The Brewery

At Mile Tree Brewery we firmly believe that having a practical and theoretical understanding of brewing results in better beer and that is why we enjoy constantly improving upon our training and knowledge.

Ever since his days as a home brewer, Richard has attended courses to develop his knowledge of the industry and improve his brewing techniques. Courses such as 'Start up Brewing’ and 'Advanced Craft Brewing’ both provided by Brewlab and attended by Richard in 2006, helped to develop the skills needed to brew quality beer. He has also been a member of the Cambridge Craft Brewers. Over the years many happy hours have been spent sharing knowledge with other members in pubs throughout Cambridge.

The Garden brewery, (a small outbuilding attached to the garden shed) allowed Richard to experiment with brews with a view to one day trying larger scale micro-brewing. The knowledge and skills gained from these courses in the early days have been hugely valuable in helping us produce award winning beer that we are proud of.

In the present day, Richard continues to build upon his knowledge and attend courses at Brewlab, Brewing Services and Murphy & Son.

Richard has always enjoyed the extensive research involved in making and developing recipes. Hours have been spent researching and deliberating over ingredients so that we produce beers that are balanced and well flavoured. Choosing the right hops, malt and barley may sound easy but spending the time getting it just right is important to us! We source fresh, good quality ingredients that are kept in a temperature controlled cold store. We keep our brewed beer at an optimum of 10 degrees celsius to ensure that when it leaves us it is at it’s best condition.

Equipment

When we chose our brewing kit we decided to choose an established company that had installed many breweries around the UK. We chose ABUK to manufacture a 5 barrel stainless steel kit and with the guidance of Richard Eaton-Jones, a brewing consultant, we embarked on our first ever brew of Adventurer in November 2012. It was a successful first brew and marked the beginning of our micro-brewing learning process!

We also have a 100 litre pilot brewing kit purchased from Elite Stainless Fabrications. This is an excellent little kit which we use to test out new recipes and produce specials for beer festivals. It is also proving popular to joint brew on for collaboration specials.

During our move to Alfric Square ABUK were instrumental in providing us with advice so that moving our kit went seamlessly. Years down the line our kit is still performing to a high standard and producing consistently good beers.

Passion

But above all, we believe that Richard’s passion for brewing is the driving success of our beer. Whilst you can spend time learning about the theory of brewing, source the best ingredients and brew on a top quality kit, you cannot buy passion. Richard’s enthusiasm for brewing has shaped Mile Tree into a forward thinking, collaborative and award winning brewery, one we are all proud of!