Tadcaster Brown Ale
Newcastle Brown Ale will not longer be brewed on Tyneside, Scottish & Newcastle has announced, making you wonder what appreciation anyone at the brewing conglomerate has of its world famous brand. Brewing will be shifted to Tadcaster, but the drink will still be labelled ‘Newcastle’ and sold by the boatload around the world. What a sham.
In fact, the last true bottle of Newcastle Brown Ale was brewed in April 2005, after which S&N’s Tyne brewery was closed and demolished, and production was moved across the River Tyne to Gateshead, at the Federation Brewery. The ‘Fed’ will now close, with the loss of 63 jobs.
Given that Scottish & Newcastle has previously closed its Edinburgh brewery, you could be forgiven for suggesting that it should now just call itself ‘&’.
Created by Colonel Jim Porter in 1925, Newcastle Brown Ale is one of the world’s most famous and bestselling beers. But if it isn’t brewed in Newcastle – or at least on Tyneside – then shouldn’t the famous name be abandoned?
Certainly, there’d be hell on if Geordies started producing champagne. That’s because of the appellation control that prevents food and drink from being manufactured outside specific regions. So Melton Mowbray pork pies, Parma ham, Jersey Royal potatoes, Feta cheese, Dutch Gouda and Welsh lamb are all protected.
But there is no such protection for Newcastle Brown Ale. I, for one, will never buy it again until its place of manufacture matches the name on the bottle. Now I’m off to Greggs of Gosforth to buy a Cornish pasty.
I co-edited and contributed reviews to The Non-Beardy Beer Book.
Hi Paul,
I read this morning about Newcastle Brown Ale and I felt really sad. It is completely iconic with Newcastle and utterly synomonous with the City itself. Heck, the blue star is as famous as the black and white stripes. I guess I would rather see the brand moved to cut costs rather than see it disappear altogether.
I have to say though Paul, I come from Melton Mowbray and the protected status is thoroughly deserving for the Pork Pie. They fought a long and protracted campaign for it to be recognised because more and more companies were simply making a Pork Pie and slapping Melton Mowbray on the front (there are differences, they are subtle, but they are there).
What I understand about Newky Brown though is, they took the protected status away because they realised they had it trademarked and that they were the only ones that could call it Newcastle Brown Ale. The brand was bigger than the recipe shall we say. With all the other protected foods, there are several companies within the areas themselves that make it, in the case of Melton Mowbray Pork Pies we have Walkers and Dickinson and Morris. So i guess the differences are there between Newky Brown and Pork Pies.
It is still sad though, we should always try and preserve what makes a region great.
Thanks Rich. I fully agree that Melton Mowbray pork pies deserve their protected status. In fact, surely every product that has a place in its name should be made in that place? Surely Melton Mowbray pork pies made outside of Melton Mowbray are just pork pies, and Newcastle brown ale made outside of Newcastle should be just brown ale. God help Yorkshire puddings.