XT have invested in a nano-brewery to produce a range of new experimental brews. These will be very short run beers of just a few casks in order to try new ingredients and brewing methods. These beers will be sold as “Baby-Animal” and will be available to pubs who want to be involved and try something a little different.
The annual special beer for 2015 is the ‘Fifteen’ – this is an English IPA to celebrate the English hop growers who have been working hard to develop new varieties to compete with the strong aromatic and fruity New World hops. XT have been trialling some of these and decided it was time to release a new beer incorporating these newbies. The new Fifteen joins the Thirteen which continues to be one the most popular XT beers and last year’s summer Saison refresher ‘Fourteen’.
The Animal beers have been breeding and two new little creatures will be available from February:
Croak – is a 4.6% Pale Amber beer brewed with a roasted rye malt and Cascade and Columbus hops.
Simples – also weighs in at 4.6% and this is a golden ‘stout’ – it’s brewed with un-malted barley more usually seen in dark stouts, giving a fuller malt flavour finished off with a gentle fruity hop: Rakau from New Zealand.
The core range of beers will be extended in 2015 with the new ‘Ten’. This is a classic dark stout. This should become a regular beer available in March and April. This will be made available in keg form as well as traditional cask, not sure who that will compete with?!
Following a chance meeting of minds at a beer festival in December – XT and MoogBrew have collaborated on a rather special beer – this certainly isn’t a fluffy little creature – The Animal/Moogbrew ‘Bastard Bunny Brew ha-ha’– is a true American style double IPA thumping in at a massive 7.2% – very generously hopped with truckloads of American greenery – Chinook, Cascade, Columbus and Summit on purist pale malts. The character was made famous in the NME magazine and the beer marks the Bunny’s new found love of craft beers.