A short hop to a new home

Robert Wicks could be forgiven if he raises a glass of Champagne rather than beer to celebrate the 10th anniversary of his brewery.

For Westerham is on the move, from farm buildings at Crockham Hill owned by the National Trust, close to Sir Winston Churchill’s estate at Chartwell in Kent, to land attached to nearby Squerrys, a Georgian stately home and gardens.

Grapes are grown on the estate to make sparkling wine and Robert Wicks, founder of Westerham Brewery, plans to restore barley there: Maris Otter was grown until the 1960s. Wicks is a passionate believer in using local ingredients to reduce carbon emissions.

Ethical heart​

He makes use of just about every variety of hop in Kent and says: “There’s no point brewing in Kent if you don’t use Kent hops. I know every hop farm in the county and can trace the plants back to source.”

He works closely with the local Scotney Castle estate, where hops are grown, and with other hop farmers in the area. Among the hops grown at Scotney is the rare Finchcock’s Hop X, which Wicks celebrates with a beer called Finchcock’s Original.

Westerham is proof that wearing an ethical heart on your sleeve is not a turn-off for consumers. The brewery is moving home because it needs extra capacity to produce such beers as William Wilberforce Freedom Ale. It was launched in 2007 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Wilberforce’s success in winning parliamentary support for the abolition of the slave trade.

Robert Wicks points out that human trafficking continues in the 21st century and a royalty from the sale of each pint or bottle of the beer is made to the international charity Stop the Traffik.​

Character​

Wicks also brews a bottle-conditioned Viceroy India Pale Ale for the National Trust: proceeds go to help pay for the upkeep of houses owned by Lord Curzon, which passed to the trust in 1986. Curzon, who restored the Taj Mahal, was a controversial figure in India but he did enjoy good beer. He recalled in his memoirs trekking across Afghanistan, hallucinating about beer and being overjoyed when a servant rode up and gave him a bottle of Bass Ale.

Westerham opened in 2004. Robert Wicks trained as a bio-chemist and then worked in investment banking, all the while brewing at home. His banking background means he has kept a firm grip on finances and has avoided some of the pit-falls of other small breweries that operate on a wing and a prayer.

With the move to a new site in the planning stage, he was still forced to add a second copper and additional fermenters at Crockham Hill to cope with demand. In order to emphasise the hop character of the brews, he has also installed a hop rocket, a piece of equipment that looks remarkably like the rocket used by the cartoon characters Wallace and Grommet.

But this has serious intent. It’s packed with hops, as many as 15 kilos per brew, for selected beers that require exceptional hop character. Following the normal copper boil with hops, the hopped wort then rests in the hop rocket where it picks up additional aroma and flavour.

Flavours​

The yeast cultures have some history. They came from the Black Eagle Brewery in Westerham that owned pubs as far away as London. The brewery was taken over in 1948 by the major London brewer Taylor Walker, which itself was bought by the even bigger brewer Ind Coope, which closed the Westerham plant in 1968.

The last head brewer deposited samples of his yeasts with the National Collection of Yeast Cultures at Norwich, where they were freeze dried. Robert Wicks was able to get samples, re-culture them and use them to get the correct Westerham flavours in his modern beers.

This year he has brewed 1730 Taylor Walker Pale Ale for the Spirit pub company that re-branded its 106 London pubs with the name of the defunct brewery founded in Limehouse in 1730.

The eight regular beers brewed at Westerham include Finchcock’s Original (3.5%) and Spirit of Kent (4%), first brewed to mark the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee with a hop grown in every decade of the reign. The brewery’s top brand, British Bulldog (4.3%), launched in 2004 to mark the 60th anniversary of D-Day, is brewed with pale malt and a large amount of crystal malt and is hopped with Northdown, Progress and Whitbread Goldings.

Robert Wicks, the six members of his brewing team, and the brewing kit, will soon be on the way to their new home once planning has been agreed with the local council.

The beers can be enjoyed in two pubs owned by Westerham: the Carpenters Arms at Limpsfield Chart and the Royal Oak at Crockham Hill. The Royal Oak was owned by Shepherd Neame, who planned to close it, and Westerham has saved it for the local community: another excuse for raising a glass of something sparkling.