Steam Machine Brewing Company in Newton Aycliffe is bringing back its flagship beer festival ‘Big Mash-Up’ this January, as it marks eleven years of independent brewing.
After a two-year break, ‘Big Mash-Up: The Next Fermentation’ will take over the brewery for a weekend of beer, music and street food, with evening festival sessions on Friday 30th and Saturday 31st January.
The festival has become a fixture in the North East beer calendar, regularly selling out and drawing visitors from across the region and beyond to experience Steam Machine’s distinctive, small-batch approach to brewing.
This year’s event will feature more than 30 beers, including Steam Machine’s own range of award-winning and seasonal brews, winter beers from across Europe, and a dedicated Fellowship of Beer bar pouring limited beers, designed and voted on by members of the brewery’s subscription community.
Among the exclusive Fellowship beers will be a honey braggot aged in an Irish whiskey barrel, a beetroot saison aged in a Spanish Rioja barrel, and a recreation of Brunswick Mumme, brewed with wild botanicals based on 19th-century descriptions and matured in a brandy barrel.
The brewery’s own beers will include favourites such as Debauchery Barrel-Aged Imperial Stout, Turkish Delight Stout, Lapsang Souchong Smoked Porter, alongside tank-poured pilsners, West Coast IPAs, fruit beers and more.
Festival evenings will also feature live music and Bavarian-style street food, turning the working brewery into a lively winter beer hall.
Steam Machine Brewing Company is based at Unit 26, Northfield Way, Newton Aycliffe, County Durham, DL5 6UF.
Tickets for the evening festival sessions are £10, which includes entry, a festival glass and beer tokens, and are available via steammachinebrew.com or from the brewery taproom.
Nick Smith, co-founder of Steam Machine, said: “Big Mash-Up has always been about showing how different and surprising beer can be. Eleven years in, we’re still excited by that idea, and it feels good to be bringing the festival back.”