Here at the Cowper Arms we are proud to stock the full range of McMullen’s locally brewed ales.
Crafted just 10 minutes down the road in Hertford and arriving still fresh at the Cowper Arms.
We stock three standard McMullen’s draught ales, bottled beers, a seasonal special experimenting with style and flavour from Rivertown Brewing and an exclusive just for the Cowper Arms
A Very Very Basic Beer Recipe
Ingredients
Malt
Water
Hops
Yeast
Method
1. Mix
2. Stir
3. Boil
4. Ferment
McMullen’s have asked us to point out, that it’s a bit more complicated than we make it sound
Origin Story
McMullen’s beer dates back to 1827, so always check the sell by date.
In 1827 a master cooper (fun fact: back in the day it was spelt Cowper) called Peter McMullen was making and supplying barrels and casks to the companies brewing in Hertford at the time. One day he decided to start brewing his own beer from his outhouse. It turned out to be a step up from the average attempt at home brew, and his full barrels were even more popular than his empty ones. By 1830 he had his own full scale brewery, the Mill Bridge Brewery, supplying ales to the pubs and peoples of Hertford and it’s surrounding areas.
Six years later, less than a decade after Peter McMullen started, he was buying his first pub. On Boxing Day 1836, he bought the Greyhound at Bengeo, still proudly operated by McMullen’s to this day. The deal included three cottages and four acres of land at a price of £481.
£481!!
It’s amazing the bargains you can pick up in the January sales if you head to the estate agents first thing on Boxing Day.
Today, Fergus, Tom and Alex McMullen are the sixth generation of the McMullen family to operate the brewery.
Brewing, Brewers and Breweries
After the initial breweries mentioned above: Peter McMullen’s outhouse and The Mill Bridge Brewery, McMullen’s operations moved with the times and have gone through a few newer breweries.
In 1891, the Old Cross Brewery was built in the centre of Hertford and the first of three wells was sunk to a depth of 140ft to provide the brewery with a unique supply of fresh water to maintain the purity and award winning quality of their ales.
Since then two further wells have been sunk to an impressive depth of 250ft into the Earth, any further and that delightful fragrance of hops that flutters in the Hertford air would be smelt in some parts of Australia. This maintains a natural supply of water and is unique to the McMullen’s brewery. Even the water in our beers is the best.
1984 saw the construction of a new state-of-the-art brewery to supply a growing demand for ale and lager.
This brewery operated until 2006 when a new brewery was opened. The Whole Hop Brewery was designed by a team led by head brewer Chris Evans to ensure the whole brewing process can be carefully controlled and give Chris the power to make sure nothing can go ruin the taste of our delicious beer.
The name The Whole Hop Brewery refers to McMullen’s belief that using pre-processed pallets or oil extracts of the hops is detrimental to the authentic cask ales and it kind of feels like cheating. McMullen’s continue the tradition of using only natural hops straight from the sack – unlike some other breweries we can mention (We won’t, it’d be unprofessional, but rest assured it’s most of them). McMullen’s know, personally, all the people who supply the hops for our beers and they’re very nice people, but more importantly, they all produce consistently good quality produce, mostly – but not exclusively – in the garden counties of England.
The Cowper Arms in Digswell may be McMullen’s best pub, but it is not the only part of their empire.
At the last time we remembered to update our website McMullen’s operated:
86 Managed pubs
49 tenanted houses
Including us, and our sister pub: The White Horse in Burnham Green.
and 7 Baroosh’s (their super smart, elegant and contemporary over 21s bars.)
We are proud to be part of this family; however our menu is exclusive to the Cowper Arms and designed by Franko and our kitchen team.
For more information visit www.mcmullens.co.uk