Since 2024 Dark Star beers are brewed at Fullers brewery, Chiswick.
The Dark Star Brewing Company was born in 1994 in the cellar of a pub in Brighton. With a brew plant only marginally bigger than an enthusiastic home-brew kit the characteristic style of hoppy beers was developed and tried out on the willing guinea pigs at the bar. As with all the best ideas, the business was planned on the back of a beer mat, driven by a few beers and funded with money we didn’t have.
A few years on, well 25 years actually, we find ourselves in Partridge Green, just south west of Horsham, West Sussex, with a 45 barrel brewhouse. It’s all been a bit of a blur really. None of us really wanted to leave the cellar of the pub, but apparently more and more people liked drinking the same beers as us, so we needed to brew more…
What’s in a name…: The brewery is named after a song by the band The Grateful Dead, although if you have a heard a different story, use that, never let the truth stand in the way of a good yarn.
In February 2018, Dark Star was acquired by London-based brewer, Fuller Smith & Turner. In January 2019, Fuller Smith & Turner sold its entire drinks business, including The Dark Star Brewing Company, to Asahi Breweries.
The brewery and taproom at Partridge Green was closed in 2022 and production moved to Meantime brewery, and following the closure of that in 2024, production shifted to Fuller’s Griffin brewery.
Cask at The Partridge, Bromley 31/07/2023 not that “hazy” but expected aroma and taste for style, some nice juicy fruits, pine needles, malty backing, assertive bitter edged hoppy finish. Good stuff.
Can at home in Hackney - picked up from Waitrose Canary Wharf. Pours clear yellow-gold with a foamy, white topping. Lightly sweet with subdued citrusy hops, soft grassy bitterness, some biscuity pale malts, light pithy notes. Light bodied with fine to average carbonation. Mellow dryness in the finish, more pithy lemon and grapefruit, dried pale malts. Real easy-drinking stuff.
1/2 pint cask @ The Harp, Covent Garden. Pâle/dorée, col épais crémeux blanc. Arôme est frais houblonné, léger rétro-nasal fleuri avec un léger apport malté anglais. Palais pâle, Marris qui assurent une bonne balance, houblonné plasiant sur le fleuri rappelant un peu un côté fleur de sureau. Petite note beurrée qui se retrouve parfois dû au cask? Léger et bien pintable.
Cask at The Harp, Covent Garden. Gold pour with a white head. Nose is peach, tropical fruits, touch of pine. Flavours of lychee, white grape, tropical fruits, peach. Quite a malty, fruity hoppy affair.
Hand-pulled pint in the Bacchus, Birmingham on 5th August 2023, first pint of a Stag Do (for little Andy, who is AndyTF2 on here). It's dark in the Bacchus, but the bright golden body of this shone out well, staying white crown too. Hop first with a fruity and piney aroma/taste, nice start to a heavy days drinking.
Cask at Ring of Bells, Taunton. Pours clear dark gold with a cream cap. Aroma: pale malts, light caramel, hints of grass. Taste: light sweet & bitter, dry taste, maybe a smidge of citrus. Medium body with soft carbonation. Just OK.
Tried
from Cask
at
Ring of Bells
on 27 Jun 2023
at 22:00
Carnivale Brettanomyces 2023. Pours a mostly clear deep ruby colour and a denken but small beige head. Aroma's: funky, sweetish, sourish, wood/tannines. Retronasal follows this. Flavour is light moderate sweet'n'sour. Warming alcohol. Medium bodied. Finishes dry and somewhat bitter. Nice reconstruction of this classic.