A tasting room in the heart of Shakespeare's Stratford-upon-Avon is preparing to serve what could be the most expensive draught beer currently available in Britain. Ya Bard's tasting room and bottle shop has secured one of only two kegs of an ultra-rare, super-strength Alaskan stout to be exported to Europe, with servings priced at a staggering £25 for a third of a pint.
The Quest for a Rare Brew
Owner Dave Moore has spent a year trying to acquire a keg of 'Blessed', an imperial stout from Anchorage Brewing Company (ABC). His persistence paid off when he became the first to pre-order from the latest batch, making his venue the only pub in the UK to secure a keg. The 21% ABV beer is so potent and valuable that it will be sold exclusively in third-pint measures. "That is plenty. It is a beer to savour. People won't want any more than that," Mr Moore stated.
The keg contains 105 servings, and Mr Moore anticipates it will sell out within a single day, with craft beer enthusiasts from 'far and wide' already planning pilgrimages to sample it. This follows a successful 2022 sale where two cases of 375ml bottles of Blessed sold out on pre-order at £70 per bottle.
Craftsmanship Justifies the Cost
Gabe Fletcher, founder and brewer at the Alaskan microbrewery, detailed the incredibly complex and lengthy process behind Blessed. The stout is aged for 33 months in premium bourbon barrels from Kentucky's Heaven Hill and Russell's Reserve distilleries. It is then filtered through large quantities of toasted and raw coconut before Madagascan vanilla beans are added prior to packaging.
"Every time we transfer, we lose beer," Mr Fletcher explained, citing evaporation and absorption by the coconut as factors that concentrate the alcohol but also contribute to the high cost and limited yield. He described the final product as tasting like 'a waffle cone filled with bourbon-soaked German chocolate cake and then drizzled with burnt caramel'.
While acknowledging the price is "a hell of a lot of money" for a beer, Dave Moore argues it is comparable to a fine wine, adding that 'more love goes into brewing the beer than producing a bottle of wine'.
A Taste of Luxury
Daily Mail reporter Andy Dolan, who was invited to sample the brew, described it as 'simply delicious'. He noted its silky, liqueur-like texture and lingering flavours of whiskey and caramel, a world away from a standard pub stout. Customers paying the premium will also receive a specially-commissioned glass to keep as a souvenir of their extravagant tipple.
Despite its eye-watering price, Blessed is not even the most expensive beer from its own brewery. That title belongs to 'A Deal With The Devil', a bottle-aged beer that takes three years to make and sells for almost three times the price. The record for recent times is held by Nail Brewing's Antarctica Nail Ale, a 2010 charity beer brewed with melted ice, which sold at auction for between £600 and £1,388 per bottle.
As William Shakespeare, Stratford's most famous son, once wrote in The Winter's Tale: "For a quart of ale is a dish for a king." Modern patrons at Ya Bard will find the royal measure has been considerably downsized, but the regal price tag very much remains.
