Alnwick brew carries a sting

NEW BEER IS MADE FROM NETTLES

Reporter ALNWICK Garden has introduced its homegrown beer – with a taste of nettles.

Treehouse APA has gone on sale at the famous landscaped gardens next to Alnwick Castle.

It is linked to the gardens not just by the name but by one of the ingredients.

The nettles used to make the beer have all been hand-grown on site.

Alnwick Brewery, formerly VIP Brewery, took on the challenge of infusing the stinging plant into a pale ale.

Head of production, Phil Bell, said: “We came up with the idea for this project where we actually use a little bit of the garden in the beer itself.

“After vigorous testing and profiling we decided to dig up some nettles. They specifically grew the nettles for this project.

“We then took them over, put them in the beer and it came up with this lovely earthy, citrusy texture.” At 4.5% ABV it has been an ideal tipple during the warm summer so far.

Phil said in his efforts to balance the flavour of the ale he had asked the Northumberland Cheese Company, which has a nettle cheese, how to go about it.

He said: “It’s absolutely flown out the door. I think the hot weather we’ve been having has been helping with the sales. It’s just a nice easy-to-drink summer beer.

“It was unbelievable to be asked to be part.

“Alnwick is such a tight town to be in and to have that connection with the Alnwick Garden and the Duke of Northumberland is absolutely brilliant.”

Growing the nettles was a change of pace for Alnwick Garden’s head gardener Trevor Jones.

He said: “I’ve been in horticulture for 44 years and never been asked to grow nettles. Normally we get rid of them.

“We actually had to bring the nettles into our polytunnels so we could grow them in the winter, which is quite unusual to do.”