Tempest Brewing Company

Tempest Brewing Company was founded in mid- 2010 by Gavin Meiklejohn. Gavin had been living in New Zealand where he trained as a chef but then returned home with his wife, Annika, in 2007 to run The Cobbles Inn in Kelso in the Scottish Borders. After hearing numerous requests from his customers for a locally brewed beer Gavin decided the time was right to venture into his own brewery. Gavin had acquired an appreciation for North American craft beers while working at what is now the Whistler Brewing Company in Whistler, British Columbia. He left Canada for New Zealand to study as a chef and while there built his own 50 liter brewery in his garage for home brewing his own beers. He then took a brewing course in Sydney, Australia, just to get some further professional insight into the brewing trade. Little did he know at the time but the garage brewery in New Zealand proved to be a foundation for the beers he now brews at Tempest.

Gavin was then joined by Allan Rice, who had also lived in New Zealand and Canada previously. Up until 2008, Allan was the business development manager at Stewart Brewing in Edinburgh but then left Scotland for a short stay in Canada. Upon his return Allan met up with Gavin and came on board as Tempest's business manager overseeing the sales and marketing of the firm while also spending considerable time in the workings of the brewery itself.

The brewery's ten barrel plant is currently housed in old dairy buildings in Kelso where the entire space is fully utlized meaning that a move to bigger premises is likely eminent. The plant itself is built of formerly used brewing equipment from the UK that has been refurbished locally to suit the needs of the brewery. Presently, the brewery has fermenting capacity of 6000 liters with conditioning space for up to 30 barrels to allow for a number of beers to be on the go at any one time. Malt and hops are sourced from the UK, Germany, New Zealand and North America and a variety of yeasts are used in the Tempest lineup.

The brewing philosoply at Tempest is to brew beers with big flavors taking influence from beers produced all over the globe while still maintaining a 'brew-to-style' attitude. In addition to their regular lineup, they try to brew varied offerings on a monthly basis just to keep things interesting. The brewery is basically running at full capacity with interest both locally and as far afield as London. They are currently looking into expanding their cask ale range to include kegged beer as well as bottled beer. There has been particular interest in their Re-Wired Craft Lager in keg format.

My personal thanks to Allan Rice for entertaining my emails and phone calls. He's been very generous in answering questions and providing me with images, etc. All the best, Allan!

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