Watercress and beer may not sound like a match made in heaven but the beer aficionados at the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) might beg to differ. The world’s first watercress-flavoured ale, Watercress Warrior, was sampled by beer connoisseurs at CAMRA’s Great British Beer Festival in London this summer, having also been highly commended at the Taste of the West Awards.
The peppery beverage was born in early 2017 when the Cerne Abbas Brewery approached The Watercress Company with the idea of developing a limited-edition watercress-based ale, and the UK’s leading grower of the aquatic plant jumped at the chance. The light and hoppy craft ale that resulted – initially created as little more than an experiment – features watercress seed as its key ingredient and has a peppery flavour, balanced against a “refreshing citrus bite”. The beer is made using water taken from the mineral-rich springs used to grow watercress at the company’s farm in Waddock, Dorset.
“We always knew that watercress was versatile but to find an alternative application for the watercress seeds just shows what a little imagination can achieve,” says managing director of The Watercress Company, Tom Amery. “The success of the beer for the Cerne Abbas Brewery is great to see and the prospect of Watercress Warrior being available on tap is mouthwatering.”
Leaving its unusual flavour to one side, the inclusion of watercress in the drink is also rumoured to boost your sex drive – a property that fits nicely with the brewery’s branding. The company is named after the huge naked chalk figure carved into the nearby Dorset hills, which many reckon to be an Iron Age fertility symbol. Every year Morris Men, employees of the Cerne Abbas Brewery and local revellers congregate at the ancient carved figure to welcome the May Day dawn and celebrate the earth being reborn.
Another product that has had something of a rebirth in recent years is gin, with the botanical spirit now the main event at many bars, pop-ups and pubs across the UK. In the past five years a whole raft of fruit-flavoured gins has hit the market, with a growing trend for summer berry-flavoured beverages in particular. Northamptonshire distillery Warner Edwards claims to be responsible for starting this trend, however managing director Tom Warner is quick to distance his company, which only uses natural organic material, from producers of “synthetically flavoured” products.
“We would encourage all producers to work with natural ingredients,” he says. “It’s much harder but the results speak for themselves. The insatiable thirst for exciting new developments by certain consumers is really lowering the quality from some producers.”
When Warner Edwards launched in late 2012, flavoured gins were not widely available in the UK, according to Warner. The gin category was still relatively traditional and was dominated by traditional dry gins, with a small selection of ‘hedgerow-flavoured’ liquors struggling to gain traction outside of farm shops.
Looking for a point of difference to compete with the marketing power of the big brands, Warner decided to draw on the flavours from his farm and experiment with different techniques. Today the company’s range of gins are flavoured with melissa herbs, local honey, elderflower, sloe berries and rhubarb, as well as a smattering of other botanicals.
In 2014 the company launched its limited-edition rhubarb gin, using a crop from a crown estate in Lincolnshire. The pink spirit, which contains 34 per cent rhubarb juice, has kickstarted a growing trend in the gin category. Several other gin distilleries, including Gordon’s, Foxdenton Estate and Edinburgh Gin, have followed suit, launching rhubarb concoctions of their own. And pubs across the country have even been offering customers free gin in return for a stick of rhubarb – a quirky marketing stunt to celebrate rising demand for the flavour combination.
Ultimately, Warner puts his company’s success in flavoured gins down to his experience in the fresh produce sector. “I actually worked in the produce industry for 10 years with Fresca Group,” he says, “and it’s this experience that has enabled us to create the flavoured gin category in the UK. My perverse seasonal knowledge of fruit varieties from around the world really helps with our NPD process, plus my black book of produce contacts helps sourcing.”
But as more fruit and vegetable flavoured drinks make their way onto supermarket shelves, it remains to be seen whether sweeter synthetic flavours or natural ingredients will come out on top with consumers. “Quality seems to shine through to all consumers,” says Warner, “but I think some of our competitors that use synthetic flavourings appeal to younger alcopop consumers.”
