Above: Left to right: Duke, from Castle Rock’s sales team, Alex and Scott from Loch Lomond and Matt, our assistant brewery manager.
It was great to welcome our friends Scott, Loch Lomond‘s lead brewer, and Alex, their head of sales, to our brewery for another day of brewing, chat and a tour of our pub estate.
REPEAT SUCCESS
Earlier in the year, we went to their brewery, just outside Glasgow, to brew Pub Tropicana – it went down a treat with our customers. It was our turn to return the favour and while we were in Scotland had already discussed brewing something a little indulgent for autumn’s chillier weather.
Above: Alex digging out the mash, overseen by Scott
EXPLODING MARSHMALLOWS
Our latest collaboration is a stout aptly named Fit to Fly – a light-hearted nod to the story of RAF fighter pilots in the 1960s, who were banned from taking their favourite chocolate covered teacakes into the cockpit, after a series of marshmallow explosions at high altitude. The ban was lifted last year after tests in a a modern cockpit found that there was no longer a risk of marshmallow messiness!
RECIPE COLLABORATION
As with any good collab the brew day was preceded by plenty of recipe chat and exchanging ideas on how to get it to work. We settled on ingredients and ABV and our designer Dan got to work on producing the fabulous pump clip.
Above: Fit to Fly on the bar at our brewery tap: the Vat and Fiddle – we can confirm it’s delicious!
MAKING THE HEADLINES
The story behind the beer even caught a bit of attention beyond the brewery, with the collab making its way into the Scottish Daily Express and Beer Today.
Great publicity for a beer inspired by a teacake!
FIT TO FLY
A huge thanks to Scott and Alex for joining us again and making the trip down. From Pub Tropicana to Fit to Fly, it’s been great to continue the collaboration and create something different and delicious together.
We can’t wait for you to get your hands on it. It’s now available in our pubs and beyond and will be on our bar at the Nottingham Beer and Cider Festival at Trent bridge from 7th to 10th October.
Cheers!
Team CRB
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