Saltaire Brewery Beer Club

Saltaire Brewery in Shipley is housed in a solid limestone edifice that in a previous life provided electricity for the local tram company. The last Friday in the month is Beer Club (no membership needed) when from 4.00 p.m. onwards customers can drink the beers and those of other micros for a bargain price of £2.00 a pint. Real cider and perry is also available.

There is no dedicated drinking area. The brewing equipment is all around.

These photos were mostly taken in the first hour of opening and gives the impression of a quite and relaxed atmosphere. However, by 6.00 p.m. the brewery was jam packed with drinkers to the extent that getting served was a monumental chore.

I was told that it was not usually so busy. It was the first beer club after Christmas and for many people the first pay day ditto so that may have something to do it with it. Anyway, it must be a very profitable venture for the brewery.

The beers on sale included South Island Pale, Blonde, Cascade IPA, Crystal Red and Triple Chocoholic. Guests beers were Dark Star M & M Special Porter Acorn Ginger. We couldn't sample them all on this occasion, it was just too difficult to get served, an opinion served by numerous other punters. So it was a short walk to the Junction in Baildon for Derwent Carlisle State Bitter and Oakham JHB!

Yorkie bars

Life is unfair. I’m stating the obvious there. Beer is unfair too. I’ve stated previously that Wirral isn’t awash with great beer. I may be wrong but I have a perception that there is a county that has more than its share of great beer and pubs and that is Yorkshire. I’m not making distinctions between North and South Yorkshire or East and West Riding. As far as I’m concerned they are all the same and can’t play cricket as well as we Lancastrians (guilty secret – I was born in Ormskirk and only became Birkonian at the age of six).

The aptly named Junction, Baildon

Anyway, I’ve spent a lot of time in Yorkshire in the last few years and have grown to be envious of its inhabitants. If I wanted to be brief I could sum up my case for Yorkshire pubs and beers in two words: Huddersfield and Sheffield. Both are meccas for beer drinkers and have more of their fair share of top-class pubs. But there is good beer all through the county. For instance my brother-in-law lives in Baildon and has a wonderful award-winning pub the Junction in walking distance and the fast-expanding Saltaire brewery in Shipley not much further away. Bradford can be reached by a short journey on bus or train and has a number of pubs that would grace any town.





Sturdy pubs built from limestone with cosy rooms and coal fires seem to abound in Yorkshire and the keen sense of local identity demands that they sell local beers. It is these local beers that most impress me about Yorkshire. All make excellent beers, with the pale hoppy beers that I’m a fan of well to the fore.  

I’ll be writing a bit more on Yorkshire in a week or two following a boozy week end away. Until then is this a White Rose-tinted view of Yorkshire? Is the beer scene not quite as I describe it? After all it is Yorkshire that seems prepared to lose iconic Leeds-brewed Tetley bitter without much of a shout. And I’ve been careful not to mention Hull.