Brewery
Original site: 227 Whittington Road N22 8YW (Enfield)
Current site: 5 Littleline House, 43 West Road N17 0RE (Haringey)
bohembrewery.com
First sold beer: June 2016 (at original site)
One of the most unusual and remarkable new breweries in London and indeed the UK, Bohem focuses on serious craft lagers in the Czech tradition, with just enough of a modern twist. Co-founder Petr Skoček, originally from Plzeň, began homebrewing when he moved here from Prague and found the local lagers expensive and disappointing. In 2015 he teamed up with a fellow expat enthusiast, businessman Zdeněk Kudr, to establish Bohem in Bounds Green, working on a small scale with a tiny 160 l kit, which meant brewing four times daily to fill one fermenter. The pair began selling their beers in 2016 and soon found demand outstripping capacity.
Since April 2018, beers have been produced at the current address in a Tottenham industrial estate close to One Mile End and Redemption, using an ingeniously-designed 10 hl two-vessel brewhouse from Czech supplier Mini Brewery KS. Unlike typical British kits, this is capable of traditional Czech ‘decoction mashing’ which, in conjunction with key ingredients imported from the Czech Republic and Germany, helps achieve a suitably authentic result.
Bohem boasts several other items of equipment rare in a British brewery of this size, including a grist mill, necessary for grinding malt to the optimum size for the mashing system, and 17 750 l and 1,000 l cylindrical lagering tanks where the beer is stored at low temperature for a minimum of five weeks after primary fermentation before it’s packaged and shipped. Assistant brewer Matěj Křížek, formerly at Břevnov monastery brewery in Prague, has strengthened the team since the move.
There’s an offsite taproom close to the original Bounds Green site and the brewery itself offers a simple but welcoming taproom on Tottenham Hotspur match days. Since early 2020, Zdeněk has managed the historic Bohemia House in West Hampstead, formerly the Czechoslovak National House, founded as a club for Czech and Slovak expatriates following World War II: this now stocks Bohem beers alongside familiar Czech brands.
Beers are packaged unfiltered and unpasteurised in kegs and cans.
Updated 26 November 2021.
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