MEAD IN WALES
Brothers are creating a buzz with their honey brew
THE green pastures of Monmouthshire are well-known for being home to some of Wales’ best food and drink. But, even by the standards of culinary genius that this county has become accustomed to, something special is brewing at a modest industrial estate in Caldicot.
Brothers Matt and Kit Newell, from Chepstow, who began making mead from honey at home, are hopeful they can turn Matt’s passion for bees into a thriving business.
Matt - a 32-year-old former geologist who began work in the construction industry when he moved back to the UK from Australia - then found himself unemployed. He decided to turn his beekeeping hobby into a quirky brewery from his kitchen in 2018 having kept bees for 15 years.
“I used to work for a beekeeper when I was a teenager,” Matt recalled from their sizeable warehouse and bar at the Severn Bridge Industrial Estate, which will open to the public on September 18. “I bought some beehives from him when he retired and I loved it.”
Kit, a 31-year-old former product designer, moved home from Reading to help Matt with the business.
“We were doing it on the side for a bit of fun but then we won the Great Taste Award in 2019 for one of our flavours and we thought we really should give it a go at scaling it up,” Kit said. “We became so busy I didn’t really have the time to do both jobs.”
The brothers now have more than 150 apiaries across the Wye valley which Matt tends to most weeks.
They are hoping the hives com
bined with their fermenters at their new site is the golden ticket to restoring a love for a traditional drink but with a modern twist.
In Wales, mead - which in its most original form is honey, water, and yeast - dates back to at least as early the year 550, written in the bard Taliesin as Kanu y Med - Song of Mead. In Beowulf, set between 700 and 1000, the Danish warriors drank mead too.
With the help of school friend Tim Tucker, who usually lives in China but joined after getting stuck in the UK due to Covid restrictions, the brothers got to work on making new and trendy sparkling meads but they’ve been surprised at demand for their traditional product.
“The original plan was to try and make the mead and market it as a new and quirky drink,” Kit explained. “But people seem to have sought us out while looking for the old-fashioned mead.”
They’re already seeing rewards, Matt said. “It’s been brilliant. People keep turning up and asking when we are open. It’s tough to turn people away but once we are open we want to be open properly - it’s important we get it right the first time.
“I think in lockdown people have probably had lots of time to experiment with different things so now restrictions have been lifted they want to pursue those interests and go out and see how others do it.”
While the pandemic has been tough, they’ve dropped lucky in being able to consult a friend Matt met in Australia who knows everything there is to know about what makes a great boozy beverage.
Like Tim, Nick Galton-Fenzi, who is also stuck in the UK due to Covid restrictions, is lending a hand in return for a bed for the night.
Kit said Nick, who has worked with Heineken and Guinness, has allowed them to “really expand and go for it”.
“Nick is a fantastic consultant brewer and we’re really lucky to have him like this,” he said. “We’ve effectively trapped him.
“He’s helped us grow our confidence and really expand and go for it because when you put a brew on it costs thousands of pounds in ingredients and we can’t afford to mess it up. Nick’s been invaluable for that.
“He’s never made mead, so we’ve introduced him to that, and he’s introduced us to some beer-making, which we’re now doing too.”
Much has changed since Nick owned his own brewery just a few years ago. Matt said: “If breweries now knock out a decent but fairly bland product it won’t sell. Carling wouldn’t sell now. People drink it because they’re familiar with it. New drinks need to be different now to sell.”
The brothers’ mead is now stocked in more than 60 shops in Wales and England but is also being consumed in Israel and China. That might have something to do with their regular appearances on national television.
In the last month alone they’ve been filming with Alan Titchmarsh, the Hairy Bikers for the Farmers’ Country Showdown, and they have also appeared on Countryfile.
“My drama GCSE has come in very handy,” Matt joked. “We don’t go out seeking it,” Kit said. “I think people just love the bees and it makes good TV. Matt is so passionate and charismatic on the camera when he talks about the bees and wildlife here. We just try and say ‘yes’ to everything if we are asked. I often think we probably don’t shout enough about being on TV - perhaps we need to make more of it.”
On the horizon is the Abergavenny Food Festival later this month, a pop-up shop in John Lewis in October, and doing up a mobile trailer to take their mead on the road.
But for now the brothers are focusing all their efforts on a seamless and busy opening.
“We want it to be buzzing,” Kit added. “We want to create a trendy place which we think is missing here.”