everything we love and it
turns out so do a lot of you too!
This year’s event is going to be bigger & better
than ever. It’s growing not only in size, with more
brerweries attending, but in length. It’s now a
two day festival with camping.
Saturday is ‘party-time’ with a full-on day of
bursting with conent; three live music stages,
over 20 breweries & artisan producers plus
imense street-food. We’ve got everything
from Chilli Eating Competitions, on stage, to

immersive theatre in the woods. This culminates
in the late-night after-party in the woods.
Sunday is ‘relax and recouperation’, starting
lazily with Bloody Marys, the Sunday Papers
and Loco-Cricket; a match filled with silly
antics, commentory & streaking! There’s paddle
boarding on the lake and even beat-boxing
classes for adults & children.
Music highlights include Bob Harris coming
back with his Under the Apple Tree brand, on
Sunday, taking over the Lake Stage for a chilled
soundtrack. We’ve got Djs like J Morrisson,
who’s previously warmed up for Groove
Armarda. There’s even an Oompha Band
booked! And we haven’t even anounced our
headliners yet!
To keep the children amused there’s everything
from free face-painters to a ‘wandering zoo’
including a Meerkat display!
There’s two staff picks: 1) Pig racing on
Saturday is going to be hilarious with the chance
of betting and 2) Ruebens ‘Bull Sh*t Tour’
isn’t to be missed. We first saw this in London
and it was great; a tour of the Festival and its
surroudning parkland that’s complete rubbish.
Hard to explain but trust us; it’ll be worth it!
Adult weekend tickets start at £25, including
camping, however prices go up with time, so
buy now to avoid dissapointment.
There’s so much content, this year, we’ve made
a new ‘stand-alone’ website:
www.thefestivalofbeer.co.uk
Left to Right:
Ben, Lucy, Nicky,
Josh, Oly & Pip (the
dog) handing over a
cheesily big cheque
Charity Work
Behind the scenes
we’re trying our best
to support help with
charity work. It’s hard
(as a fledgling business)
to know how to support
when you’re still trying
to make enough money
to stay afloat!
In late December, we hosted a
small gathering for close friends
& family... needless to say we
had a few beers!
We laid on loads of free beer &
food and, in return, we asked
for donations towards the MS
Society to help progress their
amazing work & research with
Multiple Sclerosis. It’s a charity
that’s close to our hearts.
We were blown away by
everyone’s generosity; there were
some huge personal donations
as well as chunky contributions
from Buckingham Group
Contracting & Buckingham
Plant Hire.
We were delighted that Nicky,
from the MS Society, came
to receive a big cheque...
unfortunately Duncan couldn’t
make the photo so Pip, the dog,
took his place!
A huge thank you goes to
everyone that donated, from
small to big, every bit helped.
We were truly amazed by
your generosity, together we
managed to raise £1,146!

About
Membership
Memberships work out as great value-for-money as the total value of
the perks included far exceeds the cost of membership!
Brewery memberships include lots of perks
but it’s really about being part of something,
especially at the beginning of Blackpit...
members can truly say “I helped build this”.
What’s in the box:
12 months membership
£20 off events
£5 joining / renewal gift
3 x Members’ nights for you +1
10% off in the taproom
Blackpit pin badge
Membership Card
Presentation box
Cost:
Annual subscription - £50 (auto-renewal)
Single Year - £55 (12 months only)
Joining Gift - To give you a warm welcome,
when you sign up or renew, you’ll recieve a
£5 gift voucher to spend on merchandise in
the taproom. We aren’t specifying what to
buy, you’ll look dapper regardless!
Members’ Evenings - There are 3 members’
evenings per year with free beer for you plus
one. Oh, and we’ll put on some nibbles too!
Evenings vary in content: we’ve had cheese
& beer pairing nights, other breweries
talking about their beer and nights where
we’ve released our new beers.
Money off Paid Events - Members receive
£20 worth of vouchers to use towards tickets
at The Fireworks or The Festival of Beer.
10% off in the taproom - The taproom is
open most Fridays and, as a member, you’ll
recieve 10% off any drinks you order and
pay for. Just show your member’s card!
Giving as a Present? - Memberships are
great presents for beer lovers; they come in
a slick black presentation case with the gift
voucher and pin-badge inside, plus the all
important Blackpit member’s card!
Buy online at: blackpitbrewery.co.uk

Building the hawk;
How did we do it?
Where do you start with building
a ten-meter bonfire and how do you
make it look like a massive hawk?
To be honest, a lot of it is luck, but
there was a bit of method to our
construction madness...
We’ve been building ‘stuff’ since we were
young, from radio controlled aeroplanes to
dens in the woods. It’s mad how much of
that informs what we do now.
When we ‘grew-up’ we discovered drinking
and girls. As a result we started putting on
parties, for our friends, and would build
elaborate venues. From a two-storey Cowboy
Fort (made out of scaffolding) to Pat Sharp’s
Funhouse, complete with ball-pit and slide,
we really went to town.
Now that we’ve ‘grown-up’ we’re still finding
excuses to build elabroate things and Bonfire
Night’s turned into one of those! Who would
have thought that, when starting a brewery
18months ago, Bonfire Night would have
been such a huge part of our calendar?
We start planning with office conversations
(some of which end up in the pub) that then
lead into a short-list of what to build. We
take the idea and start building a 3D model
on the computer using a free bit of software
called Google Sketchup. It’s a bit sterile
designing on a computer, we’d rather model
in cardboard or something fun. However,
computers enable you to make models so
quickly, it’d be crazy not to take advantage.

The computer model helps us work out
roughly how we’re going to create the final
sculpture. In 2017, when we built a huge
rocket, we jumed straight from computer
to the final (full-sized) bonfire. However,
in 2018, the hawk was so detailed we didnt
have the confidence to build it immediately.
So we made a 1/10th carboard scale model
of the hawk’s head, which then formed the
basis of the full-sized sculpture.
If you’re chatting to a friend, you’ll generally
look at their eyes. It’s how we commuicate.
So it made sense to focus on making the
hawk’s head the most detailed & impressive
part, as people would naturally look at this
first. Get the head right and we stood half a
chance of them to understanding the rest of
the sculpture as a hawk.
To build the hawk, we mamanged to
source pallets that were conemend for the
incinerator at Ardley. Luckily the majority
of them were the same size which make life
easy when building; it becomes a bit like
building with Lego!
All in all, it took 5 or 6 of us about three
days to build the bonfire. Not to mention
about 70 cups of tea and a few late-night
beers. All this for something that burns to
nothing in 15 minutes! So why bother and
why burn it?
Well, why bother with anything? Without
getting too philosophical it’s actually really
liberating building something that you
know won’t exsist in a week’s time. It gives
you a ‘what-the-heck’ approach; you just
get on and enjoy the process, having a lot of
fun with it. For this reason, it’s probably the
least stressful thing we built in 2018!
On to 2019, what’s it going to be? Well,
who knows! We’re not saying that flippantly,
we genuienly don’t know. We only decided
on a hawk two weeks before last year’s event.
So, answers on a postcard please!

The Core Range
Always available in cask;
perfect permanent pump beers!
GOSHAWK
CLOUD NINE
3.9% ABV 4.4% ABV
Zesty Blonde Ale
Chestnut Ale
Light, bright and blonde - a
seriously refreshing beer which is
quintessentially quaffable!
There’s lemon zest and pine kernels
mingling with the barley grains and
brightly flavoured hops, all you have to
do is take yourself there !
A Chestnut Brown Bitter which is
dark and earthy, broad and brooding.
A real block-buster built on a solid
platform of earthy hops and dark
chocolatey roasted grains. Malty,
mysterious and muscular - a big
mouthful and immensely satisfying.
...making beers we all love to drink”
There’s nothing better than walking into a pub for a quick pint and
leaving having had a few more! Our Core Range is a nod to just that;
seriously great tasting session beers that are easily quaffable, leaving you
with a real thirst for one more!
Ben - Director

bb-pump clips-FOOLS GOLD v2.indd 2 28/11/2018 15:57
bb-pump clips-NEW LEAF.indd 3 02/01/2019 14:19
bb-pump clips-DAY TRIPPER-v2.indd 1 18/02/2019 13:59
Seasonal Beer Range
Grab them quick! Our new seasonal beer menu
celebrates all that’s going on in the coming months...
LOOSEHEAD SPRING MOON FOOLS GOLD
NEW LEAF DAY TRIPPER
4.2% ABV 4.1% ABV 4.5% ABV
4.1% ABV
3.8% ABV
Golden Ale
Amber Golden Ale Golden Ale
Modern Dark Mild Pale Ale
SKY ROCKET
Modern English IPA
5.5% ABV
Available:
March
Available:
March / April
Available:
April / May
Available:
May
Available:
June / July
Available:
June
Rugby and beer’s a great
combination! Loosehead’s a
clear winner with Rugby fans
especially whilst England play
at Twickenham.
A development of Harvest
Moon, our seasonal beer back
in September, this is a solid
beer. Think Timothy Taylor’s
Landlord.
First released before
Christmas, Fools Gold sold
out in 3 weeks. Hoppy and
easy drinking; a great beer as
the weather improves.
Rethink your perceptions of
a mild during ‘Mild May’.
This is a modern and seriously
smooth beer that anyone can
get the taste for!
A modern pale ale that
packs a hoppy punch with a
suprisingly low ABV for such
a full flavour. Great for beer
gardens and summer!
A real wow! This beer won
two stars at the Great Taste
Awards. Our take on an
English IPA; at 5.5.% it’s
dangerously quaffable!
FOOLS GOLD
- G O L D E N S E A S O N A L A L E -
NEW LEAF
- M O D E R N D A R K M I L D -
DAY TRIPPER
- S P E C I A L P A L E A L E -
A L C 4 . 5 % V O L
A L C 4 . 0 % V O L
A L C 3 . 8 % V O L
bb-pump clips-170603.indd 1 06/06/2017 15:49 bb-pump clips-170603.indd 4 08/06/2017 11:27

How to
- Buy Blackpit -
PUBLIC
Option
1
Option
2
Option
3
Visit our online shop at:
www.blackpitbrewery.co.uk
Our shop’s online 24/7 with
home delivery or the option
to collect from the taproom
Come into our taproom
Open Fridays 4 - 8pm
Come in, try our beers and see
the brewery! Try on some merch
or buy bottles to take away
Pop into a pub or restaurant
serving one of our beers
Check out our social feeds
to see who’s selling what
Blackpit and when!
BEER
BLOGGIN’
Crafty Beer Bloke’s been
making waves on Instagram
since he gave a Q&A, on Beer
Blogging, at The Festival of
Beer, in 2018. Here’s one of
his latest reviews...
Crafty Beer Bloke at the Festival of Beer
“ Weekend, how I have missed thee! This week dragged
like a mother trucker didn’t it?! Topped off with a covering
of snow in Costa Del Bedford too, it’s a good job I have a
decent stock (of beer) currently, just incase we get snowed
in!
This is Jakehead, a super-charged IPA which weighs in at
6.3% on the Blotto Scale, courtesy of those absolute legends
at Wylam Brewery. Usually seen in bottles, this classic has
finally been canned and it’s a beauty! I’ve seen mixed reviews
on this (as I had done with Dank Marvin) but it hasn’t
muddied my opinion, Wylam continue to smash it!
The pour is a bold dark orange, with bags of citrus on the
aroma. In your gob the mouth-feel is smooth and packs
a real punchy flavour. Sharp citrus to start, orange and
stonefruit, followed by a caramel’esc malty backbone. There
was pine and a clean dry finish. I bloody love Wylam!! I
must visit their legendary tap room this year.
@CraftyBeerBloke
Step
1
Have a look at our beer
range in this magazine
Facebook:
@blackpitbrewery
TRADE
Step
2
Email our sales guru:
martin@blackpitbrewery.co.uk
GET MORE
Instagram:
@blackpitbrewery
3
Before you know it our van
will deliver to your door!
Email list, sign up at:
www.blackpitbrewery.co.uk
Find out who’s serving our beer, what events we’ve got coming up
and generally get more involved! Follow us on social and make sure you signup
to our email list for exclusive offers and first release of event tickets!
Step

A PROPER
WEEKEND AWAY.
It’s not your normal beer festival; pig racing is just the start!
Discover more inside this magazine.
Adult weekend tickets, inc. camping, start from £25 when bought early.
www.thefestivalofbeer.co.uk