Burton Upon Trent Cask Ale: Worthington Whiteshield

Hello, I am here today to bring you another fantastic Cask Ale post and trust me this one is a good one, so stick around.

Worthington’s Whiteshield is a traditional classic IPA (Indian Pale Ale) which is brewed in the town of Burton Upon Trent (The Brewing Capital) it was first established in 1744, just think that is 276 Years old and is still being brewed today.

The beer itself is available in bottled conditioned form, this involves a bottle of beer which is full of sediment (Yeast) which sits at the bottom of the bottle, unless disturbed.

Now, once the bottle is open you need to pour into a tilted glass at 45 degrees (angle).

The beer is also available in 9 gallon Firkin Casks which are distributed throughout the brewery.

The tasting notes for the beer are as follows:

Aromatic hops, toasted cereal notes and hints of smoke and spice enhanced by a fragrant fruity character. This all combined leaves a fantastic exquisite finish.

Wouldn’t you just love to try some of this now?

Worthington Whiteshield was first brewed at the William Worthington Brewery, which was based at The National Brewery Centre.

Just take a look at this fantastic scale of such a marvellous Microbrewery:

The Whiteshield Brewery was a separate building but also formed part of the William Worthington Brewery, The William Worthington Brewery was where seasonal ales were brewed for Molson Coors in 2010.

Whiteshield was also formally brewed by using the Burton Union System, this was a system which was set up around wooden casks and its main objective was to allow excess barm (Yeast foam) to be expelled from the casks without leaving excessive amounts of head space within the casks.

Here is an example below of the system:

In 2012, there was an increasing demand for the beer which saw the production of it to move over to the Molson Coors site.

Heritage Brewing Company in Burton Upon Trent brew a traditional classic IPA 5.6% ABV called Masterpiece and history tells us that Whiteshield and Masterpiece are similar to each other but they do have there differences.

I have tried Worthington Whiteshield myself and I must say I really did enjoy it very much, the spicy kick at the end of the palate just makes me want to have more and more, (4 pints maybe, hahahah)

The Pub I tried it in was The Dog Inn (Burton Upon Trent) which serve a fantastic range of Cask Ales to choose from and I was lucky enough to see Whiteshield on the bar.

So to summarise this post we now know that this traditional classic IPA has the history of Burton Upon Trent and it is widely available today in both bottle and cask forms .

We also know that is was brewed in a separate microbrewery, however, it was still under one name, The William Worthington Brewery.

Finally, we can definitely say that this is a Perfect Pint and in my opinion it is a beer to get your hands on and fill that glass up with and to relax and enjoy.

Cheeeeeers

Luke