Apr
Sat 25 May 2024
On The Brew
Derran has organised an insight in to the history of Edinburgh's brewing industry which will centre around the Canongate. All are welcome to join a short stroll around Holyrood, Pleasance and Grassmarket to find out more about Auld Reikie's past brewing activities and how much its bevvy-merchants have to thank religion and its Holyrood Abbey monks for.
Meet at The Cannons' Gait pub, Canongate at 13.00. The Manor will end in Cold Town House in the Grassmarket where Derran has a table booked for 15.45. (Pubs are expected to be busy given the Manor coincides with both the English and Scottish FA Cup finals).

Guests welcome (but please ensure Derran has you on the list of attendees so he can update the table booking).

Report

A gang of seven would-be brewers turned up at the Canons' Gait for the start of Derran's walk-n-talk Manor on the history of brewing in Edinburgh. Dez led the way with a copious bundle of notes.

First stop, after a taste of a few samples of what today's brewers offer, was the area around Crighton's Close, off the Royal Mile, which was the rough location of William Younger's Abbey Brewery as well as the Holyrood Brewery. The well-named Abbey Brewery was a nod toward the Holyrood Abbey monks credited with kicking off Edinburgh's brewing practices. Brewing was briefly side-stepped at Lodge Canongate Kilwinning, No 2 where Knights recounted the infamous Burns Supper where, among many extraordinary events, St Andrew's turned palid green, North Leith gave a speech which referred to UFOs and Sir Sleigh ended up seated at the top table. A short walk from the lodge brought Capers within sight of buildings once part of the beatifully tiled, former Pleasance Brewery building before a longer saunter was rewarded with a 'discovery' and loose Cape Connection at the former W. & J. Reaeburn's Merchant Brewery in Merchant Street. (A sojourn to the front door of the National Museum of Scotland presented an opportunity to look in on one of the steeple engines used in the St Leonard's Brewery: a good find by Dez.) There was another short walk to the former site of G. & J. Machlaclan's Castle Brewery (Hunter's Close, Grassmarket) (linked to John Jeffrey's Heriot Brewery) where Derran finished off his insights in to the workings and connections between breweries; connections which, today, seem to lead to Heineken and Carlsberg. Interesting to note the flitting of some town breweries to Duddingston to take advantage of improving rail links in the early 1900s as well as which reservoirs and lochs brewers drew water from and the wooden pipes used to channel it.

A few drinks and floats were enjoyed in Cold Town House and the Waverley Bar also received a visit before Knights and Ladies headed in to the night and home.

Thanks to everyone who spent their time with Dez and the On The Brew collective. Especially Derran who made it all the way from Denmark in support of The Cape Society.

Edinburgh Breweries

Mobile-friendly picture gallery.

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