Manchester in the mid-2010s was an electric period in the city’s brewing history, with several modern brewing trailblazers—including Track and Cloudwater—exploding onto the scene. Before either of them existed, however, there was Blackjack, which has been quietly plugging away with its wonderful beer since 2012.

Over the years they’ve established themselves not simply as a well-respected brewery and taproom, but through the opening and adoption of several venues around Greater Manchester. These now include Station Hop in Levenshulme, their bars at Mackie Mayor and Altrincham Market, and at their fantastic pub on Swan Street, the Smithfield Market Tavern—or simply ‘The Tav’ to its regulars.

It’s never been Blackjack’s style to boast about their achievements, however, so at the end of last year I decided to do a bit of that for them. Over the summer their lager program was, to put it modestly, having a moment. During this time I became completely enthralled by their Italian Pilsner, In Simpatico, a beer that possesses the crisp, structured body of a pilsner, and a hefty dose of aromatic Enigma hops, planting it somewhere between a lager and a pale ale. Such was its quality, I decided to name it as one of my top ten beers of the year in 2025.

Fast forward a couple of months, and I get a call from the brewery inviting me down for the canning of a new batch. Unable to resist the offer of trying the beer fresh off the line, I headed down to the brewery. Afterwards I settled in at the Smithfield with Blackjack’s managing director Jon Hartley, plus team members George Charlton, Matt Drage and Jack Williams, for a chat about the past, present and future of Blackjack Brew Co.

We’re able to produce The Pellicle Podcast thanks to our Patreon subscribers, and our sponsor Get ‘Er Brewed. If you’re enjoying this podcast, or the weekly articles we publish, please consider taking out a monthly subscription for less than the price of a pint a month.

In January 2024, co-founder of Thornbridge Brewery, Simon Webster received an email from Garrett Oliver. He’d heard a rumour that Carlsberg Britvic, the now owners of Marston’s Brewery in Burton-upon-Trent, were “laying the union to rest.” The Brooklyn brewmaster continued to ask Simon if he’d be interested in taking a set, in turn saving it from being permanently erased from British brewing history.

Six months later, after Simon and Thornbridge’s brewing director Rob Lovatt had visited Burton to assess the situation, a single Union set was delivered to their brewery in Bakewell, Derbyshire. In the months since, it has become a focal point for their brewery, and something that has stirred plenty of excitement in the process. This has no doubt been assisted by the fact it’s been used to produce some exciting collaborations, including with the likes of The Kernel and Odell Brewing. They’ve even produced a Strong Dark Mild with Garrett himself, a beer that would go on to become award-winning.

In October 2025, host Matthew Curtis was invited to spend two days at Thornbridge and document a collaboration on the union system with Theakston Brewery of Masham, North Yorkshire. As the brewers set about making a version of the Yorkshire brewery’s famous Masham Ale, Matthew set about filming, interviewing and documenting as much as he possibly could. The idea was to get to the heart of why the arrival of the Burton union at Thornbridge felt so significant.

In this documentary-style episode of the Pellicle Podcast, you’ll hear from several people at Thornbridge, including Simon Webster, Rob Lovatt, brewing manager Dominic Driscoll, and several others, plus Theakston’s head brewer, Mark Slater. With plenty of analysis throughout, plus an original soundtrack composed by the host himself, this is the story of how Thornbridge saved the Burton Union.

We’re able to produce The Pellicle Podcast thanks to our Patreon subscribers, and our sponsor Get ‘Er Brewed. If you’re enjoying this podcast, or the weekly articles we publish, please consider taking out a monthly subscription for less than the price of a pint a month.

Hops have dominated the beer conversation for decades. Modern beer culture has been built on the back of their vast trellises, the majority of which today stand in Yakima, in the Pacific Northwest of the United States.

Many North American hops, including Cascade, Centennial and Simcoe, could arguably be called legacy varieties, such has been the length and size of their impact on the beer industry. Even Citra, which was first commercially released in 2007 and is now the most cultivated hop variety in the world, is approaching 20 years of production. Without them, the beer we know and love today would smell and taste very differently indeed.

But as much as these hops have shaped beer as we know it, there has been no rest for hop merchants, or indeed the brewers who use their products day in, day out. There is a constant demand for new varieties offering up new flavours and aromas. This demand comes in part from drinkers, and indeed brewers themselves, but largely this constant development of new hop varieties—which can take up to a decade, sometimes more—is driven by the hop industry itself.

Think about it—every year sees billions of pounds worth of hops harvested across the hop growing regions of the word, encompassing hundreds, if not thousands of different varieties. Hop merchants are not only seeking that x-factor in terms of flavour, but they’re also looking for agronomic viability, and, indeed, strong profit margins. Hops can be notoriously difficult to grow, so while breeders are trying to figure out what’s going to make a new variety taste great, they’re also looking at other qualities like disease resistance, how much water input a variety needs to survive in a changing climate, and so on.

Krush—which until recently was known under its development name: HBC586—is a great example of this. In terms of its flavour and aroma it’s a riot of ripe mango, juicy peach and sun-ripened orange, but in terms of its agronomics it also requires less inputs than older varieties, making it more economical and more sustainable to produce.

If the sound of this has got your interest piqued, then you’re going to love our latest podcast. Recorded live at FyneFest 2025, in this episode Matthew chats to Robbie Harrigan, a UK-based sales representative for Yakima Chief Hops, plus Mark Cotterill of Beak Brewery in Lewes, and Brett Pemberton of Manchester’s Pomona Island. Together we chat about some exciting new hop varieties, including Krush, and taste the exciting results alongside a live audience.

We’re able to produce The Pellicle Podcast directly thanks to our Patreon subscribers, and our sponsors Get ‘Er Brewed. If you’re enjoying this podcast, or the weekly articles we publish, please consider taking out a monthly subscription for less than the price of a pint a month.