Rainbow Inn & Brewery

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Rainbow Inn & Brewery, 73 Birmingham Road, Allesley Village, Coventry, West Midlands.

Brewing commenced 1994.


THE RAINBOW INN AND BREWERY, ALLESLEY, COVENTRY by Jeff Sechiari

Life seems to have been particularly busy recently and I suddenly found myself having to spend the best part of a week at a conference in Coventry – a distraction that I could really have done without.

One of the many downsides with such events is that they usually involve staying in sterile hotels totally devoid of any interesting beers. When this is coupled with late finishes to the day and the need to spend quality time with colleagues and peers in the evening rather than exploring the vernacular architecture, usually best exhibited by the design of the local public houses, you can see why I was not looking forward to it.

As it happened our hotel on this occasion was in the village of Allesley, on the outskirts of the city. As my colleague, who was kindly chauffeuring me, drove into the village we saw the hotel straight away and it really didn’t look too bad. If nothing else it was in the centre of an attractive village with some cottages that looked to be of at least the 16th century. It also looked as though it could well have a gym and pool. The real bonus, though, was almost next door to the hotel entrance. A lovely looking pub AND BREWERY! I couldn’t believe my luck. Even the busiest schedule would allow the occasional opportunity to slip out and undertake some swift research.

We parked the car and wandered into the hotel foyer to register. While standing in the queue it occurred to me that the name didn’t ring any particular bells with me. As I was a contented passenger on this trip I hadn’t given it a great deal of thought, but clearly the time had come to check some details. As you will have guessed, I had been correct earlier on in not believing my luck, and we duly retraced our steps to the car and headed off to the far end of the village to the correct hotel – a striking example of 1960s tower block development.

The good news was that there were a couple of opportunities to get out, and visits to the Rainbow Inn and Brewery proved very worthwhile.

On my first visit I arrived approaching closing time and chatted to one of the bar staff. He must have mentioned this to the owner who sought me out and invited me on an instant brewery tour. This was particularly surprising because the pub was full to bursting point. It was like the busiest Friday night I have ever seen, but it was actually a Tuesday. The brewery was in an attractive white outbuilding in the yard behind the pub and had the brewery, plus storage rooms, downstairs and a small loft over.

Jon (Jonathan Grote) explained to me that the inn had been around since 1680 and former landlord, Terry Rotherham, had started the brewery in 1995. Jon and his partner, Andrea Lewis, bought the business last year and have continued brewing with Joe Melia as the brewer. Total Brewing Services Ltd of Kidderminster, installed the plant.

They currently produce one beer – Piddlebrook (3.8% abv, OG1036), which is named after the local stream (and sounds to me as though it should actually be in Dorset). In the past they have brewed other beers, but are restricted by the pub lease to only sell one as it is treated as their guest beer.

The recipe involves 100kg of Marris Otter crushed malt plus 12.5 kg of crushed Crystal malt, together with 800gm of Challenger hops, 400gm of Goldings and 150gm of Fuggles per brew. The brew length is 4 barrels (144 gallons) and they have the capacity to brew twice per week and the current average consumption is around 150 gallons a week. The beer is only sold in the Rainbow Inn.

Raw materials are delivered once per month and this is quite an exercise. The lorry cannot get into the yard so has to be unloaded from the road by forklift truck. Pallets of materials are then taken through to the back and stored in the loft, ready for the malt to be discharged into the mash tun.

I was able to pop back early the next evening to take a few external photographs in daylight, but there was no one around to show me around the inside again – Jon was busy away playing cricket, so I had to down a quick pint of their excellent beer and return to my hotel, only to come back towards closing time and then have another internal tour for photographs.

My thanks to Jon and Andrea for their tremendous hospitality and spending so much time with me. If you are in the area do drop in and sample their beer (they also sell Courage and Greene King) but I would warn you that their home brew has just gone up in price and now retails at a hefty £1.30 a pint!


An assortment of views taken in 2002 of the brewery. Courtesy Jeff Sechiari