I love Magic Rock Brewing Co.
You love Magic Rock Brewing Co.
We all love Magic Rock Brewing Co.
Because of this I thought it might be nice to have a little chat.
And here it is:
Hello, please introduce yourselves.
Richard Burhouse Managing Director
Stuart Ross Head Brewer
Jonathan Burhouse Director (silent partner)
How, why and when did Magic Rock come into being?
We started the brewery because we love good beer and thought we could add something to the UK market. My brother and I attended a BrewLab course at the University of Sunderland in 2010 and toyed with the idea of getting a small kit and learning to brew over a period of time but, I was after a career change, we had premises available to us and connections in the industry (I’m a partner in myBrewerytap.com) and so decided to take the plunge and employ Stuart who’d become a friend.
Your beers are very modern tasting. How do your recipes begin life?
The recipes are all devised by Stuart and myself, originally we sat down and decided what core beers we’d like to produce, this was based largely on the sort of beers we enjoy drinking. We’re both massive fans of US beers, which means lots of US hops go into more or less all the beers. Stuart’s skill and brewing experience turns the recipes into reality.
We love your labelling and graphic design. How did you arrive at the circus inspired motif? (Deep, huh?)
The Sideshow/Circus theme just stems loosely from the word ‘Magic’ in our name, I wanted an irreverant, iconic, engaging design, that people would respond to. I previously worked for 10 years in graphic design and knew that a contemporary brand would really help sell the beers. Although I helped conceive the brand, created the names etc… The actual design work was done by good friend (and hop head) Richard Norgate who I knew was a very talented designer.
Where are you brewing and what capacity do you have?
Huddersfield, 12bbl
Is there a reason you don’t bottle condition?
We don’t bottle condition because to all intents and purposes this would mean hand bottling which is time consuming and hard to scale up if demand takes off. Our bottled beers are lightly filtered to remove yeast, they are neither pasteurised or cold sterile filtered. We are in the process of trying to improve the process further so the beers are closer to our cask/key-keg beers. Our ideal solution is to have our own bottling line, but at the moment we are limited by space and financial constraints.
What are the plans for the future?
Making more beer, and spreading the Magic far and wide!
