European Beer News (Issue 19)

by Carolyn Smagalski 

Welsh brewery Celt Experience expects to double in size within the year, due to international demand for its highly “experimental and strange” craft beers. Exporting to 20 countries, owner Tom Newman rides the leading edge in markets that include Sweden and the U.S. where experimental and strange comes with the promise of success. Adding to a base of 15 core beers and three wood-infused big beers, Celt Experience has collaborated with beer celebrities in both the international and local arenas, including Boxing Cat of Shanghai, Ale Syndicate and Atlas Brewing of Chicago, BrewDog of nearby Scotland, rock band Super Furry Animals, and Simon Martin of Real Ale Today.

Searching for Free Beer?

In Ireland’s County Cork, the 9 White Deer Brewery of Múscrai Gaeltacht has your back. The one-year-old brewery cornered the Irish market with Saor, Ireland’s first locally crafted gluten-free beer. Saor, which means “Free” in the local gaelinn language, was developed by brewer and co-founder Gordon Lucey without the use of sorghum or buckwheat. He developed an innovative process of denaturing the gluten in barley malt to yield a softly hopped, drinkable beer with certified gluten levels below 20 parts per million.

In January 2015, eight Scottish brewers formed the Brewers Association of Scotland. Its membership aspires to grow the craft beer industry beyond the current $46 million mark by tapping local resources and through innovation and collaboration.

Scotland’s barley community is abuzz with a $35 million International Centre for the Science of Barley said to be on the way, including on-site microbreweries and microdistilleries to monitor the use of newly developed strains of barley in beers and spirits.