Ossett Brewery marks 25th anniversary

Ossett Brewery is the creator of Yorkshire Blonde, White Rat, Silver King and Excelsius, and owner of more than 20 pubs in Yorkshire.

The firm, originally Ossett Brewing Co, began life in 1998 on a five-barrel-brew-length kit behind the Brewer’s Pride pub in Ossett.

Within three years brewing capacity was 40 barrels a week.

Like a lot of the hospitality industry struggled significantly during 2020.

Ossett owner Jamie Lawson said: “These post pandemic times have been particularly challenging for the brewing and pub industry.

"However, the past two years have seen us enjoy steady growth and we are now delighted to be celebrating our milestone 25th year with our Silver Series.

"We believe in the future of cask ale and are determined to build on our deep roots to sustain Ossett for the future through broadening the appeal of cask with inventive and exciting brands - as seen with our Silver Series, Synergy Series, Collaboration Ales and our Single Hopped programme as well as the all-time favourites that sit within our core range.”

Winning many national and international awards, today’s brewery stands only a short distance from the original site in Low Mill Road producing an eclectic range of cask ale and lager.

The company now produces 440 brewers-barrels a week serving a pub estate of 35 outlets, free trade customers and national customers all over the UK.

Ossett has received various CAMRA, Publican and SIBA national awards over the years including supreme national champion with Excelsius.

Kicking off the celebrations is the first of a four strong Silver Series of anniversary ales to roll out this month – premium golden ale Dazzler (4.5% abv).

The second will be Easy Does It (3.4% abv), an easy drinking session summer bitter, which is a clear pale straw in colour and full bodied with hints of peach, pineapple and passion fruit on the aroma and a balanced dry, citrus bitterness in taste delivered from new British Harlequin and American Citra hops.

A third brew for the autumn is Alter Ego (5.5% abv) exploring the NEIPA (New England India Pale Ale) style and proclaimed as a ‘souped up’ dry hopped mutation of Ossett’s highly popular White Rat (4% abv).

A vanilla stout concludes the celebrations. Irish stout style, Jet (4.2% abv) is black with vanilla, chocolate and coffee notes on the aroma and a dry and bitter finish from roasted malts joined with the French Savinjski Goldings hops and US Chinook.

The company was originally founded as a brewpub in 1998 by Bob Lawson, former career brewer at Tetley in Leeds.

Son Jamie founded an independent pub group, Izakaya Pub Co Ltd alongside the brewery in 2003, which later merged into the Ossett brewing group.

Jamie has led the brewery since Bob became chairman in 2005 with Paul Spencer taking over as head brewer at the same time.

Paul is still in charge of Ossett’s beer lineup after 22 years with the company.

Jamie was also responsible for the founding of its craft beer sister company, SALT in 2018.