The Steamtug Blog

The wall of beer!

I was having a quiet ale at McFarlane’s Irish pub here in the Lake Charles resort community when the barman, who had noticed my taste for beer was “different” to the local palate, offered me to try something completely different, that only a foreigner would understand.

It was a chocolate stout. Nothing unusual about that… I had even made my share of heavy, dark stout beers that had dark chocolate added into the brew kettle with the hops. But this one was impressive! Smooth, dark with a creamy texture and a strong back taste of the cacao from which the chocolate had been made… the sweetness gone of course, as the yeast eats that bit. But yeast doesn’t like eating chocolate, instead leaving that bit for me!

I sipped and savoured, while reading the label. It came from Samuel Smith’s brewery, in Tadcaster, Yorkshire Northern England, on the Eastern side of the Pennines. I know Smith’s brewery in Yorkshire. It’s one of the UK’s biggest brewers. But that’s John Smith’s brewery from Yorkshire. Then who was Samuel Smith? I just had to know.

So I jumped on a jumbo jet and whipped over the Manchester England. Into a hire car and headed west to Liverpool, to catch up with the steamtug Daniel Adamson which was only recently recommissioned after 10 years of being under restoration. Then finally turned and headed East across the middle of the UK just under the Scottish border towards the grand old duke’s town of York. Tadcaster was the little village on the way, and upon entering I was confronted with a huge brewery looking stone building, proudly announcing to the world that it was John Smith’s brewery.

So where was Samuel?

At the back of John Smith’s big arse brewery, was a little modest building housing Samuel Smith’s brewery. I went in, and found the wall of beer! An amazing collection of specialty small batch concoctions of ever sort, and me gazing at the collection with increasing excitement to see them all! And there she was… in the middle of everything was my famous holy grail, the chocolate stout that I had been sipping in Louisiana except in a pint sized bottle. So what’s the story with this place? I asked the lady in the shop who gave me the full story. Pull up a stool, pour yourself out a pint of fine ale and I will tell it to you.

Samuel Smith was a cashed up butcher in the local district who was looking for a profession for his son. So he purchased this little brewery in the main street of Tadcaster in 1748. It had it’s own well producing a very nice supply of good quality water, and with local barley and hops available nearby and his son went to work to run the brewery under his father’s name. But fathers and sons don’t always see eye to eye (especially when there is beer involved!) so after a dispute with his dad, little Johnny picked up his mash paddle, walked across the road and start his own damn brewery. Well 200 years later, John Smith’s brewery became the biggest selling bitter in the UK making it the huge conglomerate that it is today, and was eventually gobbled up by Heineken brewing.

Samuel Smith on the other hand, continued making small batch beers like he always did. This is why they are able to make more crafted specialty style ales and continue to do so. And the kicker? They still deliver kegged ale to the local district around Yorkshire, 5 days per week, by…. horse and dray. Just like they did 200 years ago. How amazing is that? Go Samuel Smith Brewing! No need to thank me for this research, just pour me another one of those ales please….