Marston's of the universe

Pete Brown visits Marston's Brewery in Burton upon Trent home of the legendary Burton Unions.

Burton-on-Trent bugs the hell out of me.

To any beer fan it’s a legend, but to the average British beer drinker, Burton is the name of a cheesy menswear chain and nothing else. Even as an acolyte, if you ever get around to that long-dreamt of beer pilgrimage to this small Midlands town, beervana will prove elusive among the car parks and shopping malls that have replaced once great breweries such as Bass and Allsopp.

I’ve been trying to get this place to confess its beery secrets for years, but Burton simply refuses to look or feel like the greatest brewing town in history. Then, last summer, I discovered that if you really want to get a feel for Beer Town, you can do worse than abandoning your car, and entering Burton via the waterways that first enabled it to become the world’s first great beer exporter.

When the River Trent was made navigable at the start of the 18th century, Burton’s brewers could send their strong beers to Hull for export. But it was slow, expensive and dangerous, and the arrival of the Trent and Mersey Canal made trade much easier. Today the mighty Trent is unnavigable once more, but the canal still allows narrow boats and cruisers to float back into England’s Arcadian past, through places whose very names seem to smell of homebaked bread. Whittington. King’s Bromley. Barton-under- Needwood, where there are still pubs with names like the White Swan and the Shoulder of Mutton.

Coming from the south, you can stop for lunch and a pint of Marston’s Pedi.....

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By Pete Brown

Section : Brewery Focus

Page number : 14