Duck and Cover: Incoming Brews

Get your helmet on and take cover in the nearest trench; these beers are on the horizon and coming your way, fast.

Fermentation tanks: Prototype Challenge 2013

Our annual prototype challenge is back. This year it sees 4 potential new beers go head to head and you guys vote as to which of the beers you would like to see us brew permanently in 2014. These beers will be released on bottle and draft in early December.

FV 102: The Armoury

We've brought out the heavy artillery for this locked and loaded hopped to hell black lager. A rich mix of cara, crystal, and dark crystal malts has been bittered with Magnum, before the hop cannon was put to good use, dry-hopping the hell out of it with a barrage of Citra, Mosaic and Amarillo. Here's Ryan, with a sample from the fermentation tank. This beer packs a huge punch despite its modest ABV.

The first of our Prototype Challenge 2013 beers will lure you in with a warm, toasty dark malt hug, then gun you down with a barrage of mouth-puckering North American hops.

FV 206: Hobo Pop

This is no worn-out, park-bench, special-brew-swigging vagrant; this is an amped-up, ranting, street corner hobo. A Lord among hobos if you will. Our second Prototype beer is an American wheat ale with loads of rye added too. Brewed with mountains of wheat, rye, caramalt and crystal malts, fermented with an American ale yeast and bittered with Amarillo & Centennial, this 4.2% beer is what happens if something classy like a European wheat beer goes to live in Vegas.

Light and zippy on the palate and loaded with devilishly moreish thirst-quenching hop awesomeness.

FV 109: Interstellar

A beer that will make Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs, Interstellar is a red rye IPA with spicy rye flavours from the malt, and will have great all-round spicy, fruity and earthy hop aromas from the use of Willamette and Amarillo. Like the second Death Star, it's still under construction, but already packs a punch, and the third 2013 Prototype Challenge beer will weigh in with a satisfying 65 IBUs which match up perfectly with its 6.5% ABV.

FV 101: Brixton Porter

A recipe we originally devised to celebrate opening BrewDog Brixton in the city which gave birth to the Porter style. Unfortunately the deal for the site fell through at the last minute, but we still wanted to make the beer.

Brixton Porter is a delightfully decadent yet eminently drinkable dark beer. Slightly lighter in body and lower in ABV than many of our dark beers at 5% ABV, this chocolately, robust porter is fermenting away, and will become the d'Artagnan of this year's Prototype Challenge; a fourth musketeer, where before there were three. 

In oak: Salt Caramel Popcorn Beer

Imagine, if you will, you're in a movie theatre, during the golden age of cinema. You enter, passing golden fittings, through velvet drapes.You take your seat, front row centre. The lights go down and the curtains open. Before you is a piece of art. Abstrakt.

Our salt caramel popcorn beer is currently ageing in oak barrels, imparting layers of rich, toasty warm and vanilla notes, alongside the addictive bittersweet toffee flavours drawn from the salt caramel popcorn. This beer is destined to become a future member of the Abstrakt series.

Fresh off the bottling line: Santa Paws* & Hoppy Christmas

Santa Paws is a 4.5% decadent scotch ale brewed with Scottish heather honey; a robust malty beer packed with ­flavour and at a strength you can drink all (Christmas) day long.

This baby scotch ale is perfect with Christmas pudding or whilst playing Pictionary with your gran. This is our antidote to the chaos of the upcoming festive season. Raise a glass of this Christmas beer, share it with friends, family and strangers, and sit back and enjoy the view as the world descends into a fairy light fuelled frenzy.

Hoppy Christmas is our alternative Christmas beer. Deck the halls with hops, with this single hop Simcoe IPA. Sitting at 7.2% this festive pale ale is an ode to one of our favourite hops and has an awesome bitter hit with a perfectly balanced malt backbone. It makes turkey and all the trimmings taste even better!

You can buy the new Christmas Beers online here:

*Both Hoppy Christmas & Santa Paws have proved so popular they have now sold out!