Food and Drink

Beer of the Week: Big Smoke Brew Co. Syllabub Mango & Passion Fruit Pale Ale

Initially set up as a microbrewery behind The Antelope pub in Surbiton, Big Smoke Brew Co. has become massively renowned since launching in 2014.

Now operating from a new brewery in Sandown Industrial Estate in Esher, Surrey, Big Smoke’s produce is representative of the beer that the brewery founders James Morgan and Richard Craig personally enjoy drinking, which is all flavoursome, hard-hitting and additive free. The brewery also makes a clear point of refraining from using Isinglass finings – a by-product obtained from the dried swim bladders of fish, used by many breweries to make their beers clear.

With the move to the new brewery, the award-winning craft beer brand has also embraced the canning revolution, with all of their core beers now available in cans and delivered nationwide. Using six 65 hectolitre tanks, the brewery is now capable of brewing five times the quantity of beer, equating to approximately 8,000 pints per brew, whilst a state-of-the-art canning line produces 1,600 cans per hour.

Brewed using Nelson Sauvin and Mosaic hops from New Zealand, Syllabub Mango & Passion Fruit Pale Ale is a brand new beer from Big Smoke Brew Co. On pour, the beer has a cloudy orange squash complexion, capped with a fine white head. Aromas of sweet mango and passion fruit dominate on the nose, joined by further tropical notes of pineapple, apricot and a suggestion of grapefruit rind and juice, plus grassy Nelson Sauvin notes. Tropical fruit continues on the palate, conveying a prominent juicy character rife with more passion fruit, wet mango and pineapple, joined by some peach and guava savours alongside a prominent resinous hop presence and refreshing bitterness that lasts on the finish with a whisper of pepper and tart grapefruit.

Further information on Big Smoke Brew Co. can be found here.  

Jon Hatchman

Jonathan is Food Editor for The London Economic. Jonathan has run and contributed towards a number of blogs, and has written features for publications such as Eater London, The Guardian, i News, The Independent, GQ, Time Out London and more.

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