Theakstons Ltd

Our cold filtration process enables us to brew specialist craft keg beers of outstanding flavour and character. No better example is our Barista Stout which we have developed to highlight the harmonious flavour of coffee blended with malted barley. We cold filter our beers rather than pasteurise in order to protect the truly unique flavour. This enables the promotion of mouth-watering coffee aroma and flavour on a bed of rich full-bodied malt with hints of dark berry fruit hop in our incredibly popular Barista Stout.

Tasting Notes: The ultimate velvety, nitrogen infused, coffee-flavoured stout. A delicious brew with caramel and vanilla flavours, hints of dark berry fruits and a bold freshly roasted espresso aroma! Unpasteurised and cold filtered to protect the truly unique flavour.

Theakston Best Bitter is the leading session ale within the Theakston portfolio. When we refer to a ‘bitter’ beer, the term does not mean sour as in lemons, but dry as in ‘dry white wine’. So Best Bitter is a full bodied, dry beer. We use five different hop varieties to make our Best Bitter forming a complex but subtle taste profile. The combination of dryness as generated by Target and Challenger hops, is balanced by sweetness created by the generous use of prime malting barley providing the perfect accompaniment to a wide variety of food flavours as found in a Ploughman’s lunch for instance.

Tasting Notes: This fine, golden amber beer has a full flavour that lingers pleasantly on the palate. With good bittersweet balance, this beer has a subtle hop character described as sweet and fruity. It's a very refreshing and satisfying pint!

Theakston Best Bitter is the leading session ale within the Theakston portfolio. When we refer to a ‘bitter’ beer, the term does not mean sour as in lemons, but dry as in ‘dry white wine’. So Best Bitter is a full bodied, dry beer. We use five different hop varieties to make our Best Bitter forming a complex but subtle taste profile. The combination of dryness as generated by Target and Challenger hops, is balanced by sweetness created by the generous use of prime malting barley providing the perfect accompaniment to a wide variety of food flavours as found in a Ploughman’s lunch for instance.

Tasting Notes: This fine, golden amber beer has a full flavour that lingers pleasantly on the palate. With good bittersweet balance, this beer has a subtle hop character described as sweet and fruity. It's a very refreshing and satisfying pint!

A masterpiece of brewing – rich, full-flavoured ale with Cinnamon and raisins, together with a hint of walnut.

Tasting Notes: A blend of finest brewers’ malt and oats to give outstanding body set off with cinnamon and raisins sweetness balanced off by a hint of walnut and hard brewing liquor to give a beer of outstanding stature, balance and quality.

Brewed using three different malts for body, flavour and texture to give a cool, smooth, refreshing and deeply satisfying flavour.

Tasting Notes: 

Mild as a beer style is one of the oldest in British brewing. As its name suggests, Mild is mild in terms of alcohol and hop bitterness, the superb flavours of Theakston Dark Mild are driven by the use of top-quality crystal and roasted barleys. Theakston Dark Mild is almost certainly one of the original beers brewed by Robert Theakston when he first started brewing in Masham in 1827. As a beer style Mild was very popular in Britain before the last war but since then has been over-shadowed by the growth in popularity of lighter ales and lagers but is showing signs of a resurgent interest. The malty flavour of Mild makes the ale an ideal accompaniment to sandwiches and ploughman lunches.

Tasting Notes: A dark, delicious beer with a dry palate and a full, rounded, Fuggle hop flavour. It is brewed using three malts; pale malt for body, crystal malt for rich flavour and black malt for texture and taste and is the only truly national, permanently available Mild brand.

An amber ale with a zesty lemon citrus aroma and a refreshing fruity finish.

Tasting Notes: Theakston Green Hop Ale is brewed using freshly picked English Pioneer Hops grown in Yorkshire, finest quality pale and crystal malts to give a golden amber coloured ale of subtle maltiness combined with a lemon citrus aroma and a refreshing fruity flavour.

Our home town of Masham lies on the eastern edge of the famous Yorkshire Dales in the lower end of Wensleydale, one of the most beautiful areas of the country. Just to the East, lies the Vale of York and beyond the wonderful North York Moors. As such, Masham is in the middle of two of the best moorland areas in the world and home of the uniquely British game bird, the Grouse. Theakston Grouse Beater is our tribute to the many who keep and protect the moors environment ensuring the future for the famous bird and for the pleasure of many thousands of visitors that come from all over to enjoy the unique beauty of the countryside. Grouse Beater is brewed using moorland berries to give a deliciously fruity flavour on a subtle but well-balanced bitter hop and is ideal either on its own accompanying game or light curry dishes.

Tasting Notes: A golden mid-gravity bitter with initial sweetness balnaced with moderate hop bitterness. Dry hopped with 'Fuggles' to give a delicate aroma, complemented by a subtle hint of moorland berry, a favourite with Grouse.

Hogshead Bitter is a very traditional style of beer using the finest Maris Otter malt, combined with luscious cane sugars complimented by delicious, fruity Bramling cross hops to give a malty, crisp and hoppy flavoured ale.

Tasting Notes: This robust ale exhibits a maltiness with underlying tones of luscious cane sugars whilst the use of Bramling Cross dry hops contribute to the striking aroma and palate.

Theakston has committed to a long-term sponsorship programme aimed at recovering the wild salmon stocks to their former glory. As part of the plan, we launched a special commemorative ale, Infallible to raise the profile of this important ecological work.

Tasting Notes: A full bodied- warming malty ale with luxurious molasses and roasted malt flavour scented with very light hop characteristic.

Our Lightfoot beer is named after the only other brewery in Masham, at the time, which Theakston took over in 1919. The Lightfoot and Theakston families were close and indeed linked through marriage and therefore it was a natural amalgamation of two well-established businesses. For many years it was rumoured that Theakston took over Lightfoot because they had a better cricket team something that was deemed unacceptable to the brewers in Red Lane! Lightfoot has always been a popular seasonal ale in fact so much so that in 2010 it became a permanent addition to our range and is now available all year round. It's light, fruity flavour makes it an ideal accompaniment to light curries, seafood dishes and summer salads or on a hot summer’s day perfect just on its own!

Tasting Notes: A hop-forward, zesty, floral blonde beer brewed with Munich Malt and bursting with citrus flavour from an abundant use of German Perle and Mittlefruh hops creating a delicious thirst quenching, continental-blonde style beer.

Our Lightfoot beer is named after the only other brewery in Masham, at the time, which Theakston took over in 1919. The Lightfoot and Theakston families were close and indeed linked through marriage and therefore it was a natural amalgamation of two well-established businesses. For many years it was rumoured that Theakston took over Lightfoot because they had a better cricket team something that was deemed unacceptable to the brewers in Red Lane! Lightfoot has always been a popular seasonal ale in fact so much so that in 2010 it became a permanent addition to our range and is now available all year round. It's light, fruity flavour makes it an ideal accompaniment to light curries, seafood dishes and summer salads or on a hot summer’s day perfect just on its own!

Tasting Notes: A hop-forward, zesty, floral blonde beer brewed with Munich Malt and bursting with citrus flavour from an abundant use of German Perle and Mittlefruh hops creating a delicious thirst quenching, continental-blonde style beer.

This deceptively smooth, full bodied, strong ale is tawny in colour and exhibits a beautifully rich balanced character of malt, fruit and Fuggle hops.

Tasting Notes: 

Fruit zest and honey.

Tasting Notes: An amber coloured pale ale brewed using finest pale and crystal barley, Target, Challenger and Progress bitter hops and generous amounts of Sovereign hops to give a delightful honeyed aroma and flavour balanced by a refreshing zesty fruit finish.

A citrus golden ale with hints of vanilla oak,

Tasting Notes: Theakston Masham Oaked Ale is a subtly oaked golden ale brewed using a blend of normal finest quality Pale Ale with Light Crystal and Munich malts which, combined with the hints of vanilla flavour of oak and the New Zealand Wakatu hop to give a beer of outstanding floral and vanilla oaked character.

Mild as a beer style is one of the oldest in the British brewing tradition. As its name suggests, Mild is mild in terms of alcohol and hop bitterness

Tasting Notes: The superb flavours of this style of beer are driven by the use of top quality crystal and roasted barleys.

"The Legend" - One of the world’s great beers – smooth, strong and mellow.

Tasting Notes: The beer that made Masham famous – rich, dark and smooth tasting, with a character all of its own. Brewed using the traditional Fuggle hop, Old Peculier is our best known beer and has a large and enthusiastic following all over Britain and around the world.

"The Legend" - One of the world’s great beers – smooth, strong and mellow.

Tasting Notes: The beer that made Masham famous – rich, dark and smooth tasting, with a character all of its own. Brewed using the traditional Fuggle hop, Old Peculier is our best known beer and has a large and enthusiastic following all over Britain and around the world.

"The Legend" - One of the world’s great beers – smooth, strong and mellow.

Tasting Notes: The beer that made Masham famous – rich, dark and smooth tasting, with a character all of its own. Brewed using the traditional Fuggle hop, Old Peculier is our best known beer and has a large and enthusiastic following all over Britain and around the world.

Up until the mid-1980s, Pale Ale was a popular brand in the Theakston range of bottled beers and throughout the UK but with changing consumer fashions and the resurgent interest in cask conditioned beers, the popularity of a one-time mainstay of the British beer industry faded. But, as they say ‘what goes round comes around’ and once again Pale Ale has returned on a wave of popularity encouraged by the growing consumer interest in new world craft keg ales. This wonderful news has encouraged us to brew Pale once again this time with a modern twist. Cold filtered and unpasteurised, the process has enabled us to produce a beautifully hop-forward pale-coloured beer using a mix of new world hops noted for their refreshing and aromatic characteristics in a mash of Munich malts.

Tasting Notes: A potent mix of Summit, El Dorado, Chinook and Cascade hops delivers a hefty zing of spicy citrus, sweet orange and grapefruit. Generous helpings of Munich malt give balance and a pale gold coloured appearance, all to create the ultimate thirst quencher!

A full bodied ale using pale ale malt and an exotic blend of old and new world full hop flowers including Cascade to give a light, lusciously flavoured taste of Paradise.

Tasting Notes: 

Peculier IPA is our modern take on a beer style first developed in the 19th century for our armed forces serving in India.

Tasting Notes: Theakston Peculier IPA is a new world craft keg IPA brewed in Masham using a combination of Cluster, Simcoe & Bullion hops from the US and locally grown hops infused into a mash of finest quality malted barley to produce a delicate ale of Pine and new world hop aroma and subtle mango, guava and honey flavour.

A light Golden Ale brewed using Sussex hops to give the unmistakable aroma and flavour of pink grapefruit.

Tasting Notes: Fruity, citrus

Cask consumers are increasingly demanding new, lower ABV and differing styles of cask ale. Combining our wonderful raw materials with nearly two hundred years of brewing expertise we have developed Theakston Quencher. A fabulous, deceptively full-bodied cask ale with refreshing floral and fruit hop character, at 3.4% ABV, ideal for a refreshing thirst quencher on hot days or when a driving thirst demands it!

Tasting Notes: A delicate floral aroma leads to a deceptively full bodied sweet-melon fruitiness with a refreshing dry-hop finish. Brewed using finest Pearl Barley, English grown Sovereign hops for aroma and dry bitterness and generous quantities of El Dorado hops for fruit character. A thirst Quencher if there ever was one!

Sweet malted ale, smoked tea and fruity oranges.

Tasting Notes: A pleasantly smoked China tea initial sensation is complimented by a full malty flavour with delightful mandarin orange in the finish, one for the craft ale connoisseur.

A strong pale ale brew using the finest pale and crystal barley, Target, Challenger and Progress bitter hops and generous amounts of Sovereign hops for fruit flavour. A perfectly balanced ale combining malt with bitter and fruit hops.

Tasting Notes: 

A dark, Scandinavian style lagered ale.

Tasting Notes: A fascinating combination of a traditional English brewing technique with Scandinavian dark lager ingredients of Rye, Wheat and continental hops to give a distinctive and refreshing cask ale.

Our extraordinary brewing team need little encouragement to apply their expertise to new brews and styles! Challenged to produce a new cask-conditioned beer to meet the growing interest in cooler served craft beers, they have 'done us proud!' Theakston SUMMIT (Cold Pale Ale) is our latest cask ale innovation; a 4.2% ABV beer that delivers the quality and freshness of cask at a chilled temperature. Especially brewed to retain all the balanced flavour qualities of cask ale served at the cooler temperature of 6-8°C for added refreshment. Brewed with new world SUMMIT, EL DORADO and CASCADE hops – then infused with AMARILLO hops to deliver an extra hefty burst of citrus fruit aroma!

Tasting Notes: Bold tropical fruit aromas give way to a zesty, citrus, tangerine fruit flavour. Brewed with finest sweet malt to give a perfectly balanced and refreshing pale Ale. Served extra chilled.

A delightful, tropical fruit flavoured ale with a clean, zesty, thirst-quenching finish.

Tasting Notes: Theakston ‘Tour de Wot?’ is a delicious combination of British and continental barleys brewed with the rare Amarillo hop from the USA and traditional English hops to give a brew of exceptional flavour and taste. A subtle, zesty aroma leads to a pronounced tropical fruit flavour, tempered by a crisp, fresh finish, on a biscuit like-malt foundation.

This beer is deep ruby in colour with a fragrant aroma.

Tasting Notes: This leads to a beer with a mellow roasted malt character, complemented by vanilla notes.

XB is a rare delight, a real ale connoisseur’s masterpiece. A strong full-bodied ale with a subtle but superb blend of two types of bitter and three fruit hop varieties giving a most thirst quenching and satisfying ale. XB was first brewed in 1982 to celebrate the purchase of the Carlisle Brewery by Theakstons a few years before. Brewed always and ever in Masham, XB was designed as a tribute to the classic ‘border’ style of beer, strong in gravity, low but complex hop. It was an instant success and has remained so, winning over real ale devotees all over the UK. Always in the shadow of its more famous stable–mate, Old Peculier, XB has quietly established itself as favourite among serious cask ale enthusiasts. Its name came not from some clever marketing expert but rather based on the more prosaic features of the Masham brewery. In the days when the only way to distinguish the contents from one cask to the next was by use of one of only two wooden stamps dipped in white wash and applied to each cask, the only letters available were either an X or a B. We could have called in BX but we preferred XB!

Tasting Notes: A premium strength, ruby coloured premium bitter with a delicate Calvados aroma, and a subtle rhubarb and apple fruit flavour. The balance between bitterness and fruitiness from Bramling Cross and Fuggle hops used give XB the distinctively complex aroma, making it a beer to savour.

XB is a rare delight, a real ale connoisseur’s masterpiece. A strong full-bodied ale with a subtle but superb blend of two types of bitter and three fruit hop varieties giving a most thirst quenching and satisfying ale. XB was first brewed in 1982 to celebrate the purchase of the Carlisle Brewery by Theakstons a few years before. Brewed always and ever in Masham, XB was designed as a tribute to the classic ‘border’ style of beer, strong in gravity, low but complex hop. It was an instant success and has remained so, winning over real ale devotees all over the UK. Always in the shadow of its more famous stable–mate, Old Peculier, XB has quietly established itself as favourite among serious cask ale enthusiasts. Its name came not from some clever marketing expert but rather based on the more prosaic features of the Masham brewery. In the days when the only way to distinguish the contents from one cask to the next was by use of one of only two wooden stamps dipped in white wash and applied to each cask, the only letters available were either an X or a B. We could have called in BX but we preferred XB!

Tasting Notes: A premium strength, ruby coloured premium bitter with a delicate Calvados aroma, and a subtle rhubarb and apple fruit flavour. The balance between bitterness and fruitiness from Bramling Cross and Fuggle hops used give XB the distinctively complex aroma, making it a beer to savour.