Manx fans of real ale are to be treated to four of the north’s best beers as winners of the recent Market Town Taverns (MTT) Yorkshire Beer Awards.
Steven Taylor, on-trade retail director at Heron and Brearley said: ‘As a top Yorkshire pub chain, MTT became part of the Heron and Brearley group in 2011.
‘So we thought we would celebrate their inaugural beer awards in the best possible way for our customers.
‘This will be done by be hosting the winning beers in seven of our own leading real-ale pubs in the island.’
The winning ales will be showcased at the Woodbourne, Prospect, British, Queens, Terminus Tavern, Cat with No Tail and Castle Arms for a short time only.
They will also herald the real ale trail running from September 27 to October 6 at these seven houses, which are fast becoming venues of choice for the Isle of Man’s real ale fans.
The Market Town Taverns awards were announced, fittingly, on Yorkshire Day, August 1, and were chosen from submissions by 105 Yorkshire-based breweries to a blind tasting session.
Manual voting in Market Town Taverns’ 15 outlets spread over north and west Yorkshire, along with online voting saw more than 2000 votes cast for the finalists, with Saltaire Pride brewed by Saltaire Brewery emerging overall winner.
The classic English pale bitter, brewed from Challenger, Bramling Cross and Cascade hops, earned the comment from the judging panel: ‘Great example of an English beer’.
The judging panel included Cask Marque’s training and national account manager Annabel Smith.
She said: ‘When we were tasting the beers we didn’t just rate them on likeability, we had a look at the colour, we made sure they were clear, we had a good smell of the beer and, for me, it’s always about “would I have a second pint of this beer?” so my rating was weighted quite heavily in that favour.’
Guest beers to be hosted by Heron and Brearley are: Saltaire Gold, Saltaire Pride and Stateside IPA – Saltaire Brewery;
Citra – Great Heck Brewing Company;
Londinium – Rooster’s Brewing Company;
Curious and Highway – Magic Rock Brewing Company.
Market Town Taverns is a North Yorkshire-based niche operator founded in 1999 which was acquired by Heron and Brearley Group in 2011.
There are 15 free-of-tie outlets in North Yorkshire in areas around Knaresborough, Leeds and Northallerton.
The business focuses on growing real ale trade.
