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A while back, a long-time friend randomly invited me to a brewery launch party less than three miles from my house. And that’s where I met Alastair and Jennifer Boase and learned about MacLeod Ale Brewing Co. in Van Nuys, California.
Alastair is of the Scottish Clan Macleod, which also sounds like a great name for a brewery. His father owned a tavern in Scotland for four years, which exposed Alastair to the tavern lifestyle. He helped run the tavern, but was mostly on the drinking side of the bar having a jolly time with the local blokes.
Alastair went to college in Edinburgh, where he was exposed to the revival of traditional beer and he dabbled in homebrewing. After moving to the states in ’87 and working a landscaping/contractor career, he met his wife Jenny, who also had a passion for the UK and bagpiping and wanted to start a career after her children left the nest.
Starting a brewery for Jenny and Alastair’s new career that centered on the UK and bagpiping was more logical than Sean Connery playing a game of Cluedo.
Alastair and Jenny wanted to delegate the brewing to someone who shared their passion for the British cask beer style. The stars aligned when they found Andy Black, a young ambitious brewer who studied in England and discovered cask beer.
Andy wanted to be a brewer back in the states, but he wanted to skip the process of climbing the corporate beer ladder and go straight to being a head brewer. He placed an ad and MacLeod’s was born once when Alastair and Jenny hired Andy.
All of the craft beer ale that MacLeod’s produces is cask conditioned, which keeps true to the British real ale style.
Cask conditioning has the secondary fermentation happen in the cask. The low pressure environment makes the yeast happier, which unlocks more of the flavor. This process yields natural carbonation and ale that is served at the traditional cellar room temperature of 55 degrees opposed to a beer that was chiseled out of a glacier with an ice ax by a trendy, frosty bearded bar-back.
MacLeod’s also imports their hops from England and they use one European yeast strain to round out their British ales that are worthy enough to be served in Greenwich Union in London.
You may be asking, with a Scottish name like MacLeod’s, why all the British beer and why not a main core of Scottish Ales?
Having Scottish ale would be nice if the Scots had a wide variety of beer, but Alastair’s kilted ancestors brewed mainly malty beers because of the lack of hops in the region.
Don’t get your tartan in ruffle just yet Scots; MacLeod’s has a Scottish 60/- ale called The Kings Taxes that would make William Wallace himself flash the Redcoats for a pint (the “/-” means shilling).
In addition to the Scottish 60 Shilling, they have a lineup of three other year-round beers: The Session Gap Ordinary Bitter, The Little Spree Yorkshire Pale Ale, and the Jackie Tar Brown Stout.
I was fortunate enough to have the sessionable Yorkshire Pale Ale and the Brown Stout at the launch party and I had the Pale again at a preview party this past weekend. This unfiltered pale was refreshing yet complex and transported me to a Yorkshire pub talking codswallop with Seamus the Sassenach.
With the MacLeod’s tasting room at their brewery, there is not much need to buy a $2000 plane ticket to London just to experience the British pub atmosphere. The beautiful wood, the imported pub style handles, and even Ale Spent-Grain Crackers create such an illusion of the motherland that you’ll forget you’re in the middle of the valley in sweltering Van Nuys.
Jenny includes her love for bagpiping by proudly displaying the MacLeod’s bass drum on top of the cold room. MacLeod’s passion for piping will be taken even further at the grand opening, when a full pipe band occupies their parking lot. I don’t know about you, but I get teary-eyed when I see and hear a good pipe band… uuummm, that’s because I know there’s good beer right around the corner, yeah that’s it.
Now there’s great beer, I mean ale, right around the corner from me and other residents of the valley. I guess that means I’m going to be crying a lot.
