An Act of Redemption: mine's a pint

Yesterday I finally got round to popping over to Tottenham to visit Redemption Brewing, our most local brewer.

Nestled away in a light industrial estate not far from Northumberland Park, Redemption is one of a wave of microbreweries that have sprung up over the past few years. It seems that people are tired of drinking mass produced beers which cater for the lowest common denominator taste and they want a landscape populated with an uncharted hotch-poch of tastes to explore.

That's certainly what Redemption's owner Andy Moffat believes. After quitting an unsatisfying job as a trader in the City in 2010, Crouch Ender Andy saw an opportunity to follow his passion, "I knew it wasn't going to be a smooth ride, but I'm passionate about good beer and I wanted to make a contribution to London's reputation as a beer maker".

In the year Andy set up shop, cask beer, real ales and microbrewery sales were up 5% nationally, compared with a 2% fall in the beer market overall. The revival owes much to the progressive beer duty relief for small breweries that Gordon Brown introduced as chancellor in 2002. The measure halves tax for brewers making under 50,000 litres a week and tapers duty up to 300,000 litres.

Fot the first six months of Redemption's life, Andy was steering the ship single-handed. That meant short nights and long days as he brewed, sold, marketed and did all the admin on his tod.

Andy fills a cask with Redemption 'Hopspur' in response to a surprise caller from the North West who wanted a few casks for some pubs up north

The cheery Scot was rescued by life partner Sam who happily swapped her job as a newsreader for Three Counties Radio to help Andy grow the business. "No one could carry on the way Andy was", Sam old me. "Things are on an even keel now. We have a few staff and have even just taken on a few more."

Apparently customers have responded fantastically to Redemption Beers. Although life's been tough for a couple of years and Redemption is only just beginning to show a profit, all the graphs are heading in the right direction and sales have doubled over the past year. They're currently selling between 10 and 12,000 pints a week and expect that figure to increase by 30 to 40 % before the year end. In fact, it seems that things are good enough for Sam to be able to prise Andy away for their first holiday in a few years - a week in Vegas and the surrounding area to attend a wedding.

Now, I had absolutely no ulterior motive in visiting Redemption, but I can't say I was disappointed to be offered a taste. As I sampled the wares I watched two of Andy's team, finishing up 'mashing' the barley. (The mashing process is where the natural enzymes found in grain break down the grain's starches; hot water then dissolves the starches so they leach out of the cracked grain. Goddit?)

Mashing at Redemption

Redemption currently has four very unique ales. 

	Golden amber colour with citrus and some floral hop aromas. Toffee sweetness and citrus fruit flavours balanced by floral earthy hop contribution, with a long dry satisfying bitter finish
	Chestnut coloured premium bitter with malts providing coffee aromas and some hazelnut and caramel on the palate while bramling cross hops offer some dark fruit flavours. Citrus notes and an earthy bitterness lasts into the finish.
	Dark brown colour with chocolate, coffee, liquorice and some dry roasted malts flavours complimented with hints of dark fruit. Generous late hopping adds a hint of zest and initially sweetness fades into restrained bitter finish. Deceptively drinkable and SIBA Gold medal winner.
	Amber Ale with some citrus fruit aromas, chewy biscuity malt flavours, slight sticky sweetness and grapefruit piney hop flavours. Well balanced with hop flavours to the fore and an easy bitter finish.

Descriptions are Redemption's own

I didn't try the porter, but of the other three, my personal favourite was the 'Hopspur'. Does that mean. I'm just an 'easy bitter' type of a guy? Urban dusk was the most interesting beer I think I've ever tasted and one I want to go back to seated by a fire with a Sunday Roast.

Currently you can only buy Redemption beer from a pub. Two thirds of their production goes to pubs in North London, though. So it shouldn't be hard to find. Locally you can sample their ales at The Garden Ladder, The Three Compasses in Hornsey and the King's Head in Crouch End. Apparently The Salisbury's owners came for a visit, but have yet to place an order.

So what of the future? Plans for selling bottled beer were put on hold when one of their competitors paid the price for their inexperience with an uncomfortable number of exploding bottles! (But don't despair, in the meantime, outside of a pub, you can always try Dunn's steak pies or Dunn's beer bread, both of which are made with Redemption beers.)

Andy doesn't see huge expansion as part of the future. He tells me that's not why he's in the business, besides, breaking through the microbrewery tax relief ceiling would hit a small business hard. So the brewing couple are thinking about lateral expansion.  Andy told me "A Redemption pub is a strong possibility. We'd love to do it, but it's a matter of finding the right premises"

Watch this space!